I will be walking out the door soon to drive to Durham, overnight there then have a 10 minute drive to RDU airport tomorrow. I'll meet up with Crystal in Miami and taxi over to the new Regent port and board the Navigator. Looking forward to warmer weather. It's too darn early to be cold in North Carolina.

Hope to update you all on our Western Caribbean adventure! Our ports are Costa Maya, MX, Santo Tomas, Guatemala, Belize City, Cozumel and Key West.

You lucky dog, Beth! I could go for a getaway just about now and I know you and Crystal will have a relaxing cruise! I am so happy you will be seamailing!

Bon Voyage, Beth and Crystal! Have a great time!

Hi Beth and Crystal, Ray and I are doing a back to back of the Western and then the Eastern Carribean in Feb.2013 on the Navigator.

Would love your feelings and thoughts about all the aspects of the cruise, in particuler the shore excursions and which ones you enjoyed the most.

I think there is a new eating place on board...interested in that as well.

Have a ball and I am looking forward to your seamail.

yay for you Beth and Crystal

Have a great time!

Beth! Have a ball and you're right, it's too early for this weather (frost tonight!)

Snowing here in Boston! Have a wonderful Caribbean holiday!

Beth, we are all envious. You and Crystal will have a great time! SeaMail!

Thanks for all the Bon Voyage wishes, y'all. Really looking forward to being back on the Navigator.

Pat, I will be sure to check out Sette Mari for you, All I've read on cc is that the food is good, but it fills up quickly. We should be able to give you some information of our excursions. I took almost the same cruise in 2008 and took a few of the excursions then,

I am really looking forward to getting away and relaxing.

Don't know what you have planned for Belize, butgeorge and I really enjoyed the river cruise to the Mayan ruins. Lots of interesting stuff to see on the way.

You two have a great cruise - sure would love to be with you. Remember the last time I saw you on Navigator? Wish I could turn back the clock as I hate to remember just how long ago that was! Lee

Logged in early this morning to try and see the Navigator come in, but they didn't have the camera pointed toward her until I posted on their Facebook wall.

Here she is:

And there she goes! Have fun Beth and Crystal!

wonderful pixs Cindy! Have fun Beth and Crystal

Boo hoo - they left without me! Great photos though Cindy!

Wow Cindy! Nice stalking!

Cindy, those pix are so pretty, great stalking!!!!

gorgeous Cindy...good job!!

Thanks for the great stalks, Cindy. The sailaway was beautiful.

Lee, we miss you, too.

Day 1 –We’re Onboard

All was fine getting from RDU to the ship yesterday. We were onboard around 2pm and headed to La Veranda with our champagne in hand. It was the usual fare with cheeses, salads, some meats etc. Cruise Director Willie Aames, (Yes, from 8 is Enough fame) announced that our suites were ready at 2:20pm. After lunch, we headed to our home at 625 to find our luggage had arrived, so we began to unpack. When we were all finished, we slid our suit cases under our beds and headed to the Navigator Lounge where we met Chris & Jerry from Michigan and enjoyed chatting and drinking with them.

At the Muster Drill, we met Doris and VG who happen to be our next door neighbor. We had a long drill and walked to a tender. It seemed longer than usual, but it’s over.

After the drill we returned to our suite and got ready for dinner. Our stop before dinner was the Galileo’s Lounge where we ran into the ever popular Elvis making drinks at the bar. We headed to Prime 7 for our 8:00pm reservations and were asked if we wanted to join a table. Saying YES, we were seated with Debbie & Peter from the Rutgers, NJ area (not effected by Sandy). They are a delightful couple and we enjoyed their company. Debbie, Crystal and my entre plates were filled, but poor Peter only had a hand-sized piece of fish on his. I offered him a piece of Alaskan King Crab, which he enjoyed, Debbie’s lobster took over her plate and Crystal’s hunk of beef was huge. We also ordered onion rings and sautéed spinach for the table.

When dinner was over, we headed back up to Galileo’s, but the Beatles Night music and crowd just didn’t sit with us, so we headed back to 625 for the night. We was a good afternoon and evening back on the Navigator!

DAY 2 – I Can See Cuba From The Pool Deck

Since we turned our clocks back last night, we were up and dressed around 8am. We went up to La Veranda where we were greeted by Manuel, our waiter from last night. Our old stand-bys of mango, pistachios, good crispy bacon and a delightfully buttery chocolate croissant ended up on our plates along with a vegetable omelet on mine. As usual, the decaf was horrible, but then I heard the foamy whirl of a coffee machine. It is such a nice touch that Regent heard our calls and has installed a coffee machine in La Veranda. We took a wall around the ship, sat in the Navigator Lounge for a latte, then headed to the boutique for a look. Nothing, absolutely nothing interested me at all. As we walked by the windows on the port side, I looked out and saw mountains in the distance. Since we saw Cuba on the map in the lounge, I coined the phrase, I can see Cuba from deck 7, later to be changed to the pool deck. At 11am, we attended the Wine Tasting Around the World in the Compass Rose. There were wines from the US, Germany and Italy. We saw our neighbor, Doris, so we joined her and enjoyed sipping and talking about wines.

more to come........

Keep up the good work Beth - great reading. Although its time for breakfast here, my mouth watered when I read about the onion rings and spinach - my favourite things in Prime 7!!! Say hi to Crystal for me. Lee

Sounds like a wonderful start, Beth!

We have just dropped anchor off Belize, and are having a lazy morning as our snorkel excursion does not go until the afternoon.

We wound up doing a self-made day at sea yesterday, as none of the excursions really appealed. A surprising number of others had the same idea. So, apart from a trip to the craft market we did not get to Guatemala.

Crystal and Beth, it sounds like a perfect day today! I will make a toast to the two of you with champagne this evening. I'll pretend that we are sharing the moment. Enjoy your cruise.

Carmen, Crystal and I did toast you and J last night with champagne and hope we will be able to do it together sometime soon.

We just sailed away from Cozumel where we enjoyed another self-imposed seaday! Nothing like hanging by the pool resting, reading and enjoying a nice drink. We were the only ship at our dock, but as we sailed away, I saw that there were 4 big ole honkin’ ships at the other bigger pier. I was the only one to be up on the forward deck for sailaway. Nice, quite and peaceful. Today's lunch was a Tex-Mex BBQ. The mango salsa was delicious.

Lucky for us, we have met some nice people on this cruise and enjoyed their company at dinners. Sette Mari was very good, though I was under the weather. Crystal had the Cioppino which she said was delicious. We are returning there tonight, so I think I'll get it.

Last night was the Seven Seas Society Party. Cruise Consultant, Bruce, told us that there were 249 return passengers with 36 Gold, 7 Platinum and 3 Titanium. Tomorrow is the GPT event which is a Cocktail Sail-In to Key West. That should sit just right for our Parasailing a few hours later!!

Yesterday in Belize, we took the Absolute Paradise snorkeling excursion. There were a small number of us on this trip, which was nice. Once on the island, we divided up into two groups: those new to snorkeling and the advanced group. Crystal took the novice group and had a great time and I took the advanced group and did not enjoy it. It was a guided snorkel when we had to stay up with the group. I found that I was surrounded by flippers in my face all the time and wasn’t able to enjoy the fish as I was trying to keep up with the group all the time. It was not a relaxing snorkel. At least Crystal had fun in the novice group, where she saw a feeding frenzy. After the 45 minute snorkeling, we returned to the beach that had thatched umbrellas with benches, picnic tables and a few chairs. Sandwiches, chips, cookies, soft drinks and water was available. Beer and Belize trinkets was available for purchase.

As a bit of a critique, the service has been up to par. Some of the meats haven’t been the best with tough steak and lobster. Last night I ordered the herb-encrusted rack of lamb. The crusted layer was thick with mustard and salty. The lamb itself was cooked perfectly. The pastry chef is doing great work! Marc Evan, the barista in the Navigator Lounge, got his training at Starbucks in the Philippines. He’s a sweet guy, saving money to return home to earn his MBA.

I hope I can write some more when I get home later this week.

Beth, I stalked you this morning and I think what I saw was the Navigator but the port schedule said you were to be anchored so I didn't grab the shot!

Great to hear from you Beth! Enjoy warm temps, higher than here, for sure!

Thanks Karen, luckily we were all along at our dock. I was looking for the webcam to wave HI to all.

A. Kathy, one more day for warm weather then home to cool temps. Not looking forward to that, but will dream of warm, clearTahitian waters of next August!

We are on our way to Key West.

Beth, if Regent is using the same parasailing tour operator that we had when we were there, opt for the video and pictures, they were high quality and the video is great to watch when you get home!

Beth - I was worried you might not enjoy the snorkeling excursion in Belize. Alice and I felt the same way you did, and we had an even bigger crowd. I was afraid of saying anything because I didn't want to discourage you from going as it might have turned out to be better than ours was. And, at least it did for Crystal. We had complications from the beginning on FUN2. The boat they were taking us to the island on broke. We had to go back to the Mariner and wait for another boat to come from the mainland. It took forever and by the time we got to the snorkeling island it was late and the whole group had to do the swim together thing. I expected we could be on our own if it weren't for the time crunch. But, from your experience, it appears that's how they operate all the time. Stinky. When we realized what was going to happen, we thought we'd try to stay in the front of the pack with the leader to avoid the reduced viz from all the churned up sand, etc.. It only made it more rushed. Oh well, it was "free"! haha

Here comes Beth and Crystal!

Awesome!!