Look...I'm Just Saying

I'm warning you. This is long. VERY long. But it's my journal so you can go ahead and deal with it :)

Day 1: Thursday, February 24

Woke up early to take the dogs to the kennel. I was sooo sad, but at least I managed to keep from crying this time. Went back to our house until around 11:30 when Michael & Tab came to pick us up to take us to his parents’ house. Around noon the limo arrived (Michael and Brad gave their mom a hard time for hiring a WHITE limo instead of a much classier BLACK limo haha).

(His mom has pictures of us actually getting into the limo, but this is all I have - see the snow outside??) It’s important to note here that I had expectations to knock a few things off of my bucket list. Riding in a limo is one of them. Yes, that’s right. I am 27 years old and had never ridden in a limo. Where I’m from, we had two limos in the county and that meant they had 3 windows in the town car instead of 2. They were pathetic. Nobody went to prom in a limo (c’mon, our prom was in our high school gymnasium, ok?). We left our wedding being chauffered by my husband’s aunt & uncle in their Durango (which actually ended up being a highlight of the entire day. They were adorably sweet). So anyways, the things I thought I might be knocking off were:

~~- 1)~~ ~~Ride in a limo~~

- 2) Sing karaoke

- 3) Jump off a waterfall somewhere exotic

- 4) Stay out all night and watch the sun come up

- 5) Visit an active volcano (this has been debated, we visited a volcano in St. Lucia on our honeymoon, but I was thinking more of looking inside the crater, which we didn’t do there).

Tab and I open a bottle of sparkling wine, which is finished less than 20 minutes into the trip (with some help from Sue). We get to the airport, get through security and the first of many infamous “red bag” situations occur. Brad went through security first, then me, then the rest of the family. Brad and I grab our bags and head down the terminal a little to get away from the madness right outside of security. About 5 minutes later the rest of his family walk up, watching me closely. Finally someone asks if I’m missing something. Whoops, left my red bag sitting there in security! Didn’t even notice it was gone!

We all enjoy quick drinks in the bar before we head out to Orlando for our layover. We were almost through the flight when the pilot comes up and tells us to look out the left windows (yesssss, I had a window seat!). He tells us that the space shuttle from Cape Canaveral is getting ready to take off. Sure enough, we watch, as far in the distance a small object with fire underneath north like a firework. We couldn’t get to my camera quick enough to get the shuttle with flames shooting out from the bottom, but we did get the trail of smoke it left behind. Definitely one of those once-in-a-lifetime opportunities that was pretty stinking cool!

In Orlando we eat dinner at Chili’s and I learn that Orlando’s airport is ridiculously huge. I’ve heard you often have to take shuttles at Dulles but I’ve never actually had to take one. Orlando has these little “metro”-type things that take you from terminal to terminal and even outside. I felt like I was at Disney World or something.

We finally get to Puerto Rico and then to our hotel about 1am local time. The hotel we’re staying at is right in the heart of Old San Juan but nothing’s really open at 1am on a Thursday night. The hotel clerk seriously keeps us waiting for 20 minutes while he’s on the phone. There should never be a line of 15 people waiting to check into a hotel at 1am. Just saying. We finally get into our rooms and then head down to the casino for a few minutes of gambling before the casino closes. I proceed to break the first slot machine I play which leads to me having to stand there for another 20 minutes while managers have to come and eventually give me a credit for another dollar. I also had my first language barrier incident as the guy who came to fix the machine spoke no English, yet wanted me to tell him exactly what happened (it wasn’t difficult, I put my dollar in, pulled the lever yet nothing happened). I eventually walked away with $6 (having put $5 in). So I was $1 up a few hours into the trip. Woohoo for me!

Day 2: Friday, February 25: San Juan, Puerto Rico

A few hours later, we woke up to take our bags over to the ship, Celebrity Millennium. It was a lot of waiting but eventually we got on board and were able to grab a quick bite to eat before heading back into San Juan for the afternoon. It was kind of weird, to be taking a taxi away from the cruise ship with all the people coming into the port, but whatever. We walked around the city for a little while before finding a nice outdoor café to have some drinks in. After we finished a few drinks we headed back to the cruise ship.

Going forward, I’m not going to talk much about the ship experiences with the exception of this paragraph. Overall, the ship kind of sucked. I’ve only been on one other cruise before (Costa) and it was loads better than Celebrity…which was funny, because all Celebrity did was talk about how they were “number one.” Yeah, maybe 10 years ago. They very obviously catered to the older crowd. And by older, I’m talking like 70’s+. All the lounges played the same music every night (depending on the lounge): waltz, salsa, 40’s-70’s and Latin music. Even the one nightclub they had on board played the same “old” music every night. It’s like they didn’t notice that after 11pm, no one stayed in there. The staff, for the most part, were snotty and rude. Our toilet did not work well – one of the room attendants actually showed us how to BANG on the button to make it flush. C’mon now. Seriously?

Anyways. On to the islands, which is the best part of the cruise anyway!

Saturday, February 26: Tortola, BVI

We are docked at Tortola, a British Virgin Island. This island was fun because nobody except Tabetha had been there before. Brad’s family has traveled a lot so having a stop at a place they’ve never been is rare. We took a quick tour in a taxi, taking us through a lot of scenic overlooks and this one bar that is just incredible. Before we arrived, our driver warned us that if anyone were to offer us mushroom soup on this trip, to decline them. Good advice, considering I love mushrooms and would probably have taken some! Once we pulled up to the bar, you can see why mushroom soup comes with a warning label. Underwear is nailed EVERYWHERE! I loved the bar – it was overlooking beautiful beaches, the floor was nothing but sand and the building itself was basically just a bunch of boards nailed together haphazardly.

Our driver dropped us off at a beach to hang out for a few hours. It was pretty quiet with a makeshift bar right beside where we were sitting (2 for $5 mixed drink specials, always a good thing to have close by!). I took a lot of pictures with my new camera since it was the first beach.

The water felt cold, which was weird considering when we left Maryland, there was snow on the ground. Anything should have felt like a hot tub after that!

Sunday, February 27: St. Maarten

For the most part on this cruise, I just went along with what everyone else wanted to do. St. Maarten, however, I was on a mission. I wanted to go to Orient Beach. I wanted to be able to say that yes, I have been to a nude beach. Well. Let me just tell you. I have now seen more naked people than I will ever again see in my life. And I doubt that any of them were a day younger than 65. And I doubt any of them have seen a shirt or pants in several months. It was just sooooo weird to sit there and watch old ladies with their boobies hanging down talk to men with their manhood just right there in their face. Whoa, cultural difference! We walked down to the end of the beach and back and I’m pretty sure we were given lots of weird looks because we WERE clothed. Oh well. I’ve been to a nude beach. I guess next on the list is actually taking clothes off? Nottttt so much! (Don't worry, there are no nude pictures to follow)

We also found one of the coolest dogs ever. Roxy and Chloe almost got a new sibling.

Also, I found it interesting that they had a huge memorial to Ta Ta The Bus Driver. I'd love to know the backstory on that. Might have to Google that one day.

After a few hours there we went back to the main beach beside the cruise ship. It was more commercialized but everyone had clothes on there. Every island we visited, the water got a little more crystal clear and a little more turquoise. Michael got a supposed 15 minute foot massage by a local lady which turned into 45 minutes, especially after I bought her a beer. You’ll see on this cruise, we negotiated a lot of things with food. It’s amazing how so many of the islanders will drop prices if you offer a beer and food. My kind of lifestyle.

Cannonballllllll!

Getting the food massage!

Monday, February 28: St. Lucia

Ahh, it was SO nice to be back in St. Lucia. Other than San Juan, this was the only place on this cruise that I had been previously – on our honeymoon. Brad took charge of this island. Before we left for the cruise, I had emailed a girl we met on our honeymoon – Sarah – and asked her for the name and number of a taxi driver the 4 of us had used on that trip. He was phenomenal, taking us to local spots and then keeping an eye on us there to make sure not-nice people left us alone. We got off the ship that morning and one of the taxi drivers standing there knew the guy. He called the number, only to get a female voice. Apparently our fantastic taxi driver had gotten drunk in a bar the night before and left his phone in the bar. Sooo we got to find a new favorite taxi driver. The drive from Castries to Soufries was long and windy. I think his family was starting to get a little cranky from the drive.

It probably took about an hour and a half and we saw a lot of destruction from a hurricane that came through last October (thank goodness it didn’t come through the October WE were there!) Finally, we got to Jalousie. Since we had our honeymoon there (they’re probably assuming we’ll come back again one day), they let us drive all the way down to the beach. In St. Lucia, you see, all the beaches are public. You can find the most expensive, most exclusive beach on the island and they HAVE to let you on their beach. They can keep you from using their facilities (chairs, bathrooms, etc) and they can ask you to stay on a certain section of the beach, but they can’t tell you NOT to be there.

Once we got down to the beach, Brad found Desmond, a local who is at Jalousie’s beach every morning, like clockwork. He has a water taxi and we used it a few times on our honeymoon. He’s just a good ‘ol Bob Marley-loving island guy. We trusted him and his ability to drive the boat (and by boat we mean a very basic carved-out thing) so he negotiated a price to get us back to Castries via water taxi instead of regular car again. Our other taxi driver was nice enough to go to the beach with us to make sure Desmond was there – just in case we would need him to drive us back in a few hours. Since we didn’t, we bought him lunch and a beer and he was a happy camper.

We enjoyed the beach there for a few hours – when we were there before, they were remodeling some parts of the resort so it was fun to see the final product. We went snorkeling and just reminisced about our first week as a married couple J

After awhile, we got on Desmond’s water taxi and we headed to Marigot Bay. Sue and Tabetha had a BLAST on that. It really is like a roller coaster ride. The way the locals drive (both on the road and water), you’re half worried for your life and half just wanting to embrace the local way. The water got a little choppy so there were some major ups and downs but it was still a lot of fun. We stopped for lunch in Marigot Bay, which is where we had lunch on our honeymoon once too. This time, however, we went to a different place, instead of Doolittle’s (Eddie Murphy’s bar).

(See the cat hidden above the bar?)

A terrible picture of the dog we befriended on this island

We bought Desmond and his son lunch and a beer (I told you that’s how we roll). Finally we headed back to Castries. The water taxi takes about 45 minutes total but it can be quite a bumpy ride. I think most of us were sore the next day!

I took a Russian couple's picture so they took ours!

Tuesday, March 1: Barbados

I’m going to tell you upfront: Barbados was not my favorite island. It was, hands down, my least favorite. Not because of what we did – we did some pretty fun things. Just the island in general. They. Have. SO. Many. Rules!!!!! You can’t smoke. You have to have a shirt on while in the car (which, if you’re coming from the beach, you might be a little damp!). You can’t wear camouflage. You’re charged for EVERYTHING. When we rented chairs at the beach, we had to wear wristbands to prove we paid for them. When we went to the bar & grill on the beach for lunch, we had to pay to get into the restaurant and wear ANOTHER wristband. Don’t go to Barbados expecting to get a tan on your arms. You won’t have room left by the time you spend a few days.

Brad’s family had been there before and had rented a catamaran. His mom had called this guy before and asked to rent the boat out again. THAT was fun! He took us to a few snorkeling spots – first was to swim with sea turtles. I was excited, and I actually got to pet one when it went right by me! It was crowded, because a lot of the cruise ship excursions were there too, though. Then he took us to a place that had a few shipwrecks. At the time, I thought the snorkeling was the best ever. Little did I know what awaited me later in the cruise!

After that, we sailed through the Caribbean for a little while. Tab and I “surfed” – if you’ve ever been on a catamaran, they usually have a rubbery-type of surface at the front. We stood on it and attempted to stay upright. I had fun, especially since this catamaran provided free drinks and we’d had a few rum punches at that point!

Eventually the captain took us back and drove us to a local beach where we got the aforementioned wristbands. When we got hungry, we headed over to the bar and grill, as I mentioned, where they charged us $10 for yet another wristband. It was complicated, though. It was one price if you were on a cruise ship (which we were, but they didn’t know that) and another price if you were staying on the island. We knew one of the names of a local hotel so we just told them we were staying there. Then they gave us each a $10 credit on food. So we paid $10 for the wristband but then got $10 in free food at their restaurant. Made no sense to me, but whatever. It also gave us access to their dock, which had a rope swing over the water and some “toys” in the water – a few water trampolines and a floating iceberg climbing wall.

I always tried to make sure I tried the local beer!

But didn't stray much from the tropical drinks...they use a lot of nutmeg as a garnish!

So all in all, it was a great day, but I just didn’t like Barbados. Nothing was ever simple there.

Wednesday, March 2: Grenada

I loved this island. It was just beautiful. There was a lot of poverty, but you see that on most of the Caribbean islands. We got a taxi driver and went to a waterfall that locals jump off of (I was soooo hoping this was going to be another bucket list crossed off but alas. A litttttttttle too high for me!). On the way, the taxi driver stopped at a spice store and showed us a lot of spices that are native to Grenada. I got some cocoa balls that you just drop into hot water for hot chocolate.

This is where stuff started getting pretty and I started getting picture-happy!

The waterfall I considered jumping off of...but...eh.

Everything about Grenada was beautiful. The overlooks were beautiful, the waterfall was beautiful and the people were extremely nice. It wasn’t as commercialized as some of the other Caribbean islands but it still had a sense of stability.

Prisoners

The beach we went to in Grenada knew what was up – a free beach chair rental came with every mixed drink you bought. Easy enough. 6 mixed drinks, 6 chairs. Done! We did a lot of nothing on this island. This was our last island before our first sea day and I think we were all pretty exhausted. We’d been getting up before 7am and staying up until after midnight (in hopes of some decent music, but we were usually sorely disappointed).

Brad brought his hammock along and actually fell asleep in the shade on the beach. I went over to take some pictures of him and one of the locals selling things on the beach found him pretty entertaining.

There was another local who was playing guitar on the beach – I swear to you, he is Flavor Flav’s long lost twin brother. He was hysterical. He just made up lyrics on the spot about everyone, singing them. He kept telling us to get up and play, don’t waste the day, get up and do something. At one point, he had a whole flock of people dancing around him.

Our favorite pup on this island!

Thursday, March 3: Sea Day

Not much goes on during sea days except excessive eating, drinking and sun time. I was disappointed in this ship because there was only one outdoor pool area with two relatively tiny pools. There were also 4 hot tubs but I wasn’t about to get in a hot tub when it was sunny and 85 degrees out. Then they closed the hot tubs at 8, which meant there was no nighttime dips (when the hot tub would have actually been enjoyable). Whoops, I’m going into how crappy the ship was again.

At this point in the cruise, we had made friends with a bartender named O’Brien (or so we thought that’s what his name was). He was from Jamaica and fantastic.

A few days into the cruise, he knew exactly what drink the boys and Sue wanted each night and had them ready as soon as he saw them walk in. Tabetha and I were quite adventurous in our drink choices so he always had to ask us what we were in the mood for. Typically before dinner we went for a Cosmo or red wine.

A few nights he surprised us – when we asked for a glass of red wine (we usually chose one of the cheaper red wines), he brought us glasses of the ship’s expensive red wine. One he brought out he said was the best red wine they had on the ship (obviously, we had no way to know if he was telling the truth, but it WAS pretty dang good!)

We’d had an interesting dinnertime dynamic. Our head waiter, Lynn, was very nice but very proper. We usually had a few drinks before dinner and were pretty talkative and had a lot of laughs. He tried, but he didn’t quite get us. He seemed a bit “off” too, although we never could quite put our finger on it. We often didn’t get the meals we asked for, or we’d not get things we ordered altogether. In his defense, we were pretty difficult. Tabetha and I alone would typically order 2-3 appetizers each, 1-2 soups and/or salads, 1-2 entrees and 1-2 desserts for each meal. But my theory is, we’re paying for unlimited food. They serve food on a cruise ship that I would NEVER pay for myself without knowing for sure if I liked it – it’s how I learned I liked escargot on my last cruise. If I didn’t like something, it wasn’t a big deal and I had plenty of other things to choose from. Our assistant waiter, Robert, was awesome. He was from Dominica and was just so cute. He had kind of a higher pitched voice and, as it became the joke for the week, sounded like he was just about to say “PEEKABOO” with every sentence. He was super sweet.

Halfway through the week, Lynn came to our table. Usually, he gave us menus, then came back and gave us his recommendations for the evening and then came to take our order. This night, however, he started guessing what we were all going to order. But he didn’t get it right at allllllll. We kind of wondered if he was drunk. Then he never came back to take our order. We flagged Robert down, who took our order. Finally the Maitre ‘d came over and said Lynn was sick and that another head waiter would be taking care of us. Robert had told us earlier in the week that he was hoping for a head waiter position on the next ship so we told the Maitre d’ that Robert had already taken care of us and we were pretty sure he could handle it. So Robert took care of us that night (something we spoke highly of during the comment cards). The next night they introduced us to Oscar, our new head waiter who was hysterical. Just up our alley. Everything was followed with “Fantastico!” or “Excellente!”.

- “I’d like the shrimp cocktail…”

- “Fantastico!”

- “And the salmon balls…”

- “Excellente!”

- “And the Caesar salad…”

- “Fantastico!”

- “And the mushroom truffle soup…”

- “Excellente!”

- “And the lobster ravioli…”

- “Fantastico!”

- “And the grilled mahi-mahi…”

- “Excellente!”

But he was fun J He did some fun magic tricks for us. I think the tables around us were jealous because we were having so much fun with the staff. They are all very stiff until they figure out if they can joke around with you or not. Robert and Oscar figured out they could have fun with us so it made us the entertaining table. I’m sure most of the tables were thinking “stupid Americans” inside their head, but oh well. We had fun.

Oscar, with our Baked Alaska

Robert and Oscar

Friday, March 4: Aruba

Maybe my expectations for Aruba were too high. I’d just always heard so much about it – and the pictures I had seen were always just so beautiful. Don’t get me wrong, Aruba WAS beautiful…but crowded. All the beaches were jam-packed by noon which meant the water was jam-packed.

Obviously this picture was taken in the morning

Again, a local beer

I had gotten a lot of sun the day before so I pretty much stayed in the shade most of the day. I was proud of myself for not getting burned on this trip – I got pretty tan, but no burning or peeling. Brad and I took a walk on the beach and then across the road to a resort for lunch but those were the most exciting things that happened. We saw the group of girls from the cruise that we had nicknamed “Mean Girls” at the resort. It was a group of 4-5 girls who thought they were hot stuff. They weren’t old enough to drink and they walked around like they were God’s gift to men. They hated Tab and I because Brad and Michael were by far the only young guys on the ship…and they were obviously taken. The name “Mean Girls” came because their leader was a redhead who vaguely resembled Lindsay Lohan, although she definitely had more than a few pounds on her.

Also notable in Aruba was the older lady at the umbrella beside us. She fell asleep at some point in the afternoon on her side. Somewhere along the way, half of it slid out and she slept for a few hours with one boob hanging out. Have I mentioned I have never seen so many naked people as I did on this trip?

Saturday, March 5: Curacao

Our last stop. Paradise. By far, far, far my favorite. I really didn’t think any tropical place would compare to St. Lucia. I’ve now been to Cozumel, Jamaica, Grand Cayman, Tortola, St. Maarten, St. Lucia, Barbados, Grenada and Aruba. Curacao is by FAR the most beautiful place I have ever seen. The town was beautiful – the streets were lined with homes and businesses that were painted these bright, beautiful Caribbean colors. The downtown area was lively and the coolest thing was the floating bridge linking one side of the canal to the other. A lot of ships come through the canal so when a boat comes through, this floating bridge (which is stationary on one side) floats parallel to one side of the canal. I know this sounds weird and it's hard to describe. But we were there when they were letting a boat through and watched the bridge go from being straight across the canal to along one side. There's a free ferry that will take you across if you can't wait for the bridge to come back up. The beaches were absolutely pristine and the waters the clearest I’ve ever seen. I could go on forever, so I’ll back up a little.

We asked the taxi driver to go to the Curacao Liquor Factory first and then to the best beach he knew of. The liquor factor was fun, but probably would have been more fun if it hadn’t been 9am after a long night of drinking. I managed to have a sip of the chocolate liquor but that’s as far as I made it. He also showed us this substance that comes from the factory that is pretty much their “one-stop-fits-all cure-for-all”. Arthritis? Spray this on there. Hungover? Spray this on there. Run out of aftershave? Spray this on there. Seriously. It was kind of weird, but entertaining at least.

Our super-sweet Astro. Our cabbie said it was 2011 special edition haha

Then we headed to the beach. We were starting to wonder where exactly he was taking us. It seemed like we had been driving forever through this random part of the island that seemed remote. We saw a huge iguana on the way and a ton of flamingos.

He got away!

Finally, we made it to the beach and I just cannot even express how amazing it was. The best way for me to describe it is in pictures.

Mouth open, ready to swallow!

Bon voyage!

Last few notes:

- I attempted karaoke on the last night. Whether they just didn't like us or what...but they ended up not letting us go. Tab and I signed up to do Sweet Home Alabama. O'Brien went up a few times to try to get us done sooner and he kept saying everything was good to go. Well, the last person finally went and it wasn't us. The guy finally came over and said our song wasn't registered by the machine...so he didn't bother to tell us or anything, he just let us sit there. While they let other people do multiple goes at it. Just another little reason why Celebrity stunk. He apologized, but not before Brad's parents let him have it on how rude they'd been all week just because we weren't 80.

- I forgot my red bag as we were leaving our staterooms. I had my stuff out in the hall and we were waiting on Michael and Tabetha. I started walking and walked right out without the red bag. There was at least one other time in the trip that I forgot my red bag but I can't remember when. I think it was on the way to Puerto Rico on the first day. But that's why for the rest of the trip everyone always asked about the red bag.

- I learned to salsa on salsa night.

Look...I'm Just Saying

Thursday, March 31, 2011

Whole lot of randomness.

Monday, March 28, 2011

Congratulations!

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Seriously?

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Cruise 2011