We have been to Antigua probably 6 times prior, it's a lovely island. Our first visit was in 2003 (I think) during our 2nd cruise ever on Navigator of the Seas. What is most interesting is that we weren't scheduled to stop there. Nassau, San Juan and St Thomas I think were the planned stops. As we headed out of Miami, an announcement, due to the inclement weather (ie, a hurricane!) we'd be skipping Nassau and heading directly for San Juan. Okay, no big deal. Well......next day, can't stop in San Juan, the hurricane is too close, and same for St Thomas. Where to go? Antigua! What? Where the heck is Antigua? We had a very nice tour that time, considering we knew nothing about the island (I know quite a bit more now!) and were not the seasoned cruisers we are today. (for the record, we went to St Thomas the next day, then spent the next 5 days circling off the southern coast of Cuba waiting for hurricane Francis to finish flattening Florida so we could head back there, 2 days late!)
Back to Antigua current day - Chris and I don't think we've been here since our Grandeur of the Seas cruise (aka, "cruise of the dead") out of Tampa, which was about 5 years ago. We've also never been here when we were not the only ship in port - most times, they only were getting 2-3 ships a week if they were lucky. Well, apparently their luck has changed, because today there were 4 ships in port. (!!!!) Mein Schiff 2 (formerly known as the Celebrity Mercury) was there when we arrived. Soon after we docked, P&O Adonis (I think) docked next to us, and when we returned from our tour, MSC Musica had shown up. The town of St John's was rockin, and there were people EVERYWHERE.
We had to meet our tour at 840am, so we were off the ship about 825am. I keep saying "we" and in this case I'm refering to Pam, Michael and myself. Unfortunately, Chris was a bit under the weather and chose to stay on Eclipse today to recover. He was sorry to miss the tour, although we had done it before. We met the boat in front of where our ship was docked, here she is pulling up to get us! Much smaller than our cruise ship, that's for sure. The tour has 4 stops, and you ride a fast boat all the way around the island of Antigua, so it's lots of fun! We had 13 passengers and 3 crew, and we were the only 3 passengers from the cruise ships!
After we were picked up our Captain Sean, with his able assistants Trevor and David, took us to Stingray City to see some stingrays. That's Sean driving the boat, and David talking to Pam. Trevor is over the right shoulder of the lady in pink.
Stingray City, Antigua
An actual stingray! I also got to hold one and get my photo taken. I have to email them to get the picture, although it looked pretty good!!! My underwater, waterproof, shockproof camera works awesome! Thanks Costco!!!
Off we went after Stingray city to our lunch stop, Green Island. As I said, we were on a fast boat!
Lunch was very good (what wouldn't be good on a beach?) and then we headed off for Nelson's Dockyard and the Pillars of Hercules
Here's time for a bit of a lecture - Antigua was a naval repair base for England in the 1600's due to it's natural harbor, and Nelson's dockyard is what it is today. Many large yachts (and I mean LARGE) are kept in the harbor during the winter months and we got to see many of them out today.
Pick a yacht! There were at least 50 that we saw, and there's another harbor on the other side where the really large yachts are kept (!)
The pillars of Hercules are the natural formations on the entrance to Nelson's Dockyard, and that's where we were snorkeling today. Unfortunately, right before we arrived, the sun went behind some clouds so even though the water was very clear, it was pretty hard to see on camera. This is one of the few shots I took that turned out.
Then it was off to rendevous beach, where I did my best Captain Morgan impression (we were drinking rum punch by this point)
We then headed around the island and back towards the cruise dock. But we saw a rainbow!!!
Pam and I walked around town for a few minutes, and mailed some postcards and then headed back to the ship about 345pm. The ship was due to leave at 5pm, and we sure did! After a round of "my ship horn is bigger than yours" with Mein Schiff 2 (a former Celebrity ship) we sailed away and made our plans for dinner.
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