The Zuiderdam Adventure - Sept 2005

Saturday
West Jet flight #912 departed Toronto right on time for our flight down to Ft.lauderdale. It was a comfortable trip, leather upholstered seats with 12 channel tv mounted in the back of the seat in front. We collected our luggage, grabbed a taxi ($20 including tip) and were in our cabins an hour after landing. We had the late dinner seating (8.30pm) so decided to get something to eat in the Lido and after unpacking we watched the sailaway at 5pm. Three ships left at basically the same time, we were third, I've noticed the last couple of times sailing from Ft Lauderdale, there's not near as much interaction with the shore as there used to be, no horns or flashing lights from the apartment buildings, only 2 little flags.
Dinner was good, we met our table companions, an affable group, Ron, Susan & Virginia, from Varo Beach, Florida and decided that we would catch the late show in the Vista lounge. We didnt actually finish dinner, that first night, until about 10.30pm, too late for the show, so we altered our plans and spent some time in the casino before retiring for the night.
Sunday
The next day we arrived early at Half Moon Cay, Holland America's private island and had a day at the beach, feeding the fishes. It's a nice fine white sand beach with calm waters and we stayed to enjoy the BBQ before heading back on board in the early afternoon when we had reached our limit for heat exposure. Relaxing on the ship we planned to catch the late show after dinner, which we hoped would be a little quicker than the night before. Later that evening, in the casino we resolved that the next evening we would definitely make it to the show.
Monday
A day at sea, as the ship sailed South to the Virgin Islands, the weather was hot and humid.
Tuesday
Monday morning we arrived bright and early at Tortola, British Virgin Islands and took the open air truck ($6 each way) over to the other side of the island to Cane Garden Bay, we had been there before and knew it was a nice little beach. As soon as we settled down a little dog came and lay beside us, we enjoyed the morning, had a few drinks and met the truck at noon for the return trip. After lunch on board we took part in a trivia competition and after the last question we were tied for first with one other team, unfortunately our tie-breaker answer wasn't correct (St.Lawrence Seaway) and theirs (Hudson Bay) was, so we missed out on the fabulous prizes.
Dinner was excellent once more and I actually won in the casino that night.
Wednesday
St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands was our next stop and after clearing US immigration at 7.15am, we had breakfast then made an early start, walking through the shopping area toward the Skyride cable car. It's a nice trip to the top though a bit pricey at $16 each, there's a parrot show up top, some shops and a bar. We made full use of the bar and had a world famous Bushwhacker, which was very nice, I might have had more than one if it had not been 9.15 in the morning, we sat for a while absorbing the view then shopped a while and watched the parrot show. Back on board around 1pm, we had lunch and relaxed for the rest of the day, looking forward to dinner and the evening show which featured a female comedian we all agreed we should see. After dinner we had some difficulty amputating a slot machine from the arm of one of our group and consequently missed the show.
Thursday
Another day spent entirely at sea, sailing Northward again toward the Bahamas, it was the Philipino crew show tonight and one of our group made it clear she did not want to miss it. After dinner we made it into the Vista Lounge at the proper time and settled ourselves in the middle of a row, no sooner had the show begun when that same 'one of our group' left to have a shower, leaving the three of us sitting like dodos.
Friday
Arriving in Nassau about noon, we disembarked and had just cleared the terminal building when the ship sounded 9 blasts on its' horn, did that mean 'return to the ship' or 'fire on board'?, none of us could remember, but since we were on our way to get a water taxi over to Atlantis, we decided, either way, we would continue with our plans. We heard later that a fire alarm had gone off in a cabin on deck 7 and the ships fire fighting team had responded in full gear, never did hear whether it was a false alarm or not. Atlantis resort is worth a visit, enter the hotel area through the casino, we had been there before about 10 years previous when we were allowed access to all the hotels outside areas but now it's security controlled and you're restricted to a walkway around the casino, still a nice area overlooking the aquarium and beach. For $29 you can get access to all the other parts including the main aquarium, it's still worth a visit even if you dont want to pay the $29 and to make things even better, I won $60 in the casino, playing the 'Jade Monkey' slots ('Jade Monkey' 'Jade Monkey'). We spent the afternoon there, returning about 5pm, the water taxi is $6 return and operates fairly regularly.
We grabbed a quick bite to keep us going 'til dinner and decided to watch the sailaway before napping/getting ready for dinner, then we had decided to see the show which was made up of little bits from all the shows we'd missed. Dinner was, as always, excellent and as expected we missed the show.
Saturday
Early morning arrival back in Ft. Lauderdale, we disembarked around 10am and took a taxi $15 to the airport for our 2 o'clock flight.