Dorothy Piotrowski’s blog

Norwegian Cruise Lines has their own private island in the Bahamas and it’s called Great Stirrup Cay.  Each of their cruises to the Bahamas spends one day here and today was our day.  We took our time heading down to breakfast because we thought there would be a wait before we could get to the island.  The cruise ship can’t directly sail to the island so what happens is that tender boats take the guests from the ship.  These boats can hold up to 450 passengers.  I was expecting some type of rubber dingy where only 10 people would fit in.  Today was the first day that we experienced a line.  It took us approximately ten minutes to get onto the tender boats.  I was expecting a much longer wait.  The ride to the island only took 5 minutes.

With a possibility of 2000 people being on the island, you need to get there early in the day to get the prime spots.  There are many loungers and beach chairs that were on a first come, first serve basis.  There were even rarer hammocks that were quickly taken up.  But Karen and I didn’t care.  We realized that we would not survive the entire day in the hot baking sun.  Therefore we made an executive decision and rented their two loungers with cabana.  That was the best $30 we’ve ever spent. 

We quickly headed into the turquoise water and it was a perfect temperature, and perfectly clear.  The beach was pretty busy.  I would guess that probably half of the ship was there.  Most people tended to stay close to the shore.  But if you swam past them, it was great.  We saw lots of fishes out there and we didn’t even have snorkel gear.  The water was so clear that you could see right through to the ocean floor.

We went back to our cabana and then decided that we should go and have some lunch.  Norwegian provides a BBQ lunch where they had hamburgers, hot dogs, chicken, various cold salads and lots of fresh fruit.  It was yummy.  There are plenty of activities on the island, including beach volleyball, parasailing, kayaking, snorkelling, blow up water slide, and even shopping in a small straw market.

When we got onto the island, we saw a hut that was offering beach massages and I decided to spend some of my birthday money (thanks Darren and Allison) and have a neck, shoulder and back massage.  Boy did I ever enjoy that.  The only way to have a massage is with the sun, sand, a gentle breeze and Caribbean music.

I stumbled my way back to the cabana and we headed back into the water.  In the distance, there was this very large dark cloud and every so often we would see lightning.  At one point, there was this one big crack of thunder and everyone was ordered out of the water.  You should have seen how fast people decided to leave the island.  About a half hour later, the lifeguards said we could go back in.  Now we practically had the water to ourselves.

We left the island around 4pm and headed back for a refreshing shower and a late afternoon lay down.

We had our last dinner on the cruise tonight and it was a good one.  We ate at Crossings restaurant, and had a window table, with a direct view of the waves behind the boat, as we left the Bahamas, and cruised towards Miami.  Karen and I each had the scallops for an appetizer.  I went with the roast turkey and Karen went with the flounder.  After dinne, we went outside to catch the sunset.

Before we went to the show in the Stardust Theatre, we hit the casino where Karen turned $1 into $32.10.  We came back to the room to discover a towel gorilla.

Today was the first day during our vacation that we actually slept in.  Although we did see the sunrise, right from our balcony.  Around 8:30am there was a knock on our stateroom door and there was breakfast which we had ordered the night before.  Gotta love breakfast in bed.

After enjoying our breakfast with “Magnum PI” and “Little House on the Prairie”, we made our way down the gangway and into Nassau, New Providence Island.  There were four other huge cruise ships in port today.  But surprisingly nothing was ever crowded, and there was never any waiting in lines.  Nassau has the most beautiful turquoise water.  Just stunning.     

Before you can actually enter the city, you pass through the cruise terminal.  It was filled with many people trying to sell you either some kind of knickknack or tour.  Once we got through it, we grabbed a map and started shopping.  You can not believe how many jewellery stores there are.  We went into quite a few of them and I’ve never seen that many shiny things in my life.  Whenever you ask the price of an item, they would give you the original price but because you are special, the calculator would come out and most of the time the item would be discounted by 50%.   We spent about four hours walking around Nassau checking out all of the shops.  We managed to get a few things and then decided to head back to the ship.

We had a late lunch at the back of the boat, overlooking the Nassau harbour, and then decided to relax by the pool.  I’ve realized that I can get used to cruising, especially with Norwegian.  I really like not having a set schedule to do things.
 
Tonight We had dinner in the Palace dining room.  Another fabulous meal, and even better dessert.  After dinner, we headed to the Stardust Theatre where we enjoyed “On Broadway” before heading back to our room to finally discover our first towel animal.

We sailed all through the night and arrived in Freeport, Grand Bahama at 8am.  I had no sense that the ship was moving while I slept.  We went down to the Garden Cafe buffet and enjoyed our breakfast outside, at the back of the boat on Deck 11.  Leaving the boat was painless, with no waiting in line.

Karen found somebody called Smiling Pat on TripAdvisor that offers tours of the island.  We were supposed to tour with Pat but unfortunately she was all booked up.  She sent a man named “Nugget” instead and Karen and I had our own private tour of the island.

The first thing we noticed was how hot and humid the island was.  Nugget said he’d never seen a day when the temperature went over 94 degrees.  Well guess what, we hit 94 degrees. 

While driving to our first stop, Nugget pointed out many interesting things about the island.  We saw the Grand Bahama shipyard, the Freeport Container Port and the quarry where they mine limestone.

Our first stop was Paradise Cove where Nugget dropped us off for a couple of hours.  You know when you see those pictures of the Bahamas how the water is bluey/green.  Well it’s true.  We had such a great time just floating around, in the crystal clear water, which was a perfect temperature to cool off from the heat.

After he picked us up, we toured around Freeport.  We stopped at a small local market where Nugget said we should try conch.  I wasn’t feeling that well but Karen enjoyed a Bahamian local dish called conch salad.  The woman running the stall was called Barbara and she was so funny.  She explained and showed us how she took the live conch out of the shell always hoping to find a pearl.  She said she’s found many pea sized pearls but not the big one yet.  Conch salad is made up of raw conch chopped up pretty fine with onions, peppers, tomatoes and the juice of lime and orange.  Karen really liked it.  Barbara was so kind enough to give Karen the huge beautiful pink conch shell that her lunch came in as a souvenir.

We toured around the island some more where Nugget pointed out a huge castle belonging to the man that owns all of the KFCs and Burger Kings.  You should see this place.  Yes … they do KFC, Burger King, Wendy’s and Domino’s.  The other thing he told us was the “Pirates of The Carribean” parts two and three were filmed on Grand Bahama.  He then took us by the Black Pearl that was parked in front of someone’s house.

Our last stop was in Port Lucaya.  He dropped us off and we toured around the Marketplace.  It was so hot that we would try and find some shade whenever we could.  The beach there was the same turquoise shades, and so beautiful.

Nugget picked us up around 4pm and took us back to the Freeport dock.  We promised him that we would be back again.

I had a quick nap before we headed down for dinner in the Crossings dining room.  Tonight Karen had the ceasar salad and Lobster and Grouper extravaganza.  I too had the ceasar salad but went with the grilled chicken with mashed potatoes.  Our server said it was mandatory to have dessert so I went with the raspberry sherbet and Karen had the international cheese platter.

We headed back to our room where we sat out on the balcony enjoying a quiet evening, before heading down to the Stardust Theatre for another evening of entertainment.  Tomorrow … it’s a shopping day in Nassau.  Get out the credit cards!