Tuesday March 17th St. Maarten

Got up early today since we had to be ready for our excursion by 8:15. A few showers around made for a good rainbow.  

Check this out: there are FIVE cruise ships here this morning: Costa Pacifica, Mein Schiff, Arvia, Icon of the Seas (Largest cruise ship in the world), and our little (by comparison) Zuiderdam. If you do the math, that's about 20,000 cruisers!

For our excursion, we boarded a double decker bus for a tour of the island. The traffic is terrible! We stopped at a rum distillery and cheese factory. Highlight was a stop at Maho Beach, famous for its beautiful beach right at the end of the runway at the international airport. We were only there for 15 minutes but we saw three landings and I actually got two of them on video! That's a busy little airport!

Back to the ship by 1:30 for a light lunch in the Lido. Dinner tonight was our "specialty" day at the Canelleto, which was very good! 

Our entertainment tonight was a high energy song and dance routine by the resident troupe. Very talented young people!

Back to our room to watch the final of the World Baseball Classic - USA vs. Venezuela. Unfortunately, the ESPN reception on the TV was spotty at best which made watching almost impossible.

Tomorrow we'll be in Antigua and Barbuda.

Wednesday March 18 Antigua

Another pretty morning as we docked in Antigua. Celebrity Eclipse (3000) was already there. Our excursion took off in a small bus for a tour of the island. This island has a totally different feel from yesterday's St. Maarten, which was Dutch and French. This small island is part of the British Empire, although it's independent now. So, cars drive on the "wrong" side of the road, a bit disconcerting at first when you have to drive around a roundabout the opposite direction! All the cars are right hand drive; they come from Japan where they drive this way, too.

The locals are very black with that distinctive Caribbean accent and constant "Ya Man"!

We drove the length of the island on a terrible, rough road. First stop was a National Park which displayed some ruins of an old British fort on the hill. A spectacular view of the harbor below. We bought a gourd bird house from a local guy; seemed like a good souvenir!

Then down to Nelson's Dockyard a National Park and a UNESCO Heritage Site featuring restored buildings from the British Navy's facility built in the 1700s.  A secluded harbor with lots of zillion dollar sail boats. We were treated to a glass of rum punch or fruit punch.

We were back to the ship about 1:00 and time for lunch. At our tour guide's recommendation, we found a local joint called Hemmingway's and had a great meal of a fish sandwich and a bowl of fish chowder.

Ship is underway at 4:30. Our entertainment this evening was the magician we saw on our first night. He is great!!

Tomorrow we will tour Martinique.

Thursday March 19 Martinique

Arrived at the pier about 8:00. Our pier companion this morning is Royal Clipper, a beautiful 220 passenger five masted sailing ship. Owned by a Swedish company, she'll be relocating to the Med in a few weeks.

The island is quite mountainous. Our first stop this morning was an old catholic church, built in 1926, called Church of Balata, supposedly a replica of the Sacred Heart Basilica in Paris. Its in deteriorating condition, and I wonder why it was there in the first place. This area is very tropical, with a wide variety of flora.

Back down the hill to town, then up the western shore about 50 miles to Saint Pierre. We have passed into much drier areas, rocky shores, no beaches seen. Here we find the "Memorial de la Catastrophe de 1902". This is a small museum that commemorates the great volcanic eruption of Mt. Pelee in May of 1902 which completely obliterated the town, killing about 30,000 people. Historians conclude that there was 300 ships in the harbor at the time, all of which were vaporized. So, the harbor is popular please for divers to search for sunken ships. You can see some remnants of the original buildings. This was the largest volcanic eruption in the 20th century.

Back to the pier by about 1:00, time for lunch. We walked into the center of town with its very narrow, one way streets. Stopped by the cathedral of St Louis and sat for a few minutes of a mass - all in French. Lots of restaraunts and souvenir shops. We checked out a few eateries, including a McDonalds, but passed on them all - they all looked so seedy. So, we hiked back to the ship and had a nice lunch on board.

After lunch, Sam crashed with her book but I wasn't done yet. Across the bay is an historic fort which reportedly gives tours. So, I hiked all the way over there only to find it was closed. Oh well, I got my steps in today!

Unusual port departure today - we didn't leave until 8:30PM. Extremely rare for a departure after dark!

Tomorrow we explore Dominica.