Bermuda is a British island territory in the North Atlantic Ocean known for its pink-sand beaches such as Elbow Beach and Horseshoe Bay. Its massive Royal Naval Dockyard complex combines modern attractions like the interactive Dolphin Quest with maritime history at the National Museum of Bermuda. The island has a distinctive blend of British and American culture, which can be found in the capital, Hamilton.

If you have been following this blog series you know that this was our third cruise. And you know that when we were in San Juan we had seen the Celebrity Summit there. Neither of us had been to Bermuda and we were both very excited. One of the things that excited us was the unique itinerary. Most cruise port calls consist of docking or anchoring early morning and then leaving late afternoon thus allowing 8-10 hours to go ashore. This trip would leave from Cape Liberty (Bayonne NJ) spend two days at sea, dock in Bermuda for THREE days, then two sea days back to Cape Liberty.

Arriving at the cruise port it was nice to see that we had a great view of the 9-11 Tear Drop Memorial off one side of the ship and the Statue of Liberty off the other side. Shortly after getting under way we could see the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge and of course it appeared that we would not fit under it. We quickly found some new friends that we had “met” online before leaving home and we all enjoyed our time together.

We were docked at the Royal Navy Dockyard. Never having been to Bermuda we wanted to make the most of our three days. For day one we had signed up for a complete island tour from a vendor we had found online. What a fantastic tour she provided and in fact what had been billed as a three-hour tour was actually stretch to just over five hours. There were only 6 of us tourists which made things a little more personal. We saw Bermuda from one end to the other and back. The next day we took a ferry to Hamilton and after walking around there for a bit we caught a local bus to St. George’s where we spent most of the afternoon before catching the “Fast Ferry” back to the Dockyard. After meeting up with some friends, we caught the ferry again to Hamilton and got there in time to catch a street parade/party along the waterfront. The costumes were outrageous and lots of fun.

The had set aside the third day to explore the Dockyard area. We wandered through various shops and museums soaking up as much of Bermuda as possible. We stopped for lunch at the Frog & Onion. One of the owners is French – hence Frog, and the other owner is Bermudian – hence Onion. And yes it is designed to cater mostly to us tourists but we were genuinely and warmly greeted, food was very good and the service was superb. After Frog & Onion we headed back to the ship. Two sea days later we were back at Cape Liberty already looking forward to the next cruise.