Southern Caribbean Cruise Day 9: Heading Home

We woke up Sunday morning already missing the Caribbean but ready to head home. We ordered room service for breakfast so we could finish our last minute packing. We had put our big suitcases outside our room the night before so they crew members could sort them in preparation for debarkation. We had to be out of our room by a certain time so we as soon as we were all packed and had finished breakfast, we headed upstairs to the main dining floor. We picked a booth and got comfy, as we knew we would be sitting there a while. We had to wait until our group number (based on where our cabin was located on the ship) was called before we could debark and go through customs. We pulled out our cards and continued our tournament of Skip-Bo. My phone, unfortunately, was not much better than the previous night. Still obvious water damage. We still don't know what happened and why the case leaked but it was definitely frustrating heading home with a broken iPhone.

We ended up playing cards for about 2 hours. I believe I ended up winning the Skip-Bo tournament by 1 game. The wait was dragging on and we just wanted to get home. Finally, our number was called and we were able to debark, locate our luggage, go through customs, hop on a shuttle, and head to the airport. Once we arrived at the airport, we checked in and went through security before getting something to eat.

We flew through JFK in New York City again on the return trip. Overall, the flights were fine. We still didn't sleep much, but fortunately we had movies and direct TV to keep us entertained. 

We finally arrived home around 12:30a.m. We couldn't wait to crawl into our own bed and fall asleep. Before falling asleep, I decided to take a quick peek at our credit card account. What a very unwelcome surprise it was to see that somewhere along the line, our credit card had been hacked and some $300 worth of charges were put on it. We were less than thrilled. 

After getting a few hours of quality sleep, we unpacked, did laundry, got me a new iPhone, called the credit card company, and did our best to recoup after an amazing week. 

Andrew and I love traveling together. We are always able to find the best adventures and have to most fun with each other. This Southern Caribbean Cruise was no doubt amazing and will definitely be hard to top with future vacations. 

Southern Caribbean Cruise 2014 Day 8: St. Maarten/St. Martin

Out last stop was St. Maarten. St. Maarten is a pretty common island for vacationers to travel too. After our day here, we definitely saw why. St. Maarten is split into to sides: the Dutch side (St. Maarten) and the French side (St. Martin). We were fortunate enough to be able to spend some time of both sides. Both are beautiful, complete with gorgeous, warm turquoise waters and soft, sandy beaches.

We started by walking a short distance to a popular beach known as Little Bay Beach. Again, we were bombarded with people wanting us to pay for drinks, lawn chairs, etc. We found a little spot to lay our towels down and got in the water. We had a gorgeous view of our ship and, while taking some pictures with my phone, a lady asked me if I had a water proof case on it. I told her that I did in fact have a waterproof case and that it had worked really well. When I went to demonstrate just how well this case worked, I accidentally let go of my phone and it immediately sunk to the bottom! I started to panic! Luckily, she was willing to help us look for it. I thought for sure my phone, with all of the videos and pictures we had taken, was gone for good. Andrew quickly felt it underneath his feet and out his foot on it to hold it in place while someone dived down and got it. I have a huge fear of putting my head under water, but this lady was happy to go under water and get it for me! I was super embarrassed but was so so grateful that she was willing to do that for me. 

We eventually grabbed a taxi to take us over to the French side, which is also the Atlantic Ocean side instead of the Caribbean Sea. Our taxi driver was so good to answer some of our questions about the island. We ended up going to Orient Beach, which is amongst quite a few timeshares and resorts. We had our choice of spots to put our stuff down. We swam for a bit and tried to enjoy every last second we had, knowing we would be leaving the beautiful Caribbean so soon.

We took a nice little walk along the beach before we got our taxi to take us back to the ship. When we finally got back to the ship we realized that we were incredibly sunburnt. I usually don't burn but I guess my skin was done with the sun for the week!

We did our usual evening routine of a comedy show, mini golf (which Andrew ended winning the whole tournament), dinner, and Broadway style show. We ended our night by packing our suitcases so they could be taken and placed in the proper location to ease with debarkation in the morning. Right as we were turning in for the night, I noticed that it looked like there was some water behind the screen in my phone. I immediately took the supposedly waterproof case off, turned my phone off for the night to see if it just needed a break. We went to sleep in hopes that my phone would be fine in the morning.

Southern Caribbean Cruise 2014 Day 7: St. Kitts

St. Kitts was one of our favorite stops. I think it comes in at a very close second next to St. Thomas.

This day started like all the others: wake up, breakfast, get ready to get off the ship for the day. After 24 hours of antibiotics, I was feeling much better and was excited to spend the day in the sun!

A bit before we headed out an announcement was made that the gangway would be closed for about 15 minutes while another ship pulls into the dock. It happened to be a Disney Cruise ship. This ship was a bit smaller than ours but was much prettier to look at. It was fun to wave to the guests on that ship as they pulled in. 

As soon as we could, we got off the ship. Right off the dock there were tons of taxis waiting to take us to various beaches. We chose a beach at the far end of the island called Cockleshell beach. We climbed into the taxi/van and were ready to go! Two other couples, one was on their honeymoon and the other just vacationing, along with a family that consisted of 4 sweet littles girls, their parents, and their grandparents joined us in the taxi and we all headed to Cockleshell beach. The family was from the Disney Cruise and the other couples were on our cruise. It was fun to compare cruises. It was about a 20 minute drive down and it was gorgeous. St. Kitts was very green and as we drove over hills, our driver would stop at the top so we could look out over the beautiful torquoise ocean. It gives me chills just thinking about it again.

We arrived at Cockleshell beach and by this point, the grandma of the sweet family was having a panic attack. She did not like the roads and the crazy drive we just took (her daughter said she was always so dramatic). We didn't think the drive was that bad. We had about 3-4 hours to play before our taxi would meet us to take us back to the ships. I immediately had to use the restroom so Andrew and I first walked up and down the beach trying to find a good place. There were a few beach bars that didn't have a restroom, a porta-potty that looked pretty suspicious, and a small restaurant that looked promising. I decided to try the restaurant, but because I wasn't a guest at the restaurant, they wanted to charge me $2 to use the restroom! I was not happy about that so I decided to try to hold it as long as I could. Well, it didn't last long and I ended up paying a couple of dollars. We learned early on in the cruise that people will try to get you to pay for everything: lounge chairs, restrooms, and even to touch their pet monkeys. 

We spent a long time just hanging out in the water talking with our new friends from the taxi ride. At one point they even brought us beers. We felt bad telling them we don't drink but it was so thoughtful of them to do that for us! There were lots of little fishes swimming around our feet and every once in a while they would bite our toes. That is a weird feeling. After swimming, we walked along the beach and took some pictures. We laid out for a little while before our taxi came to pick us up. 

We all got back in the same taxi, except for the grandparents. The mom said that her mom (the grandma) had such a rough time in the drive over that she was not going to come back on that taxi! We aren't sure how she got back to the ship...

The little girls started complaining that they were hungry so the mom opened up her bag and started pulling out snacks. We were commenting that moms always carrying snacks with them, and then she started tossing snacks at us! Our conversations were hilarious and the snack were yummy. That was probably our favorite cab ride ever. 

The Disney ship left before ours so it was fun to watch them pull away from the dock and disappear into the sunset.

We went to a comedy show before dinner, enjoyed a fun show out in by our wait staff during dinner, then headed back to our room to watch a movie in bed. We were exhausted from our fun-filled day in St. Kitts!

Southern Caribbean Cruise 2014 Day 6: St. Lucia

Day six. We were exhausted but still ready for some more adventure.

On Tuesday I woke up not feeling so great. I was trying to fight it off but ultimately knew antibiotics were the only thing that would take care of it. I really did not want to make a trip down to the infirmary to see the doctor because I know I would have to pay an arm and a leg. We went to breakfast and I was miserable. We still had 4 full days left of the trip and I was not going to be miserable for the rest of the trip. We went down to the infirmary and let me tell you. That was my fastest doctor's appointment ever! Seen by the nurse, triage done, labs processed, seen by the doctor, prescriptions written and in my hand all within 20 minutes! Yes, we paid a lot of money, but luckily my insurance reimbursed us for most of it. I took the first dose of meds right away and quickly felt better.

Before this cruise I had done research on St. Lucia and was so excited! It seemed like a beautiful island with so many fun things to do. However, the weather that day was cloudy and gross, we were tired, and I was still not feeling the best so we decided to scratch all plans and just walk around for a bit. We had originally reserved a car but after our crazy and nerve wracking driving experience in Barbados, we decided to just cancel all cars for the rest of the week.

We walked over to the beach which was by an airport. We saw a few small planes take off and land as we made our way. We were followed and approached by a homeless man which made me super uncomfortable, but we made it safe to and from the beach. It was nice, but I'm sure there were nicer places on the island. 

We returned the ship, played some more mini golf and cards, and once again, watched as we left St. Lucia. We went to our second Elegant Night dinner, an evening show, and enjoyed a relaxing evening.

For those who didn't know, Andrew is a huge Oregon Ducks fan. They were planning a big game this night and he was hoping the sports bar on the ship would have it up on the TVs. We asked the bartender and he said he had it on his schedule. However, at game time, we discovered that the ship did not get the channel after all. So Andrew missed the game and boy was he bummed. It turns out the Ducks lost that night. Maybe they would have won if their biggest fan had actually gotten to watch the game ;)

Overall, we enjoyed our laid back and relaxing day in St. Lucia. I'm not sure if we will ever come back to St. Lucia, but it's nice to say we have been there. 

Southern Caribbean Cruise 2014 Day 5: Barbados

Wednesday: Barbados. Barbados was definitely an adventure that left us with so many memories.

Before we had left for the cruise, we had booked a car for three of our stops. One of those stops was in Barbados. We were a little nervous coming in to this because in Barbados, the driver sits on the right side of the car and drives on the left side of the road. Andrew said that he would be fine with driving so we picked up our car and headed on our way! 

We drove to the east side of the island, looking for a beach called "Bathsheba". This was one of the places I had seen online that travel critics and other tourists said was a must see. We just had one tiny little cartoon-like map to follow. The writing was small and it was very difficult to follow. The roads were narrow and we were driving on dirt, gravel, and paved roads. We saw lots of farm land, a variety of neighborhoods, and we finally made it to Bathseba! It was beautiful. It is part of the Atlantic Ocean. Definitely not a good swimming spot but the views were beautiful. 

After Bathsheba we decided to head to the beach. On our drive over we had seen a couple of beaches that looked nice. We made our way over and enjoyed and afternoon of warm water, soft sand, and hot sun.

When it was time to go back to the ship I pulled out the map to try to navigate us back. At one point we took a wrong turn and had to turn around. We found the perfect spot...the Barbados LDS church building! We had wanted to try to find the building any ways but it was fun to just stumble upon it! 

We made it back to the ship in time to watch us pull away. This was another favorites activity of ours. We love standing in the front if the ship and watching it pull away from the dock and watch the beautiful islands we had just spent the day at disappear behind us. 

That evening we played mini golf some more (I'm pretty sure I lost), played some cards, watched a movie, went to dinner, and did some laundry. Barbados was a great stop!

Southern Caribbean Cruise 2014 Day 4: Fun Day at Sea

Druing every cruise there is at least one "Fun Day at Sea". This is a day where no stops are made and it is simply a full day of sailing and enjoying all the fun that the ship has to offer. We were looking forward to this day and definitely made the most of our time.

We had scheduled a couple of spa appointments for us when we first arrived on board. I had a massage for myself (of course!) and Andrew had a nice shave with a scalp, arm, and hand massage. In my opinion, the services were very over priced and the massage wasn't the best that I had had, but we still enjoyed ourselves very much. After our bit of pampering, we went back to our room and took a nice long nap. We woke just in time to catch the tail end of the breakfast buffet. After breakfast, we went out onto the main deck to watch some ice carving. They always carve the same figure, an Indian Chief head, but it is always impressive. We stood out there watching him do this for about 30 minutes and it was hot and muggy! After the ice carving, we went back to our room for yet another nap. I think we were still trying to catch up from our lack of sleep while travelling. After this nap, we went up to the adults only deck called "Serenity". We laid out, read, and watched the beautiful ocean go by.

Later in the afternoon, we headed back to our cabin to do some laundry, ironing, and get ready for our first elegant night. 

We played our second round of mini golf in which Andrew won. It was pretty windy so I'm blaming my loss that night on the wind. 

We headed to a comedy show before dinner. They always have "family friendly" and "adults only" shows. The family friendly shows are hilarious and we always look forward to them. We have never gone to one of the adult shows but we are sure they get pretty raunchy pretty quick.

At dinner, we decided to branch out and try some new foods. I tried alligator and lobster for the first time.  The alligator wasn't bad but I was definitely not a fan of the lobster. 

After dinner we went to another theater show and then stood out on our balcony and watched a pretty neat rain storm blow through. It's always such a neat sight to watch a rainstorm when it is pitch black outside and you are in the middle of the ocean. One of my favorite things about cruises is the sights and sounds at night. So serene and peaceful. 

Southern Caribbean Cruise 2014 Day 3: St. Thomas

Day 3 was spent in the beautiful island of St. Thomas. St. Thomas is part of the U.S. Virgin Islands. This was probably our favorite place of the whole week. I had done a lot of research prior to this trip to find the best beaches, transportation options, activities, food, etc. In my research I found "Honeymoon Beach". Honeymoon beach is located just a short ways across the water from St. Thomas on Water Island. The only way to get there was via water taxi. It was a few miles away from the ship so we started walking. Soon after we started walking, a taxi pulled up next to us and offered us a ride for a great price! The taxi ride was easy and we arrived at the dock for the water taxi. The ride on the water taxi was only about 5 minutes long but it was beautiful! The island is so green, and the water is so clear and warm. As we arrived on Water Island, a little truck was waiting to take us down the the beach...for free! On the drive down, the driver was telling us about all the amenities he had down on the beach - floaties in the water, lounge chairs, restrooms, food truck, etc. We figured there must be a catch....there was no way this was all free! But it was! We spent a few hours swimming and playing in the warm ocean under the warm sun. When we were done swimming, we decided to try the special that the food shack was having that day: Lion Fish! It is a white fish and was a bit sweet and was super yummy! I wanted to see what a lion fish looked like so I looked it up when we got home....holy moly! I will never eat lion fish again.

When we were done swimming, the water taxi took us back to the main island and we decided to walk the 3 miles back to the ship! It was a beautiful and hot walk back but we enjoyed ourselves. Our calves and backs were sun burnt by the time we got back to the ship but we didn't care!

We showered, changed, and headed off to dinner. This was our first dinner at our assigned table and time. As soon as we had gotten on the ship the day before, we requested a table for 2 instead of risking being assigned to a table with other guest who weren't very fun to have dinner with (this is what happened on our honeymoon). We had a quaint little table for 2 with an awesome server. I decided that on this cruise I was going to try a variety of new foods. On this night I tried duck! It wasn't bad but wasn't my favorite.

One of our favorite things to do on cruises is have miniature golf tournaments. Every ship has at least one small mini golf course. This night, I came away with the win! I was feeling pretty excited.

The ships also have "Fun Shops", small stores where you can purchase souvenirs, jewelry, candy, and other small department store type goods. They were having a $10 sale on this night. Andrew and I both got new watches, I got a bag, and we also got tons of candy.

Another one of our favorite things to do on cruises is go to the Broadway style shows. The first night is always a special "Welcome Show" featuring a variety of singers, dancers, and other talented performers. It always gets us excited for the shows that are the come the rest of the week.

Our first full day was amazing. We had definitely started off our week so well that it was going to be difficult to top it!

Side note: Before we left on vacation, we bought a LifeProof case for my phone. These cases are waterproof and super durable. There is a water test that can be done before putting the case on your phone to ensure that it is truly waterproof. Some friends of ours recommended we do this so we can still use our phones in the water to get the best pictures possible. I was so nervous to put my iPhone in water but amazingly, it worked just fine! All of the pictures and videos we took were on my phone. Pretty neat, huh?!

Southern Caribbean Cruise 2014 Days 1 and 2: Travel

The last weekend in September 2014 (I know, I know. I'm way behind...) we embarked on our most amazing Caribbean cruise vacation! We booked this vacation way back in February and were anxiously awaiting September to arrive so we could go have some fun in the sun! The whole week was amazing; just what we needed before things got crazy at work for both of us. We did our best to take lots of videos so we could share all the fun with our friends and family! It was a busy week and there is a lot to show and tell! Enjoy!

We left Portland on a Saturday night. We took a Red-Eye flight to New York City. This was our first experience with a Red-Eye and I can pretty much guarantee that we won't be doing that again. I slept a little but Andrew didn't hardly sleep at all. We were exhausted. Overall, our flights were fine. We had a short lay-over in NYC during which we grabbed some breakfast and took the opportunity to freshen up. Our next flight was down to San Juan, Puerto Rico. We stepped off the plane and immediately felt the humidity. We got our luggage and went to check-in for our transfer service. Carnival Cruise Lines provides the option of using their airport to port transfer service. It's so handy and fairly inexpensive. We had only a 15 minute drive to port so we weren't able to see a whole lot of San Juan but we did see a few things.

We arrived at the port around 1p.m. We had been travelling since 7p.m. the night before and were running on very little sleep. We wanted a nap and a shower. Getting through security and check-in for the ship went very smoothly. Once we were on the ship, we had to wait about an hour before our room was ready. We grabbed some lunch and explored all the fun things that the ship had to offer. Once our room was ready, we went right there to get some shut-eye before the fun really started that evening! We took a nice long nap and woke a few hours later to find that Andrew's luggage had been delivered, but mine had not. I was a bit frustrated so I made a few phone calls and then waited some more. After a while, right before dinner, my luggage arrived! I was able to shower and spruce up for dinner. Dinner this night was not the usual format of sitting at your assigned table at your assigned time. It was a "come when you want" sort of a format. We were seated at whatever table was available. Our table had 8 other people. The food was great (like always) and the conversation was fun. We were finally feeling like we were on vacation!

After dinner, we had safety drills in our muster stations. It was so hot and humid and standing in the middle of a huge crowd of people with barely any breathing room for 45 minutes was a bit uncomfortable. We survived the safety drills, although I did start to have a minor panic attack. I was thinking about everything that could possibly go wrong and I was convinced that something terrible was going to happen to us! The ship was schedule to leave soon and there were a lot of fun activities going on to celebrate this. We debated going to some of these activities but ultimately decided to sit out on our balcony and watch the ship depart. It was beautiful. Yes, it was 11:00p.m. and 80 degrees and still 90% humidity, but the the city lights reflecting in the clear ocean water was breathtaking. This first night proved to us very quickly that we were in for quite an amazing week.