After taking a few years off from cruising, we decided to take another trip on Voyager of the Seas in 2004. The main reason we decided to go on Voyager again was because Royal Caribbean had decided to start offering some cruises from the New York area. At the time we originally booked the trip, the ship was to leave from the Manhattan passenger ship terminal. That was much more convenient for us than having to travel down to Florida to catch the ship. Some time after we had booked the trip, Royal Caribbean announced that they were changing the departure port from New York City to Bayonne, New Jersey. They had just reached an agreement with the City of Bayonne to use an old military terminal as their exclusive departure port. This was great news for us since the new terminal, now known as Cape Liberty Cruise Port, is only about 10 minutes from where we live.
This trip was also going to be our longest cruise as we had booked the 9 night Caribbean cruise. As usual, time flew by and it was soon time to head to the pier. It was a breeze, taking all of about 10 minutes to arrive at the terminal. Once there, we pulled up to the drop off area and unloaded our bags and then I went to park the car in the on-site parking. Check in and boarding went pretty smoothly considering it was a new departure port and everything was new and still being sorted out. My only complaint was the condition of area the ship leaves from. It was a 50+ year old military terminal so it was in need of some work. At the time, the word was that Royal Caribbean and the city of Bayonne were going to jointly develop the site into a modern port along with hotels, condos and shopping. I pass by there daily on my commute to work and so far in the 3 years since, I haven't seen any changes at the site.
Anyway, back to the review. Once we were onboard we were pleasantly surprised at the good condition of the ship. She had just gone in to drydock for a minor refresh prior to starting voyages out of New Jersey. We also realized once in our cabin, that it was the same cabin we were in on our first trip on Voyager in 2000. The cabins though didn't seem to get as much attention as the public areas while the ship was in drydock. There was some obvious wear and tear on the cabin furniture, carpets and other areas. Not a big deal, but noticeable.
This was a 9 night Western Caribbean cruise with stops in Labadee (RCL's private beach), Ocho Rios, Jamaica, Georgetown, Grand Cayman, and Cozumel, Mexico. Labadee as usual was very nice. This time we didn't hang around much on the beach. We went back to the ship around lunch time and felt like we had it all to ourselves. We went to Johnny Rockets for lunch where there was no wait. In Ocho Rios, we went to Margaritaville because I had heard a lot of good things about it. We had a great time even if I did manage to drink a wee bit too much. Grand Cayman was very nice. This was our first visit there and we really liked the island. We really wanted to see more of it than we could given the limited time we were there. Unfortunately, we were unable to get to our final stop of Cozumel due to a hurricane in the area. Instead, we turned around and headed back to Jamaica, stopping in Montego Bay. We didn't get off the ship there opting to just hang around and relax.
Once again, the trip lived up to all our expectations. The food, service and entertainment were all great. The real bright spot of the cruise was our Cruise Director, Richard Spacey. He was by far the best CD we have ever had on any of our cruises. He really made this trip great.
All in all, it was another wonderful cruise vacation. We all had a great time and enjoyed every minute of it. We had fallen off the wagon and our cruise addiction was back in full swing.
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