Our vacation started off great this year. We made it to the airport on time. Our flights went through without a hitch and before we knew it we were in beautiful Tampa, Florida. It was a little chilly when when we got there. It was sprinkling and cloudy. I guess living in Arizona taught us not to be worried about weather like that. Our hotel was close enough to the pier that we could walk. We had dinner at a restaurant that wasn't very good at all then froze our hinys off walking back to the hotel.
We woke up the next day to lots of wind. It was also freezing. Well we woke up and called Tanner and Amy to find out when they would be arriving so that we could all go down to the boat together. Well their planes got cancelled and delayed. We decided we would go down to the boat and just meet them there later. When we went down to the lobby to get our free transfer to the pier they informed us that the pier was closed and that our boat wouldn't begin boarding until three o'clock. We took a ride down to the mall. It was a very ritzy mall. And the ride over only cost us twenty bucks. We had lunch at the mall then figured it was about time for everyone to show up so we took a taxi to the airport. That was another Thirty dollars. When we got to the airport they Carnival informed us that they would transfer us to the boat from the airport. Well our bags were still at the hotel. Thinking it would only cost ten bucks or so to just send our luggage to the airport it ended up costing us twenty five dollars and an argument with a taxi driver. From now on we will rent a car. I'm never dealing with American public transportation again. Ugh!
After that whole incident everything was better. We celebrated Cindi's birthday at Carrabba's and cruised the airport all night.
The next day we were on a bus then on the ship. It was a hassle to get through all of the security and people but we were finally on the boat and things were looking up. We had tons of fun on the ship.
There were lots of us together and that made this lots of fun. It was still a little chilly that's why we're all wearing jackets. Thank goodness we all had an extra day in the airport. Some of us had to buy coats and wait on luggage.
This is at dinner time. We always had something fun to do. The servers would sing and dance and so did all of us. Dinner was definitely our favorite time on the ship. The shows were great. It was definitely fun having all of our friends together.
Seth and I on formal night. We were a little under dressed for the rest of our crowd but still had a great time.
When we pulled into Cozumel, Mexico this is who else was there. The Elation is the boat that we took our first cruise on. We didn't get to go inside again but it was still pretty neat seeing it there.
We took a two hour trip to Tulum and saw all of the ancient ruins. It was so neat to hear all of the history of the area. These people were so advanced that they had an entire calender. They had the concept of zero. They could also tell to the minute when the solstices would appear. Their architecture has lasted for thousands of years because they built it at a slope in a completely defensible walled city. It would have been better to have an lds tour guide but our guy did a pretty good job as well. Did you know that they all sleep in hammocks over there. No beds just hammocks.
This was the most beautiful beach. You can kind of see in the picture a line where the water turns from light to dark. That's where the water goes from shallow to deep. There's also a reef around the space. There is about twenty feet of space where a small boat could come in. That's why their space was completely defensible. No way of a water attack.
The last day on the boat we celebrated the girls birthdays. The guys brought out an ice cream cake topped with little pieces of fruit. It was delicious!
We were sad to have to leave and come back to regular life but it was tons of fun. Our servers were awesome. We played Marco Polo with Marco all week long. And Andrej reminded us of Antonio Banderas and turned all of the guys onto "black stone". Pretty interesting guys.
After all was said and done we had a pretty good time. We were ready to come home. Definitely a trip to remember.
1 comment:
I hadn't got to hear much about your trip...so this was fun to read! Glad you guys had so much fun!
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