Philipsburg, St. Maarten

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We arrived at Philipsburg, Sint Maarten (or Saint Maarten) at about 8 am. That was 2 hours earlier than previously scheduled due to bypassing the port of Punta Cana, Dominican Republic yesterday. We were the fourth cruise ship to dock and the closest to the port. We docked on the port side, but our starboard balcony was on the side closest to land. The docks were concrete finger piers that extended parallel to the shore. We had a tugboat tied to our starboard aft corner during docking and we hadn’t seen that before. There is a strong wind here today and maybe that’s why. Fingers crossed that weather conditions don’t prevent our next 2 ports or we won’t make 100 countries.

Is St. Maarten a country? It is a more complicated question than you’d imagine. But, for our purposes using the Encyclopedia Britannica list of countries as our definitive source, the answer is no. Some background since the 1600’s this small island has been unevenly divided into territories controlled by France and the Netherlands. It still is. In the 2000’s both French St. Martin and Dutch St. Maarten held elections regarding independence. According to our guide, Eva, today St. Martin opted to remain in France and St. Maarten opted for independence. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica St. Maarten by that election became a country within 4 countries making up the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The US State Department also defines St. Maarten as being within The Netherlands. So, while the status of the Dutch side has changed since we last visited here, we still can’t count it as a country.

Our ship’s tour was originally scheduled to meet at 11:15 am. That got changed with our earlier arrival to 9:15 am. It is not clear what the problem was, but it was an hour after that before the bus arrived for us to load. Pasted below is a description of our tour. (Sorry, the description Oceania has on their website now is completely different than what we booked. I typed it in from our hard copy.) The hour we spent waiting for the bus was bonus and the tour lasted the promised 3 hours after we boarded. It was interesting to drive around through both countries on the island. I haven’t had enough Internet access to look it up, but as I recall we only walked into Philipsburg on our previous visit here.  We were back onboard Riviera by about 1:30 pm.  Eva said there were 14 roundabouts with historic event marking monuments. I don’t know if that is what the tour description of 14 historical monuments is referencing, but most of the roundabouts (I didn’t count them) were 1 empty with a blank concrete base where something used to be and 2 we were on the right side of the bus and could only see what was or was not there in the center through and between other bus passengers. I know we saw a statue of a man in broken chains for emancipation, a woman dancing to celebrate either liberty or independence, a brown pelican for the national bird, a dry fountain that went unremarked and what looked like a broken water tank lying on its side (again unremarked). The rest of the roundabouts were empty as far as I can recall. We stopped at beach first for about 10 minutes after crossing into France. We stopped for a 30-minute potty/shopping break in the French-side’s capital of Marigot. (I was surprised that nearly everyone who spoke to us in Marigot did so in English. Clay bought 2 beers. Ironically, he bought a beer in French St. Martin that was brewed in Dutch St. Maarten.)  We stopped for 10 minutes on a windy seacliff with a monument to 5 brothers before returning to the port. It was not a great tour, and an alarm went off constantly inside the bus from the first stop to the Marigot stop. I don’t know if it was because it was Saturday, but we were in an almost continuous traffic jam as we circled the island. We’re still glad we did it as it was a completely different look at this port stop from our previous visit and we learned alot. The island has a sandy white beach for every square mile. There are 131 nationalities residing on this small 2-nation island. The 3 main languages are Dutch, French and English. The word soualiga in our tour title is an Arawak Indian (first inhabitants, here when Christopher Columbus discovered the island) word that means Salt Place. Gambling is legal on the Dutch side but not the French except for cockfight wagering.

Soualiga Historical Island Tour
3 hours Tour price $89

Drive through St. Maarten's scenic routes while soaking up the island's history.

Relive our ancestors past, learn of our struggles and get ready to understand how we got to where we are as the smallest island in the world that shares 2 countries.

This 2 nation historical tour takes you around the entire island with visits to 14 historical monuments in between multiple photostops.

End of tour description.

We had lunch in Terrace and plan dinner there as well. We don’t set sail from here until 9 pm. I’m not sure why the long day here except we are pretty close to our next port of Antigua, which we hope is country #97 now.

I asked about our Silver VIP port disembarkation perk tonight when I went to return our disembarkation form (which she tore up and threw out since I'd written in our back-to-back option as her coworker had done last time). She made a phone call and took the book with the perk listed in a O Club Silver benefits to her superior. She came back and said "they" (Riviera's Destinations staff? Oceania management?) had changed the wording and now the benefit was called Priority Shore Excursion Check-In. Um, that's not a wording change. It's a benefit removal. She said, that's all you get now. In other news, we received our promised silver member pins, ball caps and messenger bags instead of tote bags. We see the extra shipboard credit and gratuities on the TV account screen. We got the bottle of wine.

All aboard was 8:30 pm. Everyone must have gotten back aboard early as we set sail between 8:30 and 8:45 pm.

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Thwarted, Again

Last night was some rough sailing. There were barf bags out today. We didn't know if that was partly due to the Captain's complimentary cocktails from 6 to 8 pm last night or the ship's motion. Terrace was pretty empty last night and this morning.

Today we pulled up in sight of the Dominican Republic to our anchorage. We dropped a tender and opened the tender dock in the hull. The rough surf washed over Riviera's dock. The Captain canceled the port. Country #97 will have to wait. It looks less certain that I'll make it to 100 countries by 2/26. The real irony here is that we were ashore on the same island in January but this island is occupied by 2 different countries! We visited Haiti then and missed Dominican Republic today. You can see it from here, but it doesn't count. Ship happens.

I got a bonus needlepoint kit. The CD announced that all canceled excursions would be refunded automatically. When RCI cancelled Jamaica they refunded excursions and port fees and taxes automatically. We'll wait and see what happens here on Oceania. They are still struggling to catch up with accounting errors due to our gaining Silver O Club status and them deciding to combining our 3 cruise bookings once we got onboard. We'll see.

The CD said they'd issue a new Currents with sea day activities but it hasn't come yet. Clay has been spending the bulk of the last days and nights listening to audiobooks that all came off hold to him at the same time. Hopefully, he is caught up and we can watch some movies with our bonus sea day.

The Captain mentioned trying to get to our next port early. He doesn't know if the port will allow it or not. We've visited Philipsburg, St. Maarten before and have a ship's tour booked there so it won't matter to us. St. Barts is our next tender port and we won't care about missing it either.

We have a dinner reservation for Jacques at 6:30 pm tonight. Otherwise, we have nothing on our schedule today. For fun, you can look at some example menus.

I'm going to assume that Clay won't have any photos today and that nothing else newsworthy will happen and publish this now.

Sea Day on Riviera

Since we lost an hour last night and today was a sea day, we slept in. It was after 8 am before we headed out to Terrace for breakfast. It was not busy there so others must have been sleeping in too. Clay deck walked above the pool deck. The top fitness decks are closed today due to high winds. Seas were about 5-6 feet at lunch time's Captain's announcement. I think they are higher now possibly due to completely clear of the Bahamas now. I got my needlepoint kit for today.

We had lunch in the Grand Dining Room today. Clay checked the menus and found Mexican food was being served everywhere today but the GDR had the Croque Monsieur on the menu today. The noon announcement included a chef's update that they were grilling fresh caught yellow fin tuna in Terrace. A woman at the next table in GDR ordered the Nicoise salad and was surprised to hear it would contain a freshly grilled yellowfin tuna steak instead of canned tuna. She told her husband that she'd really been looking forward to the canned tuna, but she ate it all so it must have been good. We discovered a feature at GDR that we'd somehow failed to register before. GDR has a little lower righth corner of the menu called Tastes of the World. Today it had a selection of all the Mexican dishes being served as either a main course or a tapas platter to share. The waiter said it is there everyday with some featured global cuisine. We'd noticed there was always a theme at Terrace and the same dishes at GDR but hadn't noticed the sampler platter feature. Clay got it as his main course and it was beautifully presented and he enjoyed a big lunch. It was photo-worthy but sadly he left his phone in the cabin!

There is a big screen popcorn movie this afternoon. They are screening "Judy" again. We won't go. The Captain's Cocktails are at 5:45 pm this evening. We have no early reservations tonight, so we'll probably try the Grand Bar again before dinner in Terrace. Clay checked the menus for tonight too and told me I'd be shooting for the beef & basil stirfry station at Terrace. I like that and hopefully last segment's chef is still onboard. I had him trained to not put bell peppers or green onions in my food!

I'll assume no other news and post this now.

Tomorrow is country #97, Dominican Republic.

Nassau, Bahamas

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Today was a new country for Clay. He'll still always have more than me because, Libya. I was here before as a child on my first ever cruise in the 1970s. Boy has it changed a lot. We were the smallest of 6 cruises ships docked here today. We were docked at the absolute furthest point from the port gate. It must have been at least a mile long walk.

We booked a ship's tour here, Charm and Beauty of the Bahamas, for $79 each for a 3 hour tour. Description is pasted below. A few points. On arrival onboard yesterday, there was an excursions info pack, it contained changes to previously published tours. One was ours today changing from an easy tour to a moderate exertion tour. It was obviously the unmentioned dock walk. I will also say that we didn't return to port until after 1 pm so it was well over a 3 hour tour. The first hour was spent on the dock though, banding over 100 wrists (by my estimated count) and counting and recounting people standing still as 2 ships emptied out on either side. Then the long walk to our "Japanese Cruisers". These are miniature buses with rows of 2 by 1 seats with the aisle a fold down seat. Fortunately they did not fill the fold down seats but it wasn't terribly comfortable. I think we had about 2 dozen people per bus for our tour. I am sure we saw more of the island than I'd seen before so that was interesting and good to get out of the state fair crowds and atmosphere in walking distance of the port. A couple of other points about the tour vs. the description. We were released at Atlantis for 20 minutes and the rum distillery did NOT include a tasting.

Charm and Beauty of the Bahamas (NAS-014)
Port: Nassau
Tour Length: Half-Day (Approximately 3 hours)
Tour Description
Drive past a remarkable number of must-see attractions in the capital city.
Pause for photos at historical Fort Charlotte, which offers extraordinary views.
Savor a selection of locally produced, small-batch rum at John Watling Distillery.
Admire landmark after landmark on this all-encompassing driving tour of Nassau and Paradise Island with stops at historical Fort Charlotte and the John Watlings Distillery. Highlights include palm-dotted Rawson Square, lovely government buildings such as the Supreme Court and the pink-hued House of Assembly, and the mega-resort and theme park Atlantis on aptly named Paradise Island. Other iconic sights include the Prime Minister’s residence, historical Graycliff Inn and Fort Charlotte, where you will pause for photos. Built in 1788, the fort features a waterless moat, dungeons, underground passageways and dozens of cannons that have never been fired in an act of aggression. Continuing on, you will also visit a beautiful 18th-century estate downtown that is now home to a distillery named for buccaneer John Watling. The small-batch rum produced here is said to capture Watling’s bold spirit of adventure. You can determine that firsthand by sampling the different rums.

HELPFUL HINTS
Dress in weather-appropriate clothing.
Wear flat comfortable walking shoes.
PLEASE NOTE
This tour is primarily panoramic in nature with limited, optional walking at the stops. The tour is not available to wheelchair guests and those with mobility concerns should evaluate their personal level of stamina and ability before joining the tour.

End of tour description.

This second segment is 10 days and we paid a total of $6398 for a category B1 balcony cabin. We reached Silver Oceania Club status with this segment as O counts this as our 10th cruise credit. Oceania promises things worth real money but we've had to ask for them and work to get them. I have no idea if this is usual but we had to put our TA to work when we realized after final payment that we were not receiving promised benefits that we'd earned. We thought it was sorted out before this segment started, but now we're back to waiting to see. We thought for sure we'd get the promised tote bags and caps as we've seen them around the ship, but not yet. Hopefully it will all get sorted out as we expected from Oceania's literature and website but it seems in principle that as the guest you shouldn't have to manage getting what Oceania has promised.

We sailed away on schedule with no fanfare or announcements again. The horn was blown outside the harbor, I suppose to bid farewell to the pilot.

We have dinner reservations at 6:30 pm at Toscana tonight. We have to change the clocks 1 hour ahead tonight so it will be a short night. Good news is that tomorrow is a sea day.

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One Ends, Another Begins

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So today the first of our 3 Oceania Riviera cruises ended, and the second began. It was not a smooth finish nor a happy start. Last night in neither of the versions of Currents nor in our disembarkation letter was there any notice of a mandatory cabin vacating deadline. This morning at 7:45 am, the CD's voice came on in the cabin that all passengers were required to vacate their cabins by 8 am. That was 15 minutes away! I found Melissa and told her we wanted to go to breakfast and return before our 9:30 am meet time in Red Ginger for in-transit passengers. She OKed it and assured us we'd be able to do our laundry today whenever we wanted.

The in-transit special treatment for about 100 of us was torturous. Once you checked into Red Ginger you were held and not allowed to opt out. That included an hour and a half later after clearing US CBP screening! They intended to keep us all corralled until they had inspected and cleared the ship and herded us back onboard in a herd. I came off the rails and chewed out the CBP officer that I was a US citizen with Global Entry clearance and he had no right to detain us or prevent us stepping out of the terminal just because we were continuing in-transit. Had the Oceania letter spelled out the procedure as being onerous and time-wasting rather than describing it as a special privilege, we could have just walked off between 8 and 8:30 am with the self-carrying luggage group. We were penalized for following directions. We wound up out on the sidewalk at about 10:50 am. That won't happen when we get back here on 2/14! Hey, Valentine's Day!

We walked directly to the Miami's free Coral Way Trolley stop on the other side of the street and the other side of the park in the port's center. Clay found an app online. I don't know how to tell you to get there. I don't know whether the trolleys ran every 20 minutes or 45. We saw both posted. We never waited more than a few minutes. It looked like at both ends that if you were by the curb and saw one coming and flagged it down that it would stop anywhere. On our return the driver stopped outside Terminal E when the cord was pulled. It was easy. From where we boarded the trolley to get to Bayside Marketplace, you could have walked on a sidewalk across a bridge and been to the mall in 7 minutes according to Google Maps.

We did some shopping, but did not find a CVS or convenience store that would have carried what we were looking to buy actually. We ate lunch from a takeaway window that seemed most popular with local workers. It was Latin American Cuban. We shared a Cuban sandwich that was authentic and delicious and an empanada, followed by ice cream from next door at Mammamia Gelato which was also delicious. Both were better than what we've had onboard Riviera, so it was a worthwhile break. There were tables and chairs under the escalators in front of the shops so it was cool, shady and comfortable. After lunch, we used the restrooms (mens and womens not together so incovenient) and an ATM and went back to the port on the next Coral Way trolley.

We got back onboard Riviera by going through terminal security and showing our through keycards. We skipped the health screen as in-transit by showing our keycards again. The health screen appeared exactly the same as it was on 1/26, just a small paper to fill out. There was no temperature scanning apparent.

Cabins were not yet available to all passengers when we got aboard. We checked and found our guest laundry room empty and decided to go ahead and do it. We ran into a bit of resistance from the workers on the port side hallway who must have been working to keep guests out before the cabin ready call. Melissa offered escort if needed, but it wasn't. We had the laundry to ourselves. Good news since it took 2 45-minute dryer cycles on high to one 24-minute cold water wash cycle!

Clay went to dispute the latest billing on our account per the TV display. It had more than double the number of tour tickets we'd received or booked and prepaid. There's a snafu somewhere but Reception nor Destination Services could explain and asked Clay to return on the first sea day. We knew something was wrong when we didn't receive a hard copy of the first segments accounting. Also when we arrived on 1/26, there was a stack of about 6 pages documenting the accounting, billing and tours. Today on the first day of segment 2, we received nothing. We think something went wrong with book keeping and they just didn't print & deliver. What we don't know is whether it is just us or shipwide or systemwide. We'll have to wait and see.

We sailed away on schedule with no announcements to mark it and no horn blowing. Crystal wins classiest sail away with the ever-present recording of Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World". Oceania is inconsistent and erratic with their sailaways. Unless you're really paying attention, you'll just miss it!

Dinner tonight is 6:30 pm at Red Ginger again. Tomorrow is Nassau.

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Final Sea Day of this Segment

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We were up around 7am today to try to catch the sunrise's green flash. According to Currents, sunrise would be at 7:14 am. Also, it should be on our starboard side as we skirt Cuba heading northeast. We saw the sunrise but there was a thick cloud layer at the horizon so no chance of a flash.

We are still in heavy winds. The top decks are closed due to it. We had breakfast about 7:30 am in Terrace. I finally had an Egg Benedict and a chocolate croissant. After, we split up and Clay went to walk above the pool deck which was still open. I walked across the pool deck to get forward to Horizons and got blown back a step or two. I don't know how they were walking on that upper more open deck except it had to be an extra workout half the track as they went into the wind. I arrived in Horizons at 8:20 am. There were no other passengers in there when I arrived, only workers. I sat with my tablet at the table where Lisa lays out her needlepoint kits after 9:30 am. Maybe 3 people came in the next 20 minutes and ate and left. One woman came in about 8:40 am and sat where the previous sea day's woman had appointed herself #1 for needlepoint. Everyone who came in and she waved over walked by me and I made eye contact with and spoke to. That included the woman who said she was #1. When Lisa came, I ceded the table to make way and told her I had been there since 8:20 am. She said she thought the others by the window might say they were first and she went and got them and they did. Lisa told #1 I said I arrived at 8:20 am. She looked at me and at Lisa and said she arrived at 8 and the woman next to her was also there before 8:20 am. I couldn't believe she'd LIE about such a thing. Enough. After I picked up my dropped jaw, I told her she was no where near 8 am but 8:40 am as she'd walked past me and I'd greeted her. The woman she called #2 stepped in and said that she'd walked past me and I'd greeted her. I agreed that all of them who'd just pushed in front of me had walked past me and I'd greeted them all. #2 agreed that was so as she'd seen me do it except for the first woman who'd claimed #1 and #1 moved aside and said she didn't care. She cared enough about to endanger her mortal soul. Anyway, she's #2 today. How annoying. If Lisa isn't going to arrive early to check and she knows this happens and she runs out of kits pretty quickly, she needs to set out a signup sheet to thwart liars and pushy people. I just how #2 won't be on the next 2 segments!

They are showing the movie "Joker" at 3 pm in Riviera Lounge on the big screen with popcorn. We haven't seen it but after the morning in Horizons, I can say it is a much rougher ride up front and I'm not sure we'll go. After checking the Grand Dining Room menu on TV every day it has been on we've finally seen the Croque Monsieur sandwich appear today! We'll go down to the Jacques at GCR for lunch today. The menu also said they had skinny fries available today. I hope so. They have an ice cream menu at dessert that includes Humphry Slocombe toast & jam. It is a real flavor! Here is a link to the announcement about the Humphry Slocombe/Oceania partnership. I assume we'll have to try that. Back from lunch and the Croque Monsieur was served in crustless fingers and was delicious and worth the wait. The Humphry Slocombe toast & jam ice cream was very good and interesting. First flavor was salt and I reckoned salted butter on the toast because there were crunchy crouton-like bits in there with swirls of raspberry jam and the ice cream was buttery. We also each had a 2nd scoop of our previous favorite flavor of cinnamon for me and pistachio for Clay. They both failed in quality side-by-side as they were not rich and creamy quality but more like sugar-free ice milk. So we realized how badly we'd been settling for O's ice cream but thumbs up to them for the new quality partnership.

We have a 6:30 pm reservation for dinner tonight at Red Ginger. I hope we really like it because our first dinner of the next cruise segment is tomorrow same place, same time!

So tomorrow is turnaround day in Miami. We'll assume breakfast will start at 6 or 6:30 am. Our letter says in red ink, we meet at 9 am in Red Ginger from where we'll be escorted to the US Customs inspection with passports and keycards in hand and be advised when we may return onboard. It states it is not necessary to follow any check-in formalities and our onboard account will continue until the end of our cruise. Our keycards now say February 26, 2020. Oceania has already charged my CC for this segment's $288 dollars in tips so hopefully those will be disbursed tomorrow. The following 2 segments are our 10th and 11th Oceania cruises and should include our tips as a status perk. We'll see.

We have some loose plans for a 1/2 or so day in Miami to take the free Coral Way Trolley from the port of Miami to Bayside Market Place and back. I argued for a laundry day onboard instead but in the past we've often found the guest laundries closed for maintenance on turnaround day and have learned the hard way you can't count on it being available. Sad because that would be the most likely day to find availability if it were open. Again, we'll see. Fingers crossed that we could do both!

After lunch we located the guest laundry room on deck 8. It is forward of the forward elevators on the port side. You have to go through 2 doors to get to it. A signed door off the passenger hall into a crew area with 3 doors, 1 of which is to the guest laundry. Inside the very small space (and no one had an ironing board down!) were 3 stacked washer/dryers. The machines had token slots on them. The signage was contradictory. One sign said the guest laundries were complimentary (like Crystal!). The more detailed instruction sign said to use tokens in the machine's slots. Our last Oceania cruise suffered a laundry token shortage of crisis proportions. We went to Reception in case both signs were correct. The receptionist informed us that the laundry machines are self-service and complimentary and no longer use tokens. Huge thumbs up to Oceania for that improvement. Next we asked sweet Melissa if the guest laundry was expected to be open on turnaround day. She and her assistant both said they'd heard nothing about closing them for maintenance and thought they should all be open at 7:30 am.

This morning we got a new restaurant reservations card. It only had the 2 reservations we'd made online before boarding, not the 2 we made a few days ago. Clay went and asked and was told about the 08073 number being attached to our cards and not 8073. But today the guy told him not to worry about it or try to get our keycards fixed, that all the reservations are there. They just have to enter the cabin number 2 different ways to see them all. OK.

This afternoon we got a new Important Customs letter regarding our instructions for the day the next cruise begins. It looks identical to the first letter except for the yellow highlighted 9:30 am in Red Ginger instead of 9 am. Good to know since we'd have been annoyed if we'd shown up a half hour early!

Just received an email from our TA, tomorrow's Port of Miami Terminal has been changed from J to E again for 2/4/2020 turnaround day. It would be nice if we could expect the same heads up when we terminate on 2/26/2020. Since we only got this notice as embarking passengers and not as disembarking passengers I fear a cluster cuss on 2/26 when we'd like to give our transportation a correct address! Just saying.

In related news, the CD announced after 5 pm that disembarkation tomorrow had been delayed by a half-hour due to operational considerations. My cruise docs stated disembark was 7 am originally, btw. The earliest one can depart now is 8 am and then only if they carry their own luggage off the ship without any assistance. If you need or want to put your luggage out the night before then you can't depart the ship until after 8:30 am. Presumably none of this schedule shuffling affects our 9:30 am meeting in Red Ginger. We'll see.

The Currents for the last night said we sailed 2,023 nautical miles on this cruise. I don't know if there is some kind of odometer on Riviera and that's actually what we sailed. Because we covered a lot more sea than was necessary between a few of our many ports! In summary, this was a 9 night cruise and cost us $6492 for a category B1 balcony without air.

There were at least 2 notices in Currents for this last night and tomorrow's stating the Terminal E change in Miami tomorrow. So that is good news.

In bad news, we had NO ice tonight. I ran out in bare feet with our ice bucket to catch Melissa. She said there is no ice because the last night before Miami. In the morning they have US health inspectors onboard and the ice machines have to be empty and clean for that. That doesn't sound right. Shouldn't they be clean anyway? I must have made a bad face because she snatched the bucket from me and said she'd go try to find a bar that still had ice. She was back pretty quick with what she pointed out was bigger than normal cubes and hoped it was alright. It was perfect. We won't be too happy about NO ice in the morning though!

Speaking of which, we are surprised that Oceania's Destination Services never offered any tours for continuing guests. I know we're not the only ones. I've heard several people say they're on for multiple cruises.

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Costa Maya, Mexico

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We had a hard night sailing to get here. The hot weather has broken and with high winds. So we're glad it is cooler and less humid and appreciate the breeze, but it was a rough ride. Fingers crossed that we finished sailing through the system and have a calm sea day tomorrow.

Today is Sunday. Usually I have a big breakfast with eggs or something hot on weekend mornings. For this cruise, Monday and Tuesday will have to be my weekend. We've had 2 early tour starts this weekend near 8 am and for some reason Terrace breakfast hasn't started until 7 am. I prefer to return to the cabin between breakfast and an excursion to brush my teeth and apply sunscreen and insect repellent as needed. That gives me less than an hour, not enough time.

Costa Maya is a new cruise port area with a maze of forced shopping and other tourist opportunities. We went straight to our bus this morning for tour departure after the maybe mile long pier walk. When they returned us to the port, we had to walk perhaps an extra mile to try to find our way back to the pier. There has been too much of that on this cruise!

We had booked a ship's tour here to Chacchoben Mayan Ruins. It was 4 hours and cost $129 each. Description pasted below.

Chacchoben Mayan Ruins (CMA-007)
Port: Costa Maya
Tour Length: Half-Day (Approximately 4 hours)
Tour Description
Explore the ruins of Chacchoben, a Mayan city that dates to about 1,000 BC.
Hear how a local farmer stumbled upon the undiscovered site in the 1940s.
See ruins so intact that the original paint is still visible on the stucco walls.
Climb atop a towering ruin and enjoy sweeping views from above the tree tops.
Look for tropical birds and howler monkeys in the surrounding jungle.
Explore the ruins of Chacchoben, an ancient Mayan pilgrimage location known as “The Place of Red Corn.” On the 50-minute drive there, the guide will describe some of the history and culture of the Mayas that is pertinent to Chacchoben. Because of the dense jungle, the overgrown site wasn’t discovered until the 1940s and more than 50 years passed before excavation was begun. Dense foliage still surrounds Chacchoben, lending it an ancient feel that the ruins greatly enhance. While meandering about, you will likely see the original red paint on the stucco walls in one of the pyramids and the temple with a mural showing the astronomical positions of Venus. You will also have time to climb the Gran Basamento, a structure that rises above the tree level, where archaeologists found ceremonial offerings. Before re-boarding your coach for the return transfer to the pier, you will have a brief break to enjoy a complimentary beverage and perhaps purchase a souvenir.
HELPFUL HINTS
Dress in weather-appropriate clothing.
Wear flat comfortable walking shoes.
PLEASE NOTE
This tour includes a considerable amount of walking over uneven, rough and sometimes slippery surfaces. It is not available to wheelchair guests and not considered suitable for guests with mobility concerns. The minimum age to participate is 3 years old. There is a government tax of $5-8 for using video cameras at each site. No tripods or professional video cameras are allowed. Flash photography and food are prohibited inside the ruins.

End of tour description.

The tour was good. Victorio, our driver, and Roberto, our guide, both did a good job. We were not offered complimentary beverages before re-boarding the bus. These ruins were totally different from those in Belize. Nim Li Punit was village sized and Chacchoben was city sized. We were glad we did both.

We had a late lunch onboard Riviera after our return. The TV doesn't have menus available today. We have no reservations and I expect we'll have dinner at Terrace. The new stricter sanitation rules are slowing table turnover and availability more than usual. But hopefully they'll figure out adding additional staff and things will settle down. We got a letter today that allowed us to go ahead and make restaurant reservations for the following cruise today. That was good as we'll avoid the crowds on turnaround/embarkation day. We'd been unable to get all our allowed reservations pre-boarding online because they were only offering us after 8 pm! All settled now except they tell us there is some room number issue with our keycards and we need to go get them fixed. They work fine for leaving and returning so we'll see.

At 5 pm in Riviera Lounge there is a live Super Bowl broadcast. We sail at 6 pm tonight and reach Miami on Tuesday early in the morning.

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