2024 – Wow… Just wow. Kids are growing up, for my 40th birthday Janet and I booked an adults only cruise on Virgin Voyages. At 9 and 11 Abel and Kaitlyn are quite independent and my mom and dad were willing (after some arm twisting) and able (with us ordering Skip the Dishes from half the world away… jk) to take care of the kids while we travelled for 10 days! Thanks Bruce and Sue 😀 best trip ever
Jan 25&26 – a 12 hour travel day to San Juan PR with Gil and Lorraine Gauthier, the rest of the crew was en route the 26th. There was a missed connection in Atl that handed us some stress but we eventually made it. Deicing caused a late arrival and we reached the gate just in time to see our 757 back away from the gangway.
Janet rushed the 4 of us to Delta Customer Service desk and we got on Standby for a flight departing only 2 hours later. Well, three of us made it, the GILFISH was the odd man out and had to stick in the ATL airport until the 7pm flight (only a few hours longer) so it worked out in the end. Welcome to travelling as a Winnipeger…. Delta was awesome BTW (take notes WJ)
Janet, Lorraine and I landed in San Juan after dusk, used the airports luggage assistance and went to the taxi stand. Taxis are regulated in SJ so it’s set pricing. Only $30 for the three of us to get from the Airport to Old Town Sheraton, an ideally situated historic hotel in-front of Pier 4 (the pier we were using to meet Valiant Lady).
Expensive spot to stay two nights but wow, got to see Old Town SJ and to my delight watch our Lady Ship Dock on Embarkation day (January 27). We stuck around San Juan and didn’t venture to the rest of Puerto Rico 🇵🇷 we will have to visit again, it’s a big and picturesque island. The weekend prior was some large festival, it wasn’t crazy busy in the port town during our visit, the town was very explorable.
On the 26th we found some socks (I purchased and packed woman’s socks by mistake 🙃) ate at a great burger place called “buns”, walked the town to Starbucks (bought Janet her “been there” mug) and had a really pleasant day. We finished off the day with a great dinner at a recommended Sea Food Restaurant not far from our hotel. We sat on the street side, had a great clam bake with Gil and Lorraine where Paul, Emily, Genevieve and Ken eventually joined us. Great evening, great company, loved the food. We were 8 excited sailors, our ship was docking the next morning, we are going cruising 😎😎😎
Awesome evening, safe and clean hotel/port town, our balcony and rooftop in the hotel garnished amazing evening views. Everyone made it, bags stayed well packed, all that was missing was the Valiant Lady, our seaworthy home for the next 7 nights. Embarkation day (Jan 27) can’t come soon enough! Bring on the Lady Ship 🚢
To be continued. Next : embarkation day
Seas the day 