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THOUGHTS ABOUT OUR CARIBBEAN CRUISE PART II: THE NEGATIVES

1/25/2024

Before I complete this blog, I need to make a correction from last week. The city I visited in Saint Marteen was Philipsburg, not Fredericksburg. I get my long Dutch names mixed up all the time. My apologies if you tried to Google that city. This blog will be considerably shorter than the previous one. But to give a little bit of background, cruises are not my favorite form of recreation. While they have their perks, there are also some downsides that really made aspects of the trip unappealing. Let’s dive into the four negatives of cruising.

1) As mentioned in Part 1, I did not discuss our last destination, the private island of Grand Stirrup Cay in the Bahamas. The reason is because the cruise ship never made it to the island. Due to a high wind tropical storm which led to the closing of our top deck for one day that created large swells which made the ship feel like it was going through THE PERFECT STORM (And led to an awful two hour night of sleep that evening), the ship was unable to make it to The Bahamas which based on the passenger reviews, is one of the best stops on the cruise. The good news is that the family got the port fee money back for that failed stop. The bad news is the final day of the cruise, instead of being on a private island with jet skis and swimming pigs, was spent on the ship fighting through rough water on the way back to the Miami port. On the last two days, mother nature got her revenge.

2) Since the family had never been on a cruise before, the experience of opening the door to our room on the ship and realizing that the bathroom in our condo is the same size in square footage is an interesting experience. To make it work, my wife and I slept on the King bed (Which gives you about a foot to exit on either side). My daughter slept on the couch with her feet hanging over (She is 5 feet tall exactly) and my son slept on the Murphy Bed above me. If I had swung my head up too fast because of a nightmare or breathing difficulties, I would knock myself unconscious on the bottom of the Murphy bed. When our cruise ship was built, they obviously wanted to convert the exciting experience of being crushed on an airplane and convert it into a room. It had a very space capsule like, trapped in a trunk feel to it. The bathroom was even worse. It was literally a cylindrical capsule that can literally fit one person at a time. Do you need to go to the bathroom while I am taking a shower? Tough shit, u must wait. My family got very good at running down the hallway and going up a flight of stairs to the nearest public restroom on the ship. Plus, we learned not to use the toilet for any bowel movements. The vacuum flush did not work properly and that smell of 48-hour chicken often would stink up our room for a bit. Thankfully, the sweetheart girl who made up our rooms gave us a bottle of Febreeze and Purell to make the experience a little more bacteria free.

3) My last two complaints are related to one another. This has to do with the nature of how the cruise ship industry works. When I am on vacation, the goal is to relax and gain new experiences. This is why I believe that traveling is one of the most important things you can do in your life because it stimulates your body and mind. But the cruise ship industry wants to make money. COVID-19 shut the industry down for over a year. On the ship, you have a casino. The slots were cold as ice. I never saw one person walk out of that room happy. I made a 100 dollars by wining eight straight hands on a ten-dollar blackjack table and lingering around for a half hour. I did not gamble again on the whole trip. My wife and daughter had no luck. The stores on the ship are constantly trying to sell you things due to the “duty-free” stores. Whether it is alcohol, jewelry, art auctions, books, clothing, technological devices, cameras, and dozens of other products, this rampant consumerism gets frustrating after awhile when you are stuck around it for ten days. Since we stopped at six ports, getting out of the ship does not issue any relief. Every island has a port that is isolated from the city in which it docks. The ports are outdoor shopping malls filled with dozens of different types of stores including restaurants and tourist shops. In the case of Antigua, St. Marteen, and St. Kitts when we left the general port area, the experience is more natural and cheaper (More on this in #4). All prices are much more expensive in the ports. The ports also are a mixed bag. Puerto Plata in the Dominican Republic was the nicest one by far. The other nice port was Philipsburg. Antigua, St. Thomas, and Basseterre’s ports left a lot to be desired. They were acceptable but nothing impressive. Even with the duty-free discounts, many of the items up for sale felt overpriced. After Puerto Plata, my family decided against spending time inside these money-grubbing shops.

4) Besides the consumerism everywhere inside the ports, my other problem had to do with the ports themselves. It does not take long for an observant person to notice the large ten-to-twelve-foot walls with razor wire along the top and guarded on the outside by armed private security guards (And in the case of the Dominican Republic, by that country’s army itself). The Dominican Republic is a tragic country. My family decided to leave the port and were immediately overwhelmed by poverty. From the moment we left, we were bombarded with taxi drivers wanting to take us on rides deeper into the island. I wanted to see two historical streets that were a short hike away. We made it to both (Umbrella Street and Paseo de Dona Blanca) before heading a mile back towards the Macorix Rum distillery. Despite dressing down, you can’t help but stand out amongst the Dominican people. Walking that one mile changed my kids’ lives forever. They had never seen poverty like this. Everyone owns a motorcycle since no one can afford a car. They make up about 80% of the traffic. Cars are broken down everywhere on the side of the road as they buy used parts from a mechanic (Leftovers from the United States and Japan) to get their engine working one more time. Little creeks filled with feces, clothing and harmful bacteria are flowing under bridges. On the way to the rum distillery, I wanted to confirm we were walking in the right direction. I approached a member of the Dominican Army (Who spoke no English) and talked with him in broken Spanish (Casa de Ron, Sur or Norte?). He ended up escorting my family across the street while holding a Mossberg shotgun in his hand and an AR-15 strapped over his shoulder. Even though this was the most distressing experience, going to the other islands was not much better. Antigua and St. Kitts which are part of the British Commonwealth are a little wealthier. But there is still homelessness in large parts of the island, drug addicts everywhere, and if you leave the port and drive around the island, which we did in both locations, the villages scattered around the island are third world poor. The only island we went to that had a middle class; upper scale vibe was Saint Marteen which was beautiful everywhere we went. But these other three islands took the joy of the cruise away and spiraled me down into the cold, hard reality of the world. The Caribbean is a poor place and the only positive thought I had that balanced out these sad experiences is that my United States dollars helped them at least temporarily live a better life for that day. Because of this underlying reality, I really hated these ports. I FUCKING HATED THE PORTS. They often would have dancers from the island there or individuals playing the music of the island. For instance, steel drummers were in every part of the St. Kitts port. Because every port was protected with heavy security, this Disney-fied experience felt artificial and fake. I personally despised every second of it. I know these cruise ships want to protect people from the crimes that poverty can create. But our family left the port in all four locations, and nothing happened to us. In three of them, police were nowhere to be found and we were able to sightsee and enjoy our time on the island.

Anyway, drop your thoughts on this. I hope you enjoyed this summary of my family’s first ever international cruise. Whether I do it again, we will see.

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THOUGHTS ABOUT OUR CARIBBEAN CRUISE PART 1 : THE POSITIVES

1/18/2024

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From December 11 to the 21st, my family and I embarked on our first ever Ocean Cruise with Norwegian Cruise Line, a journey to the Caribbean from Miami. This was the first international trip that my family has taken together. My writing will focus on the positive aspects of this trip. This post will be the first of two parts that will review this life changing vacation.

First, a little background on how this trip happened. My wife won a contest at a local casino, and she was able to get a voucher for two free tickets for a cruise of her choice. The cruise had to be used within 15 months. The other limitation was that the cruise could not exceed 11 days. Knowing this, we decided to pick a cruise in the middle of December (The Caribbean is still 80 degrees plus) for 10 days to seven islands and ports. We bought the remaining two tickets for a little under 700 each for our two children so they could join us on this adventure. Here are the islands that this cruise would go to in order.

Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic Dec. 13 (Day 2)
San Juan, Puerto Rico Dec. 14 (Day 3)
St. John’s, Antigua Dec. 15 (Day 4)
Fredricksburg, St. Marteen Dec. 16 (Day 5)
Basseterre, St. Kitts Dec. 17 (Day 6)
St. Thomas, Virgin Islands Dec. 18 (Day 7)
Great Stirrup Cay, the Bahamas Dec. 20 (Day 9)

If you are keeping track, that is five independent countries and two United States territories. For the geography buffs, the Dominican Republic is half of the large island of Hispaniola that is shared with Haiti to the West. Haiti is a primarily French speaking nation. The Eastern and larger half of the island is the Dominican Republic which is Spanish. San Juan is the capital of Puerto Rico and a United States territory that was gained during the Spanish American War in 1898. Antigua (One island of the nation Antigua and Barbuda) declared independence from the British crown in 1981. It is a member of the Commonwealth (Which also includes countries like Canada and Australia) that recognizes King Charles III as head of state. St. Kitts (One half of the country St. Kitts and Nevis) declared their independence in 1983 and like Antigua and Barbuda, is also a British Commonwealth nation. St. Kitts and Nevis is the smallest sovereign nation in the Western Hemisphere encompassing just 101 square miles of land. St. Marteen was founded by the Dutch and still has cultural influences from this part of the world all over the city of Fredericksburg. What makes St. Marteen unique is that it is the only island in the Caribbean that has two nations on it. On the northern side, the island is called St. Martin and is a separate nation that has major French influences. Finally, there is St. Thomas in the US Virgin Islands that is another territory that was purchased by the United States from Denmark for 25 million in gold coin in 1917. The Bahamas will not be discussed in this evaluation. More on the reason for this later.

As a person who has travelled domestically for almost all my vacations (I have only been this far away from the United States one other time), I have no real memory of what it is like to travel internationally. I have been to 39 American States but only four foreign countries. So, upon entering the cruise ship on December 11th, here were my thoughts regarding my home at sea for the next ten days.

Our boat was the Norwegian Sky which upon learning during the cruise, is one of the oldest ships in their fleet. It is also the second smallest and can hold slightly over 2000 people. The ship was originally deployed in 2000 and renovated during the COVID-19 lockdowns. The ship has a classic feel to it. The dining rooms had an early 20th Century design where you could imagine individuals with top hats and designer suits enjoying a classic meal while discussing the politics of Calvin Coolidge almost a hundred years ago. Most of the activities on the ship were between the fifth and eighth floors. The eleventh and twelfth floors were for athletic activities like basketball, shuffleboard, ping pong, and multiple pools and spas that spilled outside into the sun. Due to the age of the ship, it did not have many of the family activities you see on more modern ships like water slides, laser tag, Go Kart racing, and the like. Here is a summary of what was enjoyable about this ship.

Food: All the food on the ship is free (More on this later) except for four exclusive restaurants (That serve French, Italian, Japanese/Sushi, and Steak.) There was an indoor and outdoor buffet, a sports bar, and two dining rooms both in different parts of the boat on the fifth floor. The Italian restaurant had free pizza every day from noon to 3 pm. My family felt that the food was very good quality and only a couple of things we ordered in the dining room were subpar. After we got off the ship due to the healthy quality of the food and keeping our diets under control, none of us gained a single pound on the cruise.
Activities: The boat had a fantastic library and over the ten days of being on this vessel, I was able to read a history book about a famous World War II NFL team. There were comedy shows, magic shows, game shows, trivia, and live music from various cultures scattered all over the ship during the afternoon and nighttime. It was impossible to be bored. There were also jewelry giveaways (Which excited my wife and daughter) and entertaining shows put on by the ship’s performers. The entertainment pounded and stimulated your senses almost around the clock.
Peace and Quiet: The ship had lots of lounges, bars, and hideaways where you could get peace separated away from the large amount of people that were scattered all over the ship. Being a smaller ship with a smaller number of people was a blessing. My favorite place was the observation lounge on the front of the tenth floor that looked out onto the ocean. It was always quiet in there and gave me enough time to think and plan for the next days of activities or allowed me to drink a wonderful Caribbean rum while reading my Arthur C. Clarke science fiction book.

What is a cruise without the ports and excursions? In order, I will discuss each country and location.

Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic

There is not much to say about this location, In Part 2, I will dive much deeper into my family’s experience on this island. Two things stood out.

Macorix House of Rum where the marijuana infused rum was the best. The Dominicans definitely have their own unique, sweeter tasting rum and it was fantastic.
The Puerto Plata Port: Of the six ports that we docked in, this was far and away the best one. It had a bunch of free pools, a lazy river, endless entertainment, and a beautiful island design. During our short time in the Dominican Republic, we did spend a couple of hours here sunbathing and lazily cruising on the river.

San Juan, Puerto Rico

I absolutely loved this city. The cruise ship dumps you into Old Town San Juan (There is no port) with its cobblestone streets, historical buildings, and noticeable resemblance to New Orleans. The streets despite being uphill are easily walkable and beautiful, century old Catholic churches are scattered throughout the town.
Castillo San Felipe Del Morro, the large fort that can be seen from the cruise ship that is located at the top of San Juan, is a protected National Monument with a twenty-dollar entrance fee. As one of the oldest buildings within a United States territory, it is beautifully preserved and worth the mile and a half hike up hundreds of feet of elevation to enjoy its historical relevance.
The beauty of San Juan, especially at the top of the hill inside the fort, is stunning. The ocean with its large waves and gorgeous blue water can be seen on three sides. Looking down towards the city, a haunting and gorgeous historical cemetery rests along the water to the east. Another bonus is that due to being an American territory, using your cell phones is recommended as international roaming fees are not charged especially if you need to google map yourself to the nearest coffee shop.

St. John’s, Antigua

This island was one of our three excursions. We went ziplining, which was busy but fun. This island, especially on its backside, has a wonderful tropical feel to it.
This was the first international island where I decided to leave the port and eat food in the city. The Caribbean Dollar is 2.7 dollars per US dollar. I found a nice restaurant where I got six chicken wings with an amazing tropical fruit sweet, native pepper hot sauce layered onto the skin. It cost ten Caribbean dollars (Under four dollars American and after adding the required 15% service fee, the meal cost me less than five US dollars despite showing thirteen Caribbean dollars on my bill). These same wings inside the Antigua port were over twelve US dollars. More on this in Part 2.

Fredericksburg, St. Marteen

From a beauty perspective, this was my favorite island. The water was crystal clear, and you could see thirty feet down. Because of this, my family spent over two hours sunbathing and enjoying the ocean on their beautiful white sand beach.
Due to the Dutch influence, the cheese shop, the Dutch restaurant that served me authentic Dutch pancakes, the French grocery store that was loaded with imported French foods, and the hard liquor drinks based on Dutch recipes made with the hard liquor on the island made this my only shopping day. Due to the large number of activities in the area (Including talking to Yoda Guy about the film industry for thirty minutes), drinking some wonderful Dutch coffee, and experiencing the historic Dutch area where the first settlers established the city, we did not have enough time to get over to Fly Over Beach or the French side of the island. Of all the islands, this is the one that upon boarding my cruise ship, it felt like my experience was incomplete. More on this in Part 2.

Basseterre, St. Kitts

This was our second excursion, a rainforest hike. Our guide took us into a Caribbean village where we got to hike the ruins of an old rum distillery and go about two miles into the island’s rainforest (With monkey sighting included). Once you pass a thousand feet of elevation in St. Kitt’s you are officially in the island’s National Park which is where the hike began. As a person who has never been inside a rainforest, getting to experience this type of landscape for the first time made the experience worth it. The drive to this village was also very scenic as the St. Kitts highway bobs and weaves along the cliffs near the water as you pass some of the native villages. Compared to Antigua’s drive, experiencing St. Kitts by car was much more memorable (Including driving on the opposite side of the road).
We decided as a family to hike into Basseterre where we proceeded to have the best Jamaican Jerk Chicken we have ever had (At 25 Caribbean Dollars equivalent to about nine dollars US). Feeding all four members of the family with two Carib beers cost just under 40 US dollars. Again, the same food inside the port would have been close to a hundred dollars. We walked into the city to digest the food and saw a beautiful pavilion with a fountain, a classic gothic designed French Catholic Church, and some ancient British phone booths laying around that were probably dumped from a Doctor Who set.

St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands
1. This was our final and best excursion. My family took a catamaran to a private cove on an island off the coast to snorkel and observe sea turtles, stingrays, and every single fish that is in the FINDING NEMO films while getting horribly drunk on rum during our cruise back to St. Thomas.
2. There was not much further exploring we could do as our port time in St. Thomas was very short. This will also be discussed in Part 2.

After this, there were two long days at sea to get to our final port in The Bahamas. The last part of this experience as well as some of the negatives from this cruise will be explained in Part 2. I hope you enjoyed this and come back next week for the exciting conclusion.

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THE 2023 NFL POSTSEASON SPECTACULAR (Played in 2024)

1/11/2024

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Another NFL season flew by in four months and now that 2024 has burst into existence, the playoffs have arrived. Like I have promised in the past, if I predict less than half the teams correctly (Six or less), I will skip my postseason NFL blog and write about the things that truly inspire like Jennifer Lawrence’s ass, the mating patterns of the Regent Parrot, and whether Napoleon was one of the worst dictators in history because he was angry about being born small. Here are my predictions from early September.

AFC

Buffalo
Kansas City
Baltimore
Jacksonville
Cincinnati
Miami
Pittsburgh

NFC

Dallas
New Orleans
San Francisco
Detroit
Seattle
Philadelphia
Atlanta

Here is how they finished.

AFC

Baltimore
Buffalo
Kansas City
Houston
Cleveland
Miami
Pittsburgh

I did an impressive job with the AFC. I predicted the first three seeds correctly even if the seeding was incorrect. Successfully predicted Miami as the 6 and Pittsburgh as the 7. Jacksonville missed the 4 seed on the last day by losing their last game to Tennessee. Cincinnati had injury problems all year and even without their superstar quarterback, they finished last place in the AFC North at 9-8, only a game out of the postseason. Houston’s rise was a surprise and I underestimated how talented the Cleveland Browns were before the season.

NFC

San Francisco
Dallas
Detroit
Tampa Bay
Philadelphia
LA Rams
Green Bay

Nine out of fourteen is not bad. But my predictions with the NFC were not as impressive. Like the AFC, I got three of the four division winners only missing the South in both conferences. The top 3 teams were predicted to make the playoffs but with different seeds. I expected David Carr to be the difference with New Orleans in a weak NFC South and they did finish 9-8 but lost the tiebreakers with Tampa for the division and Green Bay for the wild card. Seattle also finished 9-8 and lost the wild card tiebreaker to Green Bay. With their impressive draft, Seattle seemed stagnant this year when improvement was expected. Atlanta had the easiest schedule in the NFL which is why I picked them to finish 9-8 and get the 7 seed. Instead, they went 7-10 and are looking for a new head coach. I also predicted the decline of the Philadelphia Eagles but not for the right reason. Their team seems like it may have given up on their coach. I believed they would have a miserable Super Bowl hangover. But I did have them making the playoffs which they accomplished. The LA Rams, due to an incredible draft and staying injury free, shockingly got into the playoffs after initiating a rebuild in the offseason. And the youngest team in the NFL, the Green Bay Packers, are way ahead of schedule with their youth movement.

SUPER WILD CARD WEEKEND

Here are my picks.

Cleveland over Houston

Houston has found a franchise quarterback in CJ Stroud. He had a wonderful rookie season and stepped up at the end to lead the Texans to a division title. The future is bright with this kid. Cleveland’s playoff run may have been even more impressive. Winning eleven games despite starting four quarterbacks. Their 4th starter, 38-year-old Delaware graduate and Super Bowl champion Joe Flacco, has had a career renaissance with the Browns late in the year. I believe this will continue for another week.

Kansas City over Miami

The Chiefs are the defending champions and despite having a Super Bowl caliber defense, the offense has been abysmal especially during the second half of the season. Despite their decline, the rest of the AFC West was pathetic which allowed Kansas City to win an 8th consecutive division title. Miami was impressive early but as soon as they started playing some of the NFL’s best, they began to struggle only winning at the last minute over Dallas at home and losing the rest. If this game was in a dome, I would be leaning towards Miami. But this game will be taking place in freezing weather in Kansas City. Miami historically does not play well in this weather. Kansas City will bumble and stumble their way to a victory.

Buffalo over Pittsburgh

Not much to say here. Buffalo struggled and was sitting at 6-6 in early December. They are now 11-6 and hanging onto the 2 seed as possibly the hottest team in the AFC entering the playoffs. Pittsburgh again slips into the playoffs as Mike Tomlin keeps his insane non-losing record streak alive for another season. The talent gap in this game is immense. Unless a bomb blows up and kills half the Bills team or Josh Allen has one of his infamous high turnover games, the Bills should roll.

Dallas over Green Bay

Dallas won the division as expected even though it took until the final week to do it. Green Bay’s Jordan Love matured in the 2nd half and took a struggling 3-6 Packers team and guided them to a 6-2 finish to slide into the 7 seed. Green Bay is young and Dallas, who is undefeated at home, should defeat the Packers.

Detroit over LA Rams

The Detroit Lions were my favorite pick in the preseason. I was impressed with how Detroit finished in 2022. I expected this to carry over with an even more talented team in 2023. The Lions rewarded my prediction by rolling to an NFC North division crown. The LA Rams being in this spot is a huge surprise. Going into the bye week with injuries to three of their top four skill players and sitting at 3-6, the season was starting to resemble the miserable 5-12 2022. But in a shocking turn of events, the Rams came together and finished 7-1 and slid into the playoffs only one year after blowing up their roster due to salary cap issues and starting over. Detroit has two significant advantages over the inexperienced Rams, a great D-Line and two very good running backs. If they play conservative and use their superior line talent to control the line of scrimmage, the cursed Lions franchise should advance for the first time in 32 years.

Tampa Bay over Philadelphia

Tampa Bay is the most shocking surprise of this NFL season. They lost Hall of Famer Tom Brady and were heading into rebuild mode. In comes Baker Mayfield who wins one more game than Brady did with a more talented team the previous season and steals away a shocking division title. Philadelphia looked dominant at 10-1. Since December started, the team has completely fallen apart. Jalen Hurts looks like he has regressed, and the defense can’t stop anyone. If this play continues, I believe Tampa will blow the Eagles out and move them into their offseason with a likely new coach.

AFC Divisionals

Baltimore wins a close one over Cleveland.
Buffalo blows out Kansas City

NFC Divisionals

San Francisco blows out Tampa Bay
Detroit upsets Dallas

AFC Championship

Baltimore wins after a late Josh Allen turnover.

NFC Championship

San Francisco handles Detroit

Super Bowl LVIII

A rematch of Super Bowl XLVII from eleven years earlier. Baltimore won this game 34-31 after taking a 28-6 lead and holding on. Joe Flacco, who is now with Cleveland, was the winning quarterback. Baltimore walloped San Francisco earlier in the year. This Super Bowl will be a repeat of that game. Baltimore jumps out early and cruises to a 37-27 victory capturing their 3rd Super Bowl title and sending the 49ers to their 3rd straight loss in the Big Game since 2012. Baltimore will become the 11th team to win at least three Super Bowls putting them into a five-way tie with Las Vegas, Kansas City, Washington, and Denver.

Enjoy everyone!

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THOUGHTS ABOUT OUR CARIBBEAN CRUISE PART II: THE NEGATIVES

THOUGHTS ABOUT OUR CARIBBEAN CRUISE PART 1 : THE POSITIVES

THE 2023 NFL POSTSEASON SPECTACULAR (Played in 2024)

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