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San Juan Del Sur, Nicaragua

We did the tour with the museum, horse drawn carriage ride tour of the city and boat tour of Lake Nicaragua. The port is definitely worth visiting but needs environmental cleanup to an extensive degree. It is an area filled with potential if it got more attention. The museum needs more donations to protect their treasures. They have what we would call national treasures, sitting under what most would consider a carport environment! It was very informative and had neat things to see there. The carriage ride was quick. The horses literally were promoted to run through town, through traffic. We did see some stop and talk about buildings, but we ran past them all! There were a lot of animals wandering along the road sides to graze. Pigs, cows and horses appeared to wander everywhere, through tons of styrofoam packaging waste! The port has a lot of potential but really needs some deep cleaning. The boat tour was more about the real estate available on the lake. It’s interesting to know that I could own an island and Home for less than my home! We did go out to monkey island and see the monkeys. They are super friendly and swing down to boats when the come close to them. The story of the island was really interesting. The saddest part was the amount of pollution in the lake. They need some serious environmental cleanup at this port.

Oranjestad, Aruba

I highly recommend an organized tour in the port, especially on a holiday. This is a very beautiful island with gorgeous beaches and gorgeous waters. For our second visit we did the snorkeling tour of the shipwreck. It was fantastic! On our first visit, we were extremely disappointed. It was on Christmas Day; everything was closed. We hired a taxi to take us to a snorkeling location. He took us several miles though town and dropped us off at a random road stop and robbed us! We ended up walking along the beach back to the port. We reported the taxi driver (he was well known as the Jamaican) and he was dealt with, whatever that means there!

Cartagena, Colombia

I highly recommend taking a tour. The locals will badger you to buy things and it’s not the most friendly port. We took the hop on bus to the palace, but they wouldn’t accept our credit cards. The price was double what we had read about online and on the ship, so we were a few bucks short! The peddlers were super pushy and there was no shaded areas available to wait for the bus. We got back on the bus and went along the sea wall to go downtown. We walked through downtown and stopped at a few churches and historic buildings. Everyone wanted to charge just to look at the buildings. It was a bit dirty everywhere as compared to most port cities. We walked all the way through and back onto the ship. We stuck to main streets, but there were several times we didn’t feel like we had made the safest idea!

Singapore

Singapore is super clean and virtually crime free. Many people speak English or will help you find your way with a map. We spent an extra day exploring here. We stayed at the Raffles just as a bucket list spot. It was elegant and had the best ambiance of any hotel ever. The staff was super sweet and we loved their breakfast! It’s expensive, but worth the experience! We walked into Chinatown and enjoyed trying different local dishes. The Singapore Chili Crabs dish was amazing!!! We also had a variety of soup dumplings that we loved. At night you can sit along the riverfront and see the lights. We arrived early, selected a nice seat on the front and ordered wine and snacks. After the sun went down you could see laser lights on the Marina Bay and across the skyline. It was pretty, but we live in Vegas, so.....we were underwhelmed because we are spoiled!

Phuket, Thailand

I absolutely loved Thailand. We walked out to the town. There’s a market with an ATM if you just walk right out of the tender area and straight ahead. We got local money there and walked to the right into town. There are some great little markets and a large on not too far away. There were also food stalls that we adored. (We always look to see where the locals eat and there was a consistent stream of taxi drivers visiting a number of spots!) We found a lady making soups and she was worried that we picked her spicy ones. We know only enough Thai to get food! All I can say is delicious!!! On our return to the ship area they had set up long rows of vendor stalls selling everything under the sun. They had also set up a local currency exchange, so we exchanged some cash and had a blast! We got clothes, hand stamped leather paintings, wooden elephant sculptures, we then found a super busy little food stall and requested my favorite noodle dish, pad kee mow. It wasn’t on the menu, but she was super pleased that I asked. She produced the ingredients and we selected for her to add her seafood to it. It was the most delicious I’ve ever eaten. Yes, on the side of the road! The price translated to less than $2.00usd!!!