DCL Recap 2014: St. Maarten {5}

Hello All,

Happy Tuesday! I hope the beginning your week has been good so far. To make the start of the week a little easier I'm going to give you some island love.

Excatly 4 weeks ago I was still on my cruise (can I go back?) and it was our first day in a port! We were at St. Maarten!

Source

For those of you who don't know, I didn't know until I got there. St. Maarten is partly French where the spell the island as Saint Martin and partly Dutch who call it Sint Maarten, which is shown in the picture above. That was just a fun fact.

Anyways on St. Maarten we did the excursion called French Riviera Beach Rendezvous which is one that Disney supports, you can read about more of the details here. 

Anyways it was a somewhat early morning where we met up in one of the theaters on the ship and we met up with other people doing the same tour. They then shuffled us all off the boat and we walked what felt like forever to get on a bus. On the way to our destination (just adding some suspense) they went of the rules and logistics as well as some history facts with us. Pretty uneventful.

When we got there (just a little more suspense) we got off the bus and has to wait in line some more. But soon we saw, we saw the beach! Yup, we were spending the day at the beach! We found some beach chairs and rented the umbrellas, I believe they were like $3 or $5, but really not expensive at all. 

The waves were really strong so no one in my traveling party spent too much time in the water. Fun fact about me, I HATE getting salt water in my mouth so I don't let my head go under water like EVER.  

We also got a free lunch which I got chicken, fries and a salad maybe, I can't really remember, the only thing I can remember is that the chicken was dry. I spent the majority of the time reading and this was actually the day that I finished The Fault in Our Stars.

On the way back to the boat you have the option of getting of the tour bus down town and going shopping, you just have to find your own way back to the bus. We decided to stay on and head back, there was actually an afternoon storm brewing. On the way back to the boat they have a more detail tour and our guide was very happy and enthusiastic which was cool. 

Now you can enjoy all the pictures I took!

The view from our lunch table

The view from our lunch table again

Palm trees, pretty!

View from where we were sitting

Looking the other way

I think I took this as I was walking out but i'm not sure. Isn't the water gorgeous?

Heading back to the boat

I took this while we were hiding from an afternoon storm

Look how small the Fantasy next to the other boat. I believe it was a Norwegian Cruise Line Ship

A close up of the beauty

The rocks you see in the foreground looked fake and like foam 

I have no proof that I got off the boat at St. Maarten but I selfie take from our veranda.

Yup, that's St. Maarten in the background

 And we had a beautiful view from our stateroom

The rest of that day we spent resting and then dinner at Animator's Palate which is when the boat actually disembarked while we were at dinner. A great day overall, I can't wait to share more.