Take Your Cruise from Ordinary to Extraordinary with These 2 Additions!

My goodness, can't believe we are already at 20.

I mean just think next week our guest will be Legal Drinking Aid.

Wow.

Popums up, baby.

But we're not at 21 yet.

We still got today's episode to get through, and baby, it's a doozy.

Because why?

Because we are wrapping up our series on all things cruising.

That's right, this is our fifth and final episode of the series, and today we are diving into two topics.

I've combined them into one episode because I feel like they both have the same purpose.

They are meant to enhance the entire cruising experience.

Well, what are they?

We're talking about specialty restaurants and short excursions.

Alright, so I understand that not everybody is a cruising fanatic like myself.

So when I talk about things like specialty restaurants and short excursions, you might be a little bit confused.

So for my cruising fans, just bear with me, it will only take a moment.

I just want to catch everyone up to speed on what we're talking about.

So first, I'm gonna dive into the specialty restaurants.

Now, most people realize that one of the awesome things about cruising is that included in with the cruise fair is all the food you care to eat.

And that is indeed the case.

But it's become very popular in recent years for the cruise ships to also include what they call specialty restaurants.

So these restaurants are going to be, most of them always have some type of awesome steakhouse.

Some may have like a Japanese steakhouse or some type of really nice Italian restaurant.

Whatever it may be, it's going to be something over the top amazing, generally coming at a flat price for the dinner.

So that's what a specialty restaurant is.

And that's what I want to talk about.

Because you might be thinking at first, well, I mean, the main dining room serves up amazing food as it is.

So why do I care to pay extra?

Well, you don't have to, but if you want to do as my awesome client, Tom Cates does, you'll realize it's definitely worth it.

And that's what I want to tell you about Tom Cates, or better known to most people as Tommy Cates, because that's where I first learned how amazing the specialty restaurants are.

So let me tell you a little story.

In the eye of his travel advisor, Tommy Cates is pretty much a walking contradiction.

What do I mean?

What I mean is is even though he would cruise on nothing less than a seven-night cruise and have nothing less than the grand suite, he had no desire to sail on anything other than carnival.

And even though he had won the Florida lottery in years past, when he's at the casino, he's playing nothing but the penny slot machines.

He may be waiting in the VIP waiting area before his cruise, but don't expect to see him dressed up in no suit and tie come formal night.

No way.

Because Tommy Cates, or in my case, Uncle Tom, he had his cruising pegged to a T.

Matter of fact, his favorite place to eat on any of his carnival cruise was the Carnival's Fahrenheit Steakhouse.

What I found particularly interesting was his advice to me.

And that was the night that he loves to go to the steakhouse is the night of the formal night, the captain's dinner, when everybody on the ship is so excited to get dressed up and they all head to the main dining room for that much sought-after lobster and prime rib.

He said, Why would we do that?

Instead, we can go to the steakhouse, wear our comfortable clothes, there's no one in the restaurant, and we can have all the lobster and prime rib we care to have.

I'm telling you, the man was brilliant.

I was fortunate enough to get to experience his piece of advice firsthand.

Because on the very first trip that I ever worked on for Uncle Tom and his wife and his group of family and friends, well, they invited me to come along with them.

As he said, might as well bring their travel agent with them.

That way, if something goes wrong, they can throw me overboard.

I was hoping he was joking.

Luckily, nothing went wrong, so we didn't have to even explore if he was serious on that or not.

But back to the specialty restaurant.

He was so right.

Our table was the only party in the entire restaurant.

The service was absolutely incredible.

The food was over the top, luxuriously delicious.

And like I said, we were sitting in there with comfy clothes, meanwhile, everybody else is dressed up in all of their stuffy clothes and looking all fancy and heading to the main dining room.

Meanwhile, we were the ones with the real plan.

Because, well, we were smart enough to trust what Uncle Tom had to say.

You know, what made that dinner so amazing wasn't the food.

It wasn't the service.

It was the time that I got to actually sit and talk with Uncle Tom.

Because I have to tell you, he was one of those guys who every Thanksgiving and Christmas, he was one of those who just kind of sat in the corner and chuckled, and you would see his little rosy cheeks as he'd be laughing under his breath at everybody else.

But he didn't talk much.

But it was at that dinner he said, let's have my travel agent sit down at the end of the table with me.

I talked to him throughout the entire dinner.

It was absolutely wonderful.

It was one of those memories that I will cherish forever, especially because when we got back home and upon working on him and his group's next cruise later on, Uncle Tom would end up getting sick and he went into the hospital.

His passing took us all for surprise.

Why did he have to leave?

Why is it always that the best men, the best people, the good guys always have to leave us so soon?

But as easy as it is to dwell on what is no more, I have to instead think positive.

I have to be thankful for that cruise.

That one cruise that I got to book for Uncle Tom and his group, that was at the start of my career as a travel agent.

It was right after I opened the doors to Better Days Travel.

And that just set a fire in me as a travel agent because it made me realize that this isn't just a job.

I'm truly creating memories.

This was a memory for myself, but I get to create memories for everybody.

Because of this one cruise, it's given me the best piece of advice that I offer to every single person I ever book on a cruise ever since then.

And that is, don't worry about packing that suit and tie or that fancy dress, skip the captain dinners, and head to the steakhouse instead.

All right, now that you got your bellies full on a little prime rib and lobster, let's go ahead and switch gears over to shore excursions.

All too often, cruisers, myself included, pick these awesome itineraries, these amazing destinations that you're going to visit within the week or however long your cruise is.

But so many times you end up going and you get off the boat and you just wander around the port and you go to the different gift shops and maybe visit the restaurants like Senor Frogs and have a big old margarita or something.

That's it.

Then you find yourself wandering back on the boat and you're, you know, ready to set sail.

But I have to tell you, if that's all you're doing, you are totally cutting yourself short on the entire experience off the boat.

I mean, I get it.

The cruise ships, they are incredible.

But the destinations that you visit are as equally amazing, if not even more so.

I have to highly encourage you to go the route of booking a shore excursion.

All right, gotta take a quick pause again for my non-cruising listeners.

I want to catch you up to speed with exactly what I'm talking about when I'm referring to shore excursions.

So, just as I explained, you can go on the cruise and get off at each port a call and wander around and do your own thing in the destination.

Or you can opt to book what is called a shore excursion, or basically some type of guided tour to visit parts of the destination.

Generally, we're talking about the Caribbean.

So maybe it's different excursions that you get off and you go with the group of fellow cruisers to visit different parts of the island.

And maybe it's to do a bus tour around and visit the area restaurants.

Or maybe it's to go with the group and you get on a big, huge, like 50-foot catamaran and go off and to the different snorkeling locations.

That's what I'm talking about when I'm talking about shore excursions.

And what I want to tell you about is the shore excursions are amazing.

They give you an opportunity to really and truly experience the destination in a way that you just can't do on your own.

These shore excursions, they can be booked through the cruise line, or if you are using a travel agent, you can always book through them because they actually work with some other preferred third-party shore excursion companies that offer a even more customized experience, typically something with uh fewer people in the group and maybe just has some different options than what you can get direct from the cruise line.

But regardless, I'm telling you, the shore excursions are definitely a must.

I've been on quite a few Caribbean cruises in my life, and every one of them that we've done shore excursions, we have never come back disappointed.

We always come back with some type of crazy story about how it was either absolutely out of this world or sometimes a little bit terrifying.

The terrifying part generally comes in the way of getting on a rickety bus that is made out of a converted, like big Ford F-350 that they've then put seats in the bed of the truck, and they've loaded the thing down, and now you're cruising through the island, going down the roads, and the driver's just got the foot to the floor, and you're in the other lanes of traffic as they're trying to get enough speed to make it up the hill, and everybody in the bus is screaming, and the driver's

just cracking up, laughing, and you're just praying that you actually make it to the uh excursion.

Then you make it to the excursion, and generally we've done a lot of these excursions where we get on, like I said earlier, like a big 50-foot sailing catamaran where the party's just getting started as the rum punch is slowing, and you're heading off to sea to hit some different snorkeling locations, and just gives you an opportunity to dive in.

They include all the snorkeling gear, and it just makes for a really awesome day off the boat.

Out of all the excursions that I've done, there's always still this one particular excursion that sticks out in my mind.

And that was on one of a cruise that I took with my mom and sister, where we stopped in Puerto Rico and we booked an excursion to do a hike through the rainforest, absolutely out of this world.

Loaded in a nice air-conditioned bus, we made our way from the cruise port up into the rainforest of Puerto Rico.

When we booked this excursion, we didn't realize at the time that I was going to end up having some issues with my knee that would later end up resulting in me having to have surgery.

So when the main part of the excursion was to take a hike through the rainforest, we started realizing maybe that wasn't going to be the best choice for me.

I said, no, let's go ahead and go on it and let's just see what happens.

And I'm so glad we did.

Because as our group made our way up the mountain, gaining an elevation, we made a couple of different stops, a couple of different lookout points.

Obviously, for the blind passenger, the lookout points weren't really such a big attraction, but it did give us a chance to get off the bus.

And lo and behold, the weather was terrible.

It was raining.

Matter of fact, it rained the entire time.

And I can't tell you how many people on the tour were so upset by it.

We were in the rainforest, remember?

That's what our tour guide told everybody.

You guys, you're in the rainforest.

In the rainforest, it rains.

It's not just the name.

Luckily enough, we did make a stop at a little uh gift shop, a little tourist spot along the way, and people were able to pick up ponchas who were worried about getting wet.

We ended up keep making our way up the mountain, and I wish I knew how high an elevation we went, but we won't get that detailed.

So, anyways, we ended up deciding, me and my mom and my sister, that once we got to the main stop, our last stop of the trip, where we would get out and take the heights through the rainforest, that because of the issues that I had with my knee, that we would probably just tell our tour guide that we were just going to stick back around the bus and mingle around the parking lot and just, you know, see what we could do.

You know, we're pretty easygoing, so we didn't have a problem with that.

So sure enough, when everybody else was off the bus, my mom went up to the driver and let him know what our plan was.

He was so awesome.

And that's where this tour goes into one for the record books, because the tour guide, well, he wasn't even supposed to have been a quote unquote tour guide because he was just staying in the bus and would be there waiting on everybody as they got back.

But as soon as he heard that we weren't going to go, he was like, no way.

He's like, it doesn't matter if he has to walk slow.

He's like, matter of fact, let me guide him.

And so we're like, okay, you know, if you're sure.

And he's like, yes, I insist.

And so it was absolutely awesome.

Here you have this guy.

I don't know if he's ever met somebody else who's blind or not, but he took me by the arm, or I took him by the arm.

And that's what we call going a sighted guide, where I hold on to the arm of whoever I'm going with.

I'm still using my cane and my other hand, just uh being sure that they don't run me into anything.

But they're guiding me.

And so he actually didn't want me to walk with my mom or sister.

He wanted to guide me.

And so, sure enough, we did.

And so we started our hike through the rainforest.

And it was an easy hike.

The path ended up being it was paved the entire way.

And it was absolutely wonderful because here you have this guy who had told everybody, be sure, you know, you don't get off of the path.

You don't touch any of the trees or foliage.

You, you know, you stay on the path and do the walk and have some fun.

But he knew that wasn't the same for me.

And so he was so wonderful.

He would be like, okay, hold on, hold on, Kevin.

And he'd jump off the path and he'd run down and he'd grab a branch from a tree and bend it so that I could feel the leaves.

And he'd start explaining to me what type of tree this was and letting me feel the different leaves and the texture.

And it was just amazing.

We'd be walking and he'd stop and he'd have me listen and he'd explain to me the type of bird, the noise that he was wanting me to listen to.

And it was just literally out of this world.

I can't explain how much I enjoyed it.

And it was because somebody decided to take a little bit of extra time to make me not feel different than anyone else.

And at the end of the excursion, I realized, wow, I got a much better experience than anyone else on that trip.

Matter of fact, I bet if you asked anyone else who had been on that tour that day, I bet they can barely even remember it.

But for me, it was something that I will never forget.

And for my mom and sister, they too, they enjoyed it so much because they got to see how this guy helped me out, getting to see everything by touching it and feeling it.

And he just explained everything to me.

And it was out of this world.

By the time we got back to the bus at the end of the hike through the rainforest, I tell you, I had to sit back and think on our long bus ride back to the cruise, was, you know, I never even had to explain to this guy how I see the world, that I see the world through all of my other senses, not relying on the vision.

He already got it.

He understood it.

And it made me just feel like everyone else.

Matter of fact, made me feel like a true VIP.

Because, of course, we had some people at the end of the tour who wanted to be kind of uh butts about it and started complaining that they didn't get a self-guided tour.

And um, our awesome driver who kind of put them in their place.

And uh, we got a good uh laugh over that at the end.

But, you know, it was just one of those trips.

The entire cruise was amazing.

We did some awesome other excursions, but that one, that particular excursion where you had one person who took the time to guide me, who who let me experience the rainforest in a way that I could truly appreciate it, was just absolutely magical.

And that's how I want you to realize, and that's the power that a shore excursion can have.

Because, as I said, the cruise ships, they're awesome, but the destinations, they're even more amazing.

And with that, our series on all things cruising has just wrapped up.

I hope you enjoyed it.

And if you haven't caught all five episodes, I encourage you to go back and listen to the others.

Because, especially for those of you who have not cruised before, I'm telling you, the world's waters are waiting for you to come explore.

SPEAKER_00: And that's the lowdown on life and travel.

If you enjoyed today's episode, please leave a review and don't forget to subscribe for more.

Want to hear more from Kevin Lowe?

Be sure to follow his travel agency, Better Days Travel, both on Facebook and Instagram at Better Days Travel.

Plus, subscribe to his weekly newsletter that hits your inbox each Sunday morning.

Just visit betterdaystravel.com.

That's betterdaystravel.com to sign up.

And until next time, just keep living and enjoying life like it was meant to be.