A Feast For Your Senses: Fuel for your sense of wonder and sense of humor: Oasis of the Seas - Day 6

One extra note about the evening after we left St. Maarten - I still don't understand how these ships with the open center couldn't have devised some sort of retractable roof in their design plans for when it rained. By the time we came out of dinner, Central Park's pathways were flooded with lots of standing water and we dodged puddles all the way back to our cabin. Found out later that a Facebook roll call member had the misfortune of slipping on the wet Boardwalk this same evening injuring her knee. She reported that they made it back to their cabin and the steward was kind enough to make her an ice pack out of a plastic laundry bag.

I was so beat by the time I headed to bed the night before, my notes I was trying to make at the end of St. Maarten day look like the words were falling off the page. Usually about mid cruise I hit a wall thankfully only figuratively and need a long rest. I gave up trying to make any further notes and next thing I knew it was 6:30AM and we'd already sailed past the forts at the edge of the port in San Juan.

We'd also already been to San Juan on that first cruise where we did a combination tour that covered a bus tour of Old San Juan, a semi guided tour of the biggest fort, and ended with a tour of the Bacardi Rum factory. Smitha told us that she was most excited to return to San Juan because it meant she could go to the mall. Not going to lie, I considered that excursion to the mall myself for about 2 minutes. I'd read that San Juan offered a trolley to go between the forts that I considered riding just for some sightseeing plus visiting the bar there known as the birth of the pina colada. Did I end up doing either of those things? Nope.

Headed for our now routine breakfast at Coastal Kitchen. Branched out on my pastry tray choices this morning and got a blueberry muffin. Turned out to just be a couple blueberries buried in the middle of the muffin but it tasted a lot fresher than the donuts.

For my main dish I ordered a mushroom and cheese omelet and the cheese looked so clumpy, I thought they'd put scrambled eggs inside my omelet at first!

The Coastal Kitchen manager not only came by our table to check on us, he spent most of our meal chatting. There wasn't much passenger traffic so it wasn't like he was ignoring someone who was waiting to be served. The host interrupted to tell him she'd been called away and he launched into a whole explanation to us about how they were planning for a practice drill. Fast forward to a few minutes later when we raced down to the Schooner Bar for 10AM morning trivia and heard the Captain call for a "Code Charlie." We had the seats by the railing and watched several crew members standing around in their spots down on deck 5. Sometimes half the fun of staying onboard on a port day is watching the crew run practice drills.

After trivia we decided to head out into port with the intent of just wandering and seeing what piques our interest. The skies were very gray as we walked past all the sidewalk vendors and salespeople offering tours and selling cigars. Got some nice pictures of the light blue ship against the grey clouds now that this pier had us pulled in bow first.

I'd read tips from people online about how easy it is to grab anything you may have forgotten because there's a Walgreens nearby in San Juan. I decided to head into Walgreens simply to see if there was any unique treats to find and I wanted to see if the prices were drastically different than they are back home.

The view of Walgreens from the end of the pier:

Pointed out to Dad all the fun Spanish translations for familiar packaging and noticed lots of 12 packs of soda cases cut in half and shrink wrapped to stay contained. Saw this in St. Maarten's shops too. Do they expect tourists to only be half thirsty?

They'rrrrreeeee umm Bueno?

Sent my mom back home this picture because we've been trying to find her favorite ice cream for years. Too bad it wouldn't last long enough for us to bring some home:

The one theme I seemed to find in several variations of treats was hazelnut and caramel or many items that showcased a teddy bear logo with the brand name "Bimbo." Wonder how many people brought a Bimbo back with them from Puerto Rico?

We were only in Walgreens for a few minutes but by the time we came out of the store, the skies opened up with enough of a steady rain to be obnoxious. We decided to head back to the ship and had our sea pass cards out and ready to show security at the gate. I started to walk past the guard first and he stopped me to insist that we also show photo ID. Thankfully Dad had the habit of always taking our passports off with us. He showed both of ours to the guard who then let us pass. Dad got a kick out of the idea that the only port to make us show our passport was part of the USA.

There was a long line to get back onboard so we had to stand on the gangway waiting in the rain for a bit. At one point we got asked to stand aside so they could bring some tables down the gangway. We still made it back onboard just in time for the start of Family Animated Movie Trivia at 11:30AM, a trivia we didn't care too much about missing if we were still off in port. Once it was over, we finally headed to our cabin to drop off the items we'd brought onshore.

Dad wanted to try Sabor again for lunch today as he wanted to try the tacos. I decided to use the opportunity to try the other appetizers of Spicy Beef Empanadas and Chicken Stuffed Jalapenos Wrapped in Bacon.

Our service with Tavarez as our waiter today was once again super slow and still everyone was sliding around like an ice rink on that floor. Dad went with the Shredded Beef Short Rib and the Spicy Chicken tacos with a side of Grilled Corn on the Cob.

I ordered the Shrimp Taco and a side of the Yucca Barrel Fries.

We got seated fairly quickly but it was a long wait to get our order taken and even longer to get the food. I was surprised that we were never offered drinks and I had to get his attention to order the Avocado Margarita. All the specialty margaritas they offer at Sabor are priced at $13 so they fit within everyone's deluxe drink package. Even though I watched the bartender make my drink this time, it still tasted like I was drinking straight from the bottle. I guess I'm just not much of a drinker because the amount of salt on the rim made me pucker just as much as the alcohol.

We finally had to call Tavarez over and insist that he just bring everything out at once so that I could still make it to the 1:30PM Geography Challenge. Geography and music trivia are Dad's trivia Achilles heels so he wasn't as rushed as I was.

Tavarez was quite shocked that we wanted our food so soon but did his best to oblige by bringing out the bulk of what we ordered since that's all that was ready so far. I noticed while eating my shrimp tacos that they lacked anything to go with them in the form of toppings. We were almost done eating when Tavarez came over to ask "Didn't you want the lettuce etc to go with your tacos?" Umm yes, of course I did is what I said in my head. Instead out of my mouth came "It's okay" to avoid being kept longer. It turns out that we got done by 1:10PM so I stopped on the way to grab a small cup of ice cream from Cups and Scoops to calm down the spicy flavor lingering on my taste buds.

Geography trivia went okay and one of the older couples we played many a trivia with sent me away with a bonus question of which is the furthest state east, west, south, and north. As I gathered my stuff to rejoin Dad back in the cabin, the husband John also tried to quiz me by asking what the capital of Iowa is because I'd gotten excited about the country capital based questions. When I was able to readily answer Des Moines, their reaction was as if I'd just revealed the answer to life's most challenging question. As it turns out, I relayed the questions to Dad and he knew most of them. Even the ones I didn't know or remember!

On the way back to the cabin, I had stopped off at Sorrento for a piece of pizza. Once at the cabin I grabbed my secret Pepsi product root beer and took both to the balcony to watch the DreamWorks Sail Away Party in the aqua theater.

Doesn't everyone drink their root beer in wine glasses? We had enough plates and silverware sets left to feed an army. Glasses however were only wine and champagne flutes plus it wasn't until the last day or two that they bothered to replenish used glasses for our bar area.

Thanks for the sneak peek rehearsal in front of the rock wall! Eric (front) seemed to be the group leader and was way more into the moves than everyone else.