Explora II Cruise - February, 2026
Day 4 – St. Thomas
Saturday, February 7
Our shore excursion---oops, sorry---"Destination Experience" was originally called "Sailing on a catamaran" but was changed to "Cruising on a catamaran" which seemed like an important change since our particular catamaran did not have sails. We briefly considered cancelling, but ultimately decided to go ahead.
We checked in at the Journeys Lounge, got our numbered tickets and after a very brief wait, lined up and exited the ship, walked down the dock and boarded the catamaran.
Oh, look! Marge from yesterday's drawing class is on our excursion. Marge is talking non-stop. How fun!
We travelled for about 20 minutes, then anchored at Island Cove for the snorkeling. Marge talks over the safety briefing and crew instructions. Ugh. Wifey likes to snorkel, but I do not, so I was planning on just relaxing on the boat. Two problems: Snorkelers are instructed to either stay with the group or go with a "buddy". Wifey immediately leaves the group and goes off on her own away from everyone else. The other problem is that Marge is not snorkeling, either. She is going from person to person (none of which she appears to actually know) and telling them a long story about how she has snorkeled all over the world and she "accidentally" left her snorkel gear in the closet of her suite. I put accidentally in quotes because my theory is that Marge left the gear on purpose since she wouldn't be able to talk while a snorkel was in her mouth. Am I being a little mean? Yes. But is she annoying the crap out of me? Also yes! And I will note that Fred didn't sit with her on the ride over and he's going snorkeling--with his own gear! Which means he got his snorkel bag out of the closet yet didn't make sure Marge had hers? Something's off here.
So now instead of relaxing, I am keeping an eye on wifey while simultaneously, very carefully, positioning myself about 20 feet from Marge at all times.
I'm growing concerned. There's still about 20 minutes of snorkeling left and Marge is running out of people to talk to. I think my turn is coming. I may need to jump in the water.
Whew. Just in time, a few snorkelers returned to the boat early and got "Marged". I narrowly escaped that one!
We're now heading to the beach. Marge doesn't want to get off the boat. The crew member is explaining to her that everyone needs to go to the beach so they can use the time to clean the boat. Marge is going to talk to the captain.
Update: Marge is staying on the boat. Fred is going to the beach. :-)
I hung out at the beach (which is on Water Island). Wifey went snorkeling again from the beach. She came back and reported there wasn't much to see. We were told there were turtles, but they were hiding today. After about an hour, we loaded onto the catamaran and headed back to the Explora.
We chose to only make reservations at the four restaurants (we are not going Anthology or Chef's Table) on sea days. We never know how tired we'll be after an excursion, plus the food in the Emporium Marketplace is fantastic, so we just elected to go there on port days.
Finally for today, I want to cover the night lights in the suite. There are two motion-activated lights on the lowest shelf of each nightstand (one on each side of the bed). If you are sensitive to light, they could be an issue. We did not find them to be problematic. The bed is high enough that the lights don't really shine in your eyes if you are sleeping.
Also, in the bathroom is a small USB night light. It does not have a motion sensor or on/off switch. If it's fully plugged into the USB port, the light is on. We found that our suite attendant during the morning cleaning would pull the light slightly out of the port to turn off the light, then during the nightly turn-down, he would push it in so the light would be on:
Final step count for Day 4:
