This year, Crystal and I decided to change things up for our vacation this year. Rather than doing the group vacation w/ all of our peeps, we decided to take a small siesta by ourselves (missed you guys though!). The driving factor for this decision was time constraints, which forced us to take our vacation earlier than usual and conflicted w/ everyone else’s schedule. After much debate and consideration, we decided to try out a cruise. In the past, I had had a bad cruise experience and was not overly excited to try another. However, Crystal managed to coerce me into this cruise and we signed up for trip through the Western Caribbean on the Liberty of the Seas – a Royal Caribbean vessel. I am happy to say that it was a trip of a lifetime and reluctant to admit that my wife was right >.> (but lets just keep that between us…)
When considering how to write about my wonderful trip,I immediately ditched the idea of trying to write a play-by-play of our adventure. I have been accused of being long winded – which is completely unjustified – and I wanted to avoid writing a meandering post that no one would actually read or simply skim <cough> Mike </cough>. In this case, I am going to break up my vacation post into 3 separate posts. They are as follows (I will link the others as I get around to writing them).
- Vacation Highlights and Favorite Moments (this post)
- Cruising 101 – All about what it means to jump on a cruise ship for a week: what there is to do, what the experience is like, and the common misconceptions.
- The Western Caribbean: Labadie, Haiti; Ocho Rios, Jamaica; Georgetown, Grand Cayman; and Cozumel, New Mexico – All about the places we went!
Fun stuff, right?
Anyway, without further ado, here is a list of our favorite vacation moments (in typical countdown fashion).
6. The Beaches
What is a vacation without a beach? Crystal and I both are very big beach enthusiasts. Although we did not spend as much time at the beach as usual (there was just so many other wonderful things to experience), the beaches in the Caribbean are simply amazing. The islands of the Caribbean can boast as having some of the clearest water in the world. Many times, when looking off your ship, the water is so clear that you can see the bottom of the ocean giving you the impression that your 14 story ship is floating in only 2 feet of water. The water itself is the brightest color of blue. In fact, the water is so blue, that it makes a clear sky look dark. The effect can be quite disorienting.
I could not believe the beauty of the beaches we visited. With their bright blue water and bright white sand, they were a marvelous place to enjoy. During our first beach adventure in Haiti, Crystal and I were so impressed that we both crawled into a hammock, watched the ocean, and enjoyed the serenity for hours. It was nice.
5. Room Service (the Towel Animals)
On a cruise (at least a Royal Caribbean cruise), they really know how to treat people right. The staff on the ship was simply amazing and made me feel like royalty. Of all the staff, I was most impressed w/ our Room Attendant. He was an awesome guy w/ a great sense of humor who when out of his way to make sure that we were as happy as can be. In addition to offering excellent service, the room attendants on cruises often leave ‘Easter eggs’ for their guests in the form of towel animals - something akin to cotton origami. Our room attendant did the same and would use props around the room to enhance his creations. Here are a few pics of what he left us.
I found myself looking forward to coming back into my room each night in order to see what kind of creature was waiting for me. It was a very simple but nice touch to the experience that I really appreciated.
4. The Casino
Not too long ago, I was at a certain person’s bachelor party (I am not breaking B.P. etiquette if I don’t name names) in which we took a trip to a casino. I had never been to a casino before, so I spent much of the time on the slot machines, watching my money get slowly bled from me. It was fun for a while, but relying 100% on chance got boring pretty fast. Our cruise ship had a casino as well and although I was not completely gun-ho for checking it out, Crystal had never been. Consequently, we decided on the amount of money we wanted to waste (cause you NEVER gamble money that you don’t plan to and can’t afford to lose) and gave it a try. Once again, we hit the slot machines and I came to the same conclusion that they were simply a mindless way to waste money. Crystal and I played for a while and then decided to leave.
On our way out, I walked by a dealer who was standing at a Roulette table with no customers. Since I had never played before and she currently did not have anyone else playing, I asked her if she would mind teaching me the game. It was one of those games that you always seen it on TV and I was pretty curious on how it worked. After a brief explanation and about 3 rounds, I was hooked. I LOVE Roulette. The game is awesome and the mathematic undertones are challenging! It involves calculated risk, statistics, and probability. Your play style can wildly based on the different factors of the amount of coverage you wish to have, the amount you have to gamble, how risky you feel, etc. Starting w/ 10 dollars, I ended up playing roulette for almost 2.5 hours building my ‘horde’ beyond 50 dollars and finally walking away w/ 10 dollars.
It was a complete blast and more fun than I had ever anticipated that I would have in a casino. Roulette is the bomb and a great – longer lasting – way to have fun at a casino!
3. The Parrot Guy
While in Mexico, we ran across a vendor who had 3 parrots. If you were willing to pay him 15 bucks, he would allow you to take a picture w/ the parrots, which were on a stand behind him. To be honest I was not totally impressed and, after dealin’ back-n-forth, the guy finally convinced me to pay 10 bucks for Crystal and I to get a picture w/ parrots. We paid the guy and Crystal stood up near the parrots for the first picture. Much to my amazement, the vendor started grabbing parrots and placing them on Crystal! I was totally impressed as he would pose the parrots in whatever position and they would simply stay there until he took a picture. These were Picture Posting Parrots (henceforth known as PPP’s or P3’s)! When my turn came up, I was amazed (and also alarmed) again when he had one of the PPP’s bite my outstretched finger and hang from it as he took pictures. So cool!
The PPP experience was so neat. Being a sucker and giving into this particular vendor request turned into a unique and special memory.
2. Drinking Extravaganza
As all our friends can attest, Crystal and I are not much of drinkers. Growing up, I was instilled w/ a very healthy respect (borderline fear) of drinking. In fact, I was about 23 years old before I tried my first alcoholic beverage. Over the last few years, Crystal and I have been experimenting w/ different drinks, keeping in mind of our limitations and the responsibility involved. While on the cruise, Crystal and I both decided that we would cut loose a little and experiment w/ different types of drinks. Since I know next to nothing about alcoholic drinks, it made some pretty amusing circumstances in which I was trying fish for suggestions on ‘good drinks’ without revealing how much of a noob that I was. Consequently, I came across as a bumbing noob but ended up w/ some pretty cool drinks to try out. Here are some of the drinks that we tried over the week.
Nathan
- Bourbon
- Scotch (my 2nd favorite!)
- Martini (these are AWEFUL!! How can anyone like these??!?!)
- White Russian (my favorite)
- Black Russian
- Rum Shots
- Frozen Margarita
- Labadoosie
Crystal
- Strawberry Pina Colada
- Sex on the Beach (her favorite)
- Some of Nathan’s drinks, followed by much gasping and choking
- Labadoosie
The funniest moment was when Crystal and I decided to have drinks before we ate. Crystal managed to kill off a Sex on the Beach pretty quickly, which went straight to her head and resulted in a slightly imbalanced wife. Being the kind, considerate husband that I am, I took the opportunity to tease her mercilessly and still get pretty tickled thinking about it. Also, I tried to convince Crystal that all drinks had a ‘first your drink it, then you do it’ rule… but, sadly, she was not convinced.
1. Sea Turtle Farm
While in Grand Cayman, Crystal and I had the privilege to visit the local sea turtle farm on the island. Sea Turtle farming is a pretty hot topic in the animal rights world, so I am going to try to avoid that topic and simply say that it was quite a powerful experience to be able to interact w/ these great creatures. When we visited the farm, we were able to walk up to large tanks which contained varying sizes of turtles, which were swimming around, doing their thing. The great thing was that we were allowed to reach into the tank and pull out the turtles to view them and interact w/ them. Here are a few pics:
I don’t think I can express the coolness factor of being able to get ‘hands-on’ w/ these amazing critters. It was a ton of fun and very informative of not only the value of these animals but also the the dire situation that they are currently in. If you ever get the chance to visit a sea turtle farm – do it – as you will not be disappointed.
In Conclusion
All in all, our vacation was amazing. I could write pages about the things we did and the amount of fun that we had. However, I will have to satisfy myself w/ my top “n” list. It suffices to say that this vacation did everything that a vacation should do, providing a nice restful and stress-free time. I can’t wait till next year!
More posts to come soon. Until then, take care.