That Holland America cruise

I have been on some 14 cruises, but the Holland American cruise line is the worst I have ever used, or rather, the Zuiderdam ship was by far the worst ever.

The thing is though, we had a wonderful cruise IN SPITE OF THEM, when at  the end of December  2017, I headed out with eight adult friends and five kids.

It was the camaraderie that did it.

Great travel partners

What I found as a really horrible first impression from we embarked was the fact that they never even had a small welcome package in the staterooms. They remind me ever so much of Spirit airlines, for once you pay your fare, you have to pay for almost every single thing. For example, I have never been on a cruise where you go to the gym and pay to even cycle! Dinners in certain dining rooms you had to pay for and in some recreation areas, you had to pay to even enter! Yuck.

To make matters worse, the new year's eve party music was terrible and they even started the countdown almost 2 minutes after midnight and only gave out free champagne after people grumbled loudly.

Anyway their saving grace is their staff, all of whom were wonderful and also their entertainment, especially the Trinidadian steel bank Island Music.

Half Moon bay, Bahamas

I liked the choice of ports of call too, Bahamas, Aruba, Curacao, Cartagena, Panama Canal and Limon, but that is what attracted me in the first place and caused me to take that particular cruise.

I started out enjoying wonderful tours all the way to Cartagena, then because a man had sneezed on me for about 15 minutes non-stop at a show the night after news year's day, boom, I was hit down with an influenza virus.

First I went through it was a coughing spell for an entire day, for which I took lozenges. Then feeling better, went on the tour of the "Walled city in Cartagena," when bam I  fainted on a sidewalk with 103 degree fever.

What a shock.

However, having friends around was what saved my life as in no time they secured my belongings and had me back on the shuttle to the boat and right to the hospital doctor. I was in isolation for two days but was happy and animated after that and enjoyed the rest of the cruise, thanks to the great company.

Back to the tours before the drama.

The first stop was at Half Moon Bay, one of the 700 "islands" of the Bahamas. This one is owned by Carnival Cruise but its just a small cay surrounded by a white sand beach. I swam but the water was cold brrr. Then the rain poured.

That was a forgettable port stop.

A section of the scenic Arikok National Park

ARUBA

I liked Aruba which reminds me a lot of Antigua,.......flat, lovely beaches all around and hot.  As it is a very dry island, they grow very little and import much.

Apart from tourism the only other industry they have is aloe vera farming, processing and export.

What  really caught me though were the caves and the fabulous rock garden.

The best caves are  in Arikok national park. That area reminds me of our own Hellshire in Jamaica.

The Guadirikiri  cave was very impressive  with its fabulous  stalagmites and stalactites and interesting formations which challenge the imagination.

The other cave we stopped at was Fontein but because of the delicate bat population, we couldn't take photos inside.

The island itself is tiny and  less than seventy miles from Venezuela and they take tourism seriously, even giving us helmets and flashlights to tour the Fontein cave. It is unique  too with a population of just over one hundred thousand but made up of ninety six nationalities. They also have a high literacy rate as education is compulsory and most people speak a minimum of four languages.

They remain part of the kingdom of Holland and have an ambitious green program to go totally renewable by 2020. To achieve this the airport is covered with solar panels and they have quite a large wind farm and are serious about recycling.

What I really fell for though was  the Rock Park at Ayo which was once a sacred ground for the indigenous Arawaks.

This area is close to the town of Santa Cruz in the center of the island. I have seen really spectacular rock foundations in my time in Nevada, Utah, Colorado etc, but this was even more awesome.

The backdrop to this Rock park was mount Jamananota, only 620 feet high, but when you are on a really flat island, even a little hill like that looks high!

To get to this point we had driven through an eerie, deserted area where the guide said the French had murdered a number of Indians and according to him, at nights, if you drive though that area alone at nights, ghosts enter your vehicle!

Obviously bunkum but a timely constant reminder of how vicious the European invaders were towards the indigenous people throughout the western world when they arrived.

Curacao

Curacao is also part of the Dutch kingdom and interestingly, like Aruba, it also has a female governor. The governors have to be locally born people though.

It is however larger and more industrialized than is sister island Aruba, even being a banking haven,. It also has the deepest deep sea harbor in the Caribbean, so does a great deal of trade, especially with its neighbor Venezuela.

Venezuela is currently being devastated by a socialist experiment which has led to chronic shortages so people from that large, powerful neighbor, visit in droves and work in Curacao to send money back to their relatives.

 

The Venezuelans even operate a floating market at the port in Curacao where you can buy any agricultural product from the barges then they load up on scarce imported goods to take home.

In general Curacao is a shoppers haven for all its Caribbean neighbors. Because it has so much going for it, tourism does not appear to be as well developed as over in Aruba.

We took the island tour and visited  the Hato cave  near Willemstad but it was nothing close to those in Aruba although better lit.

Cartagena

My first impression of  Cartagena was that  it is  not only a dirty city but also unsafe as most homes are grilled. Unfortunately because during the tour of the walled city  I collapsed I never really got  to see much, so that’s a lasting impression.

The "walled city" is  an old district full of impressive colonial architecture and heritage sites and surrounded by thick stone walls. It was founded by the Spanish in the 16th century after an attack by Francis Drake. It took two centuries  to be  completed, as the city faced frequent damage from storms and pirate attacks.

Today hundreds of people make their living selling wares and offering services there. Some women even dress in  traditional costumes and charge to take photos. You can also get a horse drawn tour of the city. I was really enjoying this outing until I had to be unceremoniously evacuated, but that's life.

After that, I stayed on ship after coming out of isolation, but really enjoyed the rest of the cruise hanging out with my group of dear friends, the Simmons, Simmonds and Green and even getting beaten badly in drafts.

The entertainment on the ship was really good, especially the magician and Island Music steel band from Trinidad. They really enjoy entertaining guests and it is by far the best steel band I have even seen in my life.

So despite the flu setback I enjoyed myself immensely for the company, the tours, he entertainment, the workers made up for the lousy cruise line!

Think I am going to give Central and South America a break for a while though. For about two years ago when I returned from Brazil, Guyana and Surinam  I also had a fever and was isolated at Medical Associates in Jamaica as they thought I had brought back malaria to the island!
Fevers and I are not doing too well with Latin American travel somehow!

SCENES FROM MY BALCONY DURING ISLOLATION. THIS WAS JUST OUTSIDE THE PANAMA CANAL

SCENES INSIDE THE WALLED CITY BEFORE MY DEMISE!

 

Kidnapped!

Now I know what it feels like to be kidnapped and imprisoned! Well maybe that's a bit dramatic since my experience was nothing like that poor Colombian senator who was kidnapped and held by rebels for some seven years during which period she had a child (no doubt the result of rape) for one of the rebels.

So by comparison, my experience was by no means as frightening but it was a form of kidnapping and imprisonment anyway.

It started so simply, for after having a bout of fever and shivers on Friday 25th May and taking the  usual home remedies and having the fever go away, to my  surprise after a great day of riding to Lovers leap in St. Elizabeth from Spur Tree Hill in Manchester on Sunday, when I returned the fever suddenly reoccurred accompanied by chills.

View from Lovers Leap

By Monday morning the stubborn fever was still around, so I went to my doctor at Medical Associates Hospital  to get some antibiotics. Problem was, my doctor was sick so they sent me to his colleague Charmaine Webb who I had  known many years ago. When she heard about the fever going and coming, for some reason she looked up symptoms for malaria and asked me if I had been to any countries where they have the disease.

I mentioned that I had been in south America but had been back for over three weeks but that seems to have set off a panic as according to them Brazil has a serious malaria epidemic.That's when it was referred to a Dr. Kildere Donaldson who is supposed to be an expert in contagious diseases and he insisted that I had to be admitted for observation and the matter reported to the public health authorities for malaria had been eradicated from Jamaica and they were paranoid that it not return to the shores. I had to be admitted immediately they said so the necessary tests could be done.

 Never having encountered a situation like this, I called to get legal advice but was told that my contact had no knowledge of public health law. So I called a friend had been the medical officer of health for St. Ann. His sober advice was that I go into hospital for observation and testing for  if I didn't, the public health authorities could send the police for me and take me into the public hospital  to be quarantined and tested.

 Well that was enough to get me to go back and be admitted to Medical Associates where they put me in a private room, under a mosquito net and all! However, the  net was open at the top so if any mosquitoes were around, they could have flown in and out in wild abandon, so happily, since I am terribly claustrophobic, I quickly abandoned it!!!

For two days, I was put through every possible test and I think they took away at  least half of my blood and would you believe I never even had a temperature or chills for the entire time I was there . 

Anyway, the hospital is not bad at all. The food good and all the staff nice but there is no place like home. So since I had absolutely no more symptoms, I was allowed to go home although the test results from the government lab were not yet not returned. (I hear those bureaucrats down there can take up to 2 weeks to send back the results!)

What a relief all around. No more confinement and no more topless mosquito nets.

One thing I know though, the next time I go south, I will be taking every single vaccine available, from yellow fever to dengue, for I will never be confined again.