Half way through our Jewel of the Seas cruise brings us to the island of Antigua (pronounced an-tee-gah). Once again, our plans revolved around going to the beach.
First of all, we woke up at 7 and were ready for the Windjammer at 8. Crowds for the Windjammer haven't been bad at all when we have been there, with little lines to speak of. The omelette station has been my go-to breakfast place, especially because I've lost the ability to tolerate mass produced eggs.
In Antigua, the dock is rather short so we had to take the forward elevators to disembark instead of the Centrum elevators. The good thing about this is the walk from the ship to the port area is quite short.
We needed a taxi to get us to our beach of choice, Valley Church Beach. Antigua boasts they have 365 beaches (one for each day of the year) and after some research on TripAdvisor, Valley Church Beach looked beautiful.
As soon as we walked into town, the usual barrage of taxi drivers hit us. My general strategy is to go to the back of the "pack" of drivers and find a driver who isn't in our face, so to speak. We found one such driver who agreed to drive the six of us to Valley Church Beach for $30 each way.
Our driver, Cutty, took us in his van and provided narration about the island and what we were passing along the way. He was nice, curteous and the sort of driver you hope to get on any island.
What drew me to Valley Church Beach besides the beauty of the beach is $5 chairs and $10 umbrellas along with free WiFi. Sure enough, when we arrived that was the situation.
First and foremost, the beach was beautiful The color of the water was amazing, perhaps more beautiful than Orient Beach in St Martin, although the water was not as clear here. The sand at Valley Church was made up shells and sand, so it was more coarse than normal. That being said, the sand brushed off our bodies easier.
Once we got our seats and umbrellas ($20 for 2 chairs and umbrellas) we immediately ran into the chrorus line of vendors trying to sell jet ski rides, shirts, massages, CDs, shark wrestling (seriously) and other wares. It's easy enough to say no thank you but I'm certain no less than 10 times were we asked about jet ski rides.
When we arrived, the beach was completely empty and it stayed that way for the first hour or two. But quickly thereafter more and more people showed up. It wasn't crazy crowded by any means but by the time we left, the beach was pretty full.
There's also a bar and restaurant at the beach. They offer the usual sort of drinks, although no waiter service. For food, they offer hot dogs, burgers, pizza, salads and an assortment of seafood dishes that are considered local food. We didn't try the food but the beer prices were between $3-5 per beer. Not bad.
The water was, well, beautiful. An amazing shade of blue and the perfect warm temperature. It was a pleasure to go swimming here and the view made the experience wonderful.
Cutty came to get us at our pre-arranged time of 2:30 and we piled back into the van and headed back into town. We had lofty goals in the morning of coming back early to shop in town but the sun was once again brutal and since we had not eaten anything, we all wanted to get back onboard for food and rest.
Once back onboard, we went straight up to Seaview Cafe for a late lunch. The food was good as usual and came out quickly. I am noticing more and more people onboard the ship in the early afternoon. I had a discussion with Cutty, who said if Antigua is the first island their ship stops at, lots of people take taxis but if it's an island they visit towards the end of their cruise, people stay onboard the ship to save money. I think he might be onto something.
After getting back to the room to rest (also know as taking a nap), we got ready for dinner and Italian night in the main dining room. Food was really good all around, with the eggplant pargmigan standing out as a favorite.
Tomorrow we are going to St. Lucia and the Captain warned us over the PA system that we will need to go siginifigantly faster than any other day, so we may feel a little more movement tonight. I can feel it more than usual but truthfully a little rocking is perfect for sleeping.
