Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Cruise: Day 5, St. Thomas, Virgin Islands

So, we weren't supposed to pull into the island dock until 10am this day, so we ended up getting up before we got there and having breakfast. And then the ship was running a bit late so it was even later than that. so we got to watch from our balcony as we pulled in to the dock. Here is a pic as we are pulling in.






 And below are pictures of Mom and I from our balcony with the island in the background after we docked. It was beautiful!

 After we finally docked and got off the ship we wandered around a bit looking for the people who were in charge of our tour for that day. It was a lovely island tour - we went to a few different lookouts up on the hills of the island and then we went to Magen's Bay Beach, which was lovely. The thing is that the tour driver was hard to find so we had to spend a bit of time wandering around at first.

After we did find the guy, our fist stop was at this one viewpoint which was way nice. There were some random parrots there, which were cool.









Also, we saw this random rock with a carving in it. Here is Mom with the rock. Mom is not as big-busted as the carved lady. Haha. 






This guy was our tour driver, I forget his name but I do know it was something French. He was really nice. He told us funny stories about how American's on vacation tend to forget themselves. He told us one story of a guy who's wife fell down and he was so drunk he just walked away from her. He did not approve! It was funny. 
 A view of the cruise ship port as we were driving around the island. Ours is the front ship.

 This is a view of Magen's Bay from up on a viewpoint up high. It was so pretty!


 











The pic below is of Mom enjoying the scenery as we were driving around the island.
 Then we headed to the beach. We spent a few hours there just relaxing and enjoying the sun. It was lovely.
 After heading back to the drop-off we went and took a little trip up this tram to a place called Paradise Point. Here is a picture of the island as we were ascending the hill.


 And here is Mom at the top. We ended up in a car with this random couple and they seemed super annoyed that we were with them. It was funny.
 Above is another picture from the top. Below are pics of Mom and I in front of the random Paradise Point board with some random lizards on it. I just thought it was a funny thing, so we had to take pics.  

















 We could have walked further up the hill to this little thing, but Mom's knees couldn't really handle it, so I just took a picture of it and called it good. After we took the tram back down to the bottom we turned and looked back at it and saw a rainbow (it very slightly spit as we walked back to the port). You can see the white posts from the tram line on the hill. 
 We were supposed to leave the port at 6pm, but since we were the front ship in a line of several (as you saw in an earlier pic) we didn't pull out when we were supposed to. That meant that I got the opportunity to take this pretty picture of St. Thomas at night. 
That night I can't remember what we did specifically. There was always something fun going on, so I am sure we enjoyed ourselves. We might have gone to a show ... I don't know. Also, for some reason we didn't have a towel animal that night. It made us both sad.

Come back tomorrow to learn about Puerto Rico!

Tuesday, March 05, 2013

Cruise: Day 4 Sea Day

So, after the Bahamas we had a Sea Day. We didn't take as many pics this day as other days, so I will tell you about it and then I might be nice and post Day 5 today as well, just for you :D

So, after a late breakfast and a little bit of a stroll around the ship we did a bit of karaoke in the main lounge of the ship. 




Then we headed back to the room to look at the schedule of things to do and see what else was up for the day. That was where I took this random pic that I thought was fun.






Then we noticed that there was ice carving on the deck, so we got our stuff gathered up and went out there. These are a few pics of the deck. The ship in general had 3 pools, 9 hot-tubs, a water slide, bars, night clubs, comedy clubs, and tons of other stuff.





Here is the guy who did the ice carving. It is a carving of an eagle, but it is kinda hard to tell. Just know that it took him less than an hour (we only caught the end of it) and it was amazing.











Later we headed over to name-that-song which was a blast (sorry, you can't really tell in this pic what is going on, but this was the only pic we got of it). Just so you know, we did this several times while we were on this ship, and it was always a blast - we always made friends with the people around us and we learned a new slogan which was "I will never see these people ever again in my life, ever" and we basically gave ourselves permission to act like idiots because  no one could make fun of us later. 

That night we also went to the 5-star restaurant on deck. We didn't get any pics, but it was pretty cool. I think that in general I learned that fine-dining is not my thing, but it was fun to do once in a while. Then we saw our friends from the day before in the comedy club which was fun.

 That night our little animal was a scorpion. It was a great day. Relaxing and fun.

Saturday, March 02, 2013

Cruise: Day 3, Nassau, Bahamas

Okay, first off, I know I missed a few days in there. So sue me - I was working nights.

So, we pulled into Nassau while I was still asleep at 7am so I missed seeing the whole docking process. But after we did get up we went out onto the balcony and had the most amazing view!




We were amazed by the size of the ropes they used to tie the ship to the dock - so we took pics with it. 




We went on a tour of the town. We drove around for a bit and learned about how things work in the Bahamas. The buildings are all colour coded. Government buildings are pink and police stations are all green. I think there were other designations but I don't remember. The kids all wear uniforms to school too which is kinda crazy. School was out the day we were there because they were having an election to decide whether or not to make it legal for Bahamian citizens to gamble on the islands. They have these huge resorts for tourists but they aren't allowed to actually gamble in them themselves, which I thought was crazy. (I looked it up later and the results of the election was that they are still not allowed to gamble). It was interesting to learn all about their way of life.

They have these free water taps in low-income neighborhoods, but our tour guide made sure to point how all the houses in those areas still had satellite tv. Good thing they have their priorities straight! I can't say much though because it is like that in most places in Canada or the US as well.


 Anyway, then we went to this local fort called Fort Fincastle. It was built to defend the island from ships and so it was made to look like a ship itself. Actually, most of the forts we saw in all the islands that we went too were built like that which was interesting. Here is a few pics of of Fort Fincastle.
 



 And here is a beautiful soldier we met at the Fort.











He liked me! ;)













 This is our tour guide - his name is Marcus. He was awesome! He also liked Dr. Pepper.


















 
This is what Bahamian money looks like. It is worth the same as the American dollar and is pretty much interchangeable with it.








Next we got to go and see the huge, new(ish) Resort/Casino Atlantis. This is what Atlantis looks like from Fort Fincastle.

It was pretty spectacular. Here is Mom and I sitting on a beautiful throne, like the royalty that we are!








 This is us with the ship in the background by the water. Look at the colour of that water! It is spectacular!!

That night was formal night, so after going back to the ship (which left the dock at 3pm that day) and having a little afternoon catnap, we got all gussied up. Don't we look pretty? We were lucky that I brought a professional hairstylist in my luggage with me lol.
We got to see the captain and first mate's and even the Cruise Director, Josh (aka Big Sexy). It was like a brush with fame!





After dinner that night we went and hung out at karaoke a bit. I even sang a song! In my formal dress, which was a little bit strange, but still fun.













 After being there for a while we headed back to our room where this beautiful flower was waiting for us.
And that was it for the Bahamas. Come back tomorrow where I will tell you all about our first Sea Day!