Cruising the Caribbean - Part 3

We carried on to St Thomas, the main island in the US Virgin Islands. This place is a shopping mecca! As we already had a big diamond in tow by this stage, we bypassed the shopping (after a brief look) and took a tour around the island. It's quite pretty, and used to be under Danish rule - the street names are all in Danish, which I found quite fascinating. The views from the top of the island were great, looking out over the other islands, and over to the British Virgin Islands as well.

The next stop was a bit of a surprise, as when we initially booked the cruise we were supposed to be going to Santo Domingo, in the Dominican Republic. About two months after we booked it we got notified that it would be changed to San Juan, Puerto Rico - which I was more than happy with!

Old San Juan felt more like we were in Spain or something Mediterranean. Beautiful old buildings, with their little juliet balconies, so cute! The Spanish influence is very strong.

Sailing out of San Juan was beautiful - there were two other cruise ships in port, and we were the first to leave, passing the fortresses and castles. Old San Juan was an unexpected highlight!

The next morning we both woke up feeling really bad. I spent most of the day in bed, which wasn't so bad as we had a half day stop in Turks and Caicos. The most beautiful water, but not much else to see! By evening time I had had enough and we both went to the onboard doctor - who funnily enough was an Aussie - and got diagnosed with the norovirus :o( Antibiotics and being quarantined to our cabin for the last 24 hours of the cruise were the order of the day. The last day was a day at sea, which we had to spend in our cabin, watching tv, snoozing on and off, and ordering room service!
Then it was back to reality and to the airport - where Delta had bumped us off our flight, which meant we had to run to get our connecting flight in Detroit, and when we got to Vancouver, my luggage didn't show up - apparently as it was "too late to the gate" - despite us being at the airport 4 1/2 hours before our flight left Florida! Needless to say I was not impressed. All our toiletries were in my bag - so we didn't even have toothbrushes when we got home! Luckily it turned up the next afternoon, unfortunately after the emergency toothbrush purchases.

All in all, a wonderful cruise. Andrew is a cruise convert, we had a great time (despite being sick for the last two days), had some amazing food (lobster tails, oysters, lots of amazing fish, luscious desserts and pastries, fresh fruit.... the list is endless), and got engaged!