Cruise Wrap-Up
Our transatlantic Royal Caribbean cruise aboard the Jewel of the Seas was for 14 nights. Here is our room on the ship; we went with the cheapest room category so it was an inside room so there is no window. At our rate of ~$65/day/person (includes lodging, taxes, fees, gratuities, all you can eat food, entertainment, and transportation to another continent), it’s hard to beat the value of a cruise!
During our cruise there were many activities on board the ship. One day there was the monthly staff awards ceremony. Staff are recognized for every 5 years they work with Royal Caribbean. Some of the staff have been with the company for 25+ years!
They told the story where a few weeks back (not during our cruise), the ship received a distress call from a sailboat. Because the sailboat was not in jeopardy of sinking it wasn’t mandatory that the cruise ship help it. They were the only vessel in the area and the captain made the decision to go to the sailboat to help. Once the ship reached the sailboat they found that only one couple was on the boat and the engine was broken.
The other vessel still had sails that could work and they were going to the same island the ship was. The captain offered to take them on the ship but they refused as they didn’t want to leave their boat. The ship then left and went to its planned destination. The staff on the ship looked for the sailboat all day but it never arrived in port. At the end of the day when the ship left it went back to the sailboat and 4 staff on the ship volunteered to go and stay on the sailboat to fix the engine. The ship left 4 people there and continued to its next destination. The Royal Caribbean staff fixed the sailboats engine and made it to land. The ship then went to pick them up. During the ceremony the 4 staff that volunteered to go onto the sailboat were recognized for their selfless act. They also received an extra $200.
Once our ship crossed the Atlantic Ocean and was entering the Mediterranean Sea there was a fun ceremony to celebrate the crossing of the Atlantic. King Neptune, god of the sea, came on the ship. Captain Dustin asked King Neptune for entry into the Mediterranean Sea and smooth seas (which he definitely delivered on!). He presented the king a key to the ship.
Before King Neptune would let us pass he needed some sacrifices. Several comical reasons were made up about what the officers had done to deserve retribution. One of the things was that two officers were caught stealing cheese from the buffet before it opened to the passengers. The requested sacrifice was getting slime dumped on them.
After the sacrifices there was free champaign.
Another day on the ship we celebrated the ship’s 14th birthday. Balloons fell down and there was a large cake.
On May 18, 2018 the ship docked at Valencia, Spain. The port was very large and to get to the city center you had to take a shuttle bus that was around 45 minutes each way. Brian and I didn’t have anything that we wanted to do in the city so we never took the shuttle bus. We got off the ship and walked to the port terminal in hopes of getting WiFi. The WiFi was too slow to upload pictures but we were able to read our email. We then went back onto the ship to relax.
Here are the towel animals that we got in our room during the cruise.
Overall, our trip from San Juan, Puerto Rico to Rome, Italy was fantastic aboard the Jewel of the Seas, and we’d recommend a transatlantic cruise to anyone else that is looking for great value (and have two weeks to kill!).
Sunset on our final night of the cruise
