Archive for 2009
We have not customarily cruised over the holidays, but when we booked the Caribbean Princess a few years ago for a 7-night cruise in early December, I wondered if she would be decorated for the holidays. I was not disappointed! more…
Truthfully, there’s no vacation from God. Wherever you go in the world, even in the universe, God will meet you there. Right where you are now, God is there … loving you, inviting you into his family. So, no matter where you are … or what day of the week is, God is knocking, waiting for you to open your heart to him. more…
After enjoying several cruise vacations, it’s easy to forget all the things you didn’t know on your first cruise. Recently, we boarded our cruise and started to wander around exploring the ship. Of course, we had to stop at one of the bars to pick up a drink to enjoy during our explorations. While we were waiting for our drinks, a guy next to us at the bar was served his drink. He signed the ticket, then dug into his pocket to pull out a couple of dollars for the server. The server smiled big, thanking him. As this nice man walked away with his drink, I followed. I asked him to pull out his copy of the drink ticket he’d just signed. He was surprised to see that the cruise line had automatically added a 15% gratuity to his drink. I encouraged him to leave his cash in his room on the ship, everything is taken care of with his shipboard charge card. He thanked me for taking the time to tell him this.
How do first time cruisers learn these things? Lots of folks, like me, are trying to spread the word on the Internet, so if you are a first time cruiser reading this – good for you. As a travel agent, I try to make sure all my guests know what to expect. I guess I just want to encourage everyone to help out this folks when you run into them on a cruise. You might make a new friend for life!
When we took our first cruise years ago now, we weren’t Internet savvy and hardly any of our friends had ever taken a cruise. Everything we knew about cruising was written in the cruise brochure or the cruise documents. So, we boarded the ship for our cruise ignorantly bliss, and now we know, first time cruisers are so easy to spot: more…
After three or more ports of call, there’s nothing like a leisurely day spent relaxing and playing on one of the cruise line’s private islands. We’ve only visited two or three of them, because we usually select cruise itineraries with only three ports of call, but we always enjoy those relaxing beach days on private islands. So far, we’ve visited Princess Cay and Coco Cay. more…