Royal Clipper Trip Report -- Day 8
Published Tuesday, April 5th 2022Day 8 -- St. Kitts
Sunny, low 80s, brief showers in the afternoon
We got up and had an early breakfast because we had a shore excursion planned. It was basically a driving tour of the island, and we got off to a rough start. We tendered to shore in Basseterre (literal translation from French: "low land") and met the van that was going to take us on the tour. The driver asked if we had tickets, but nobody had given any of us tickets. So eventually, the cruise director (Meno) came to help and I guess they had to call the tour office to confirm that our group was actually booked for the tour. Then they realized that the van they had sent for us wasn't big enough. So we had to wait about a half hour while the company sent a bigger van.
The new van arrived, apologies were made, and we boarded and started the tour. After a very brief drive through a few blocks of Basseterre, we stopped a local hotel to "explore the gardens". This seemed odd, as the gardens were very modest, and only took about 5 minutes to walk through and then we were just in the pool/bar area of this hotel. Turns out they sent the right van, but the wrong driver. So we were just hanging out until the new driver arrived. The new driver arrived, we headed back to the van, and they handed us brochures for the hotel, which had a picture of the Royal Clipper on the front cover, which I found very funny for some reason.
In the gardens:
A view of Basseterre from the hotel:
Ok, so we have the right van, we have the right driver, and we got to start the actual tour. From this point, the tour was very good. Our driver was very knowledgeable and shared a lot of interesting history dealing with the indigenous people of the island. Our next stop was Romney Manor, which is part of a much larger estate that was once owned by Sam Jefferson, the great-great-great (maybe one more great?) grandfather of Thomas Jefferson. (The country's other connection to the US founding fathers is that Alexander Hamilton was born on the island of Nevis.)
There are lots of interesting sights on the estate, but it's also the home of Caribelle Batik. Batik is a distinctive dying technique The shop offers demonstrations on the technique and sells dyed fabrics as well as Batik clothing.
Foundation of the original Romney Manor house, and the famous 400 year old tree.
From there, we visited Brimstone Hill, which was a British defense fort. This was a very cool site. I enjoyed it a lot. It had great views of the port, but there were also several very interesting historical exhibits that described military life at the fort.
After the fort, the driver took us to St. Friar's Bay. During our tour, our ship and moved from its original position to the Bay and this is where we were going to meet the tender. The tour was just about 4 hours, and we got back to the ship at 1pm to get lunch.
After lunch (Italian buffet, with pretty disappointing pizza), we tendered back to the beach with our snorkel gear. It turned out to be a great spot for seeing a lot of different types of fish, including gar, sea stars and pufferfish, which were really cool to see in the wild. We stayed in the water for an hour or so. One of the other interesting things about snorkeling here was that it was so easy to stay afloat in the water. We didn't have floatation vests, but I never had to work to stay on top of the water. When we'd had enough snorkeling, we were going to sit on the beach, but that's when it started raining, so we hopped on the next tender back to the ship.
The Italian buffet:
On the beach:
We got back to the ship around 4:30, and had our Afternoon Snack a little early. Then at 5:00, we boarded tenders one more time. This time, we weren't going to shore. We tendered alongside the Royal Clipper as it lowered its sails and we got great pictures of the ship under full sail.
The "photo tender" lasted about an hour, and we got back onboard just after 6. At that point, Cruise Director Meno conducted our disembarkation talk. It was pretty standard -- what to do with our luggage, settling our onboard account, etc. There were a lot of questions about Covid testing, since those of us returning to the USA needed a negative test within 24 hours of our arrival. Thankfully, the port had set up a testing facility so that we could get tested (for a fee) as soon as we got off the ship.
At dinner, we sat with some of our traveling group. We had the best time sharing our experiences from the week, comparing notes, and comparing our sailing to what we've experienced on larger cruise ships.
For appetizers, I had scallops in a tomato/asparagus ragout, which was terrific, with no asparagus flavor. And the scallops were cooked perfectly. Kathryn had hearts of palm, and said they were good. I had the Caesar salad, which was very good with lots of cheese.
For entrees, I got the Lobster Thermidor on cheesy risotto. This was an excellent dish. Kath got the Chateaubriand, which was phenomenal. It was one of the best dishes of the week, without question. We also shared the fish entree because it sounded really good, but was just ok. Definitely the least appealing of the three options on the menu that night. Someone else at the table got the vegetarian strudel, which she said was very good.
Lobster:
Beef:
Out-of-Focus Veggie Streudel:
However, it was also a birthday for one of our tablemates. So the staff came and sang "Happy Birthday", which was silly and fun. But they also brought us a birthday cake! So we actually had 2 desserts, and of course, I ate both of them and felt like a pig. But they were both pretty delicious.
Here's Kristin, making her birthday wish:
And my double-dessert plate (oink, oink):
We stayed at dinner -- talking and laughing and (maybe) drinking -- until 10 pm. We stayed so long that we were late for the start of the talent show in the Tropical Bar. Passengers and crew both performed. Some sang, some of the crew did funny skits. It was kid of fun, but we didn't stay for all of it. Kath grabbed a cup of coffee from the Piano Bar and the two of us headed up on deck to see the stars. It was a beautiful night and we didn't get back to the room and bed until just after midnight.
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