Post Cruise Post

We're back! After a whirlwind Caribbean vacation and a whirlwind Labor Day weekend, I finally have a moment to unwind on my couch with a laptop and a peaceful stare. I'll try not to stare in the direction of the suitcases still piled in the entryway while I'm blogging.

There's so much to tell you about our cruise that I just don't think I can get it all out in one post. I'll try, though, I promise.

First of all, it was awesome! I highly recommend it. As far as "seasickness" goes, we didn't feel queasy for even a second. In fact, I absolutely loved the rocking of the ship. It was incredibly soothing at bed time.

From the moment we arrived on the ship, the feasting began.

It was lunch time, and we were immediately shown the way to the buffet dining room, The Brasserie. After eating, we wandered around the ship for a while, trying to figure out where everything was. It was extremely confusing! There were several sets of stairwells/elevators that went to some floors but not all floors, so you never knew where you were going to end up! We did a lot of walking on this trip! Here we are in the center of the ship, which was like a big atrium with two glass elevators. Very cool! This was where all of the shopping places were. Apparently, everyone likes to buy jewelry, perfume and liquor when on cruises because there aren't any taxes on them. So they were constantly announcing sales and raffles and such to entice people to spend more money. Weird!

Finally, our room was made available by about 1:00 so we scurried in to check it out. It was pretty much like the picture, except that the to twin beds were pushed together to make a king size bed, and Noodle had a cool bunk bed that pulled down from the wall.

Then, we went swimming in three of the four pools on the boat (the other one was adults only) and did an emergency drill where everyone had to put on their life jackets and troop down to a specified place on the boat (BOR-RING!).

Finally, we were off! The ship slowly made its way out of the Tampa Bay. It was an excellent time for a quick workout, because the gym is at the top/front of the ship. But before we knew it, it was time to eat again. We could choose between eating at the Brasserie buffet or sitting down for a "fancy" meal in the main dining room at our chosen time of 5:45. We wanted to try something new, so we decided on "fancy." We were assigned the same table and waiters for the whole week and also sat with another family. They turned out to be great dinner companions. Tao, Shirley, and little Stanley were a Chinese family from Canada. We had great conversations about culture, government, adoption, family, etc. It was so much fun!

The next day was the first long day at sea. I think we enjoyed being on the boat the most out of all our activities. We spent a lot of time exploring and trying out some of the activities. Noodle went to Camp Carnival and loved playing with the other kids, making crafts and playing games. (When Amie asked Noodle what she liked best about the cruise, she told her it was the Hairy Chest Contest. They held it out on the pool deck while we were swimming and boy, that was an educational moment in Noodle's life!)

That night, we got all dressed up for the Captain's Cocktail Party. It was a good excuse to get pretty and take pictures, really.

Wednesday morning our ship arrived at Grand Cayman island. Feeling adventurous, we had decided to go swimming with stingrays for our excursion on this stop. Just getting there left us feeling a bit like cattle, however. Everyone was herded onto a ferry and then herded into a waiting area for the bus. There were lots of people trying to offer deals on bus rides to various experiences. At one point, a man from Carnival cruise lines came over to our little group and, pointing, boomed at us in a loud voice, "STAY RIGHT HERE BY THIS SIGN! AND DON'T LET ANYONE PUSH YOU AROUND!" We laughed about that for the rest of the week.

I will have to write a separate post about the stingrays because we bought a disposable waterproof camera and I haven't gotten the pictures developed yet. But let me just say, it was really COOL! Other than that, I wasn't much impressed with Grand Cayman. It looked like an older, less developed version of South Florida. The water was beautiful though.

The next day we awoke to the sight of another ship outside our window and realized we were docked at Cozumel, Mexico. Noodle had fun making faces and waving at the men on the deck of the other ship. You can see in this picture how close we were to them and the dock inbetween (as seen from the ferry we took to get to Playa Del Carmen). After the ferry, we rode a tour bus (quite the upgrade from the old school bus on Grand Cayman) to the Mayan ruins at Tulum. It was very hot and people were shamelessly, constantly, trying to sell us stuff throughout the day. We learned a lot from the tour guide, but were disappointed when we realized they weren't even allowing people to touch the ruins. Apparently they were tired of people vandalizing things and only allowed us to walk on specific pathways around the structures.

But the most disappointing part was that Hurricane Dean (which had passed by the week before) knocked out the wooden stairway that led down to the beach. We couldn't get down the cliffs any other way, so there was nothing left to do but wander around in the heat for far too long! Noodle was very sad. Crushed, I might say. (Check out the iguana in this picture!)

However, we did make restitution by finding another small beach to go to for an hour once we made it back to Cozumel. Noodle found dozens of shells, pieces of coral, a Mexican centavo, and smooth sea glass to put in her "treasure box" which was actually an empty Cuban cigar box that Seth bought for her while we were there. She was extremely happy and showed them to everyone on the ship.

Ah there's so much to tell about this trip, but I'm getting too tired to write anymore. To make it short, we enjoyed another day at sea on Friday and came back to Tampa on Saturday morning. We got up late, packed slowly, and managed to be some of the last people to get off the boat. It was perfect, because we didn't have to wait in any lines like everyone else, and the customs people barely glanced at us!

Home again... but can't wait to do it again!