The big Brace family trip finally arrived! All fifteen of us in the immediate family - - my parents, their three children and those children's families were able to go on a cruise together. We had never been on a vacation with just us before and some adults in the group (Camille and Ana) had never been on a cruise so this was a pretty big deal!
The cruise was on Royal Caribbean and it left out of Port Canaveral on Sunday, March 6 making three stops in Coco Cay (Bahamas), St. Thomas, and St. Maarten. I really care more about the boat than the stops (since I've been to so many of the Caribbean islands already and they all seem pretty similar anyway) so I was very excited to be going on the Freedom of the Seas. Back in 2006 when it debuted, it was the biggest ship at the time (definitely no longer!) and I remember driving past it on the way to Cocoa Beach thinking "Someday I'm going to go on that ship." It only took ten years but hey, I made it happen!
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| Gigi had the girls write a report on the islands. Aubree did St. Thomas. |
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| Calleigh did St. Maarten. This was 9:30 the morning of departure. |
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| Freedom! |
We all left our house at about 10:00 with Ricky and Ana (and my dad who was with them) making a stop along the way to drop off their dog at the kennel. The rest of us got there a little too early and had to wait for them which just made the excitement mount as we got to gaze at the big ship but couldn't board yet. My parents and Shawn had rental cars so we then had to wait even longer as Duncan went with them to drop them off and then ferried them back to the ship. And then finally, we could begin the boarding process. After going through security, we ended up in a fairly large line, although it was moving pretty quickly, to actually check-in. As is his custom, my dad struck up a conversation with the couple directly behind us in line who were with their teenage daughter and younger son. He asked where they were from (Tennessee) and they revealed at some point they had an additional son who was on a mission trip. My dad's ears perked up to that and said "Oh, is it a church group?" When they said yes, he asked what denomination and she said "Seventh-Day Adventist." What are the odds, right? Turns out the husband, Claes Svendsen, is a doctor for one of the Adventist Health System hospitals. Small world! We exchanged info with them to meet up later on the ship.
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| The boys goofing off |
We finally got our ship cards and then it was GO time! Oh, it is so exciting to be going on a whole new adventure with your kids. It definitely makes things that much more fun when you can experience things with them for the first time. I was pretty giddy myself! We checked our cards and saw that we all did get the 5:30 dinner seating and that our tables were 311 and 312 (we assumed two tables of eight). We already knew our cabin numbers, of course, from booking it. We were in cabins 1860 (Ricky & Ana), 1862 (Shawn & Camille), 1870 (Us), and my parents (1872). The numbering is a little confusing. All the other cabins start with the number of the deck which leads you to believe you're on the 18th deck...but the highest deck on this ship was 14. Instead, we were on the 12th deck. This would be the highest deck we had ever stayed on while cruising (usually we are like 4 - 8ish) so definitely a change.
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| Got our ship cards. Ready to board. |
When we looked at the stock photos of the room online, it looked like it would be a porthole (we did not get a balcony because we didn't want to worry about the kids, among other things). Well, when we walked into the room, we were in for a big surprise when we saw that the entire wall was windows...from floor to ceiling. It was really, really great. I almost preferred it over a balcony because your view from the balcony is somewhat limited due to the partitions whereas with this, we could see everywhere. We also weren't sure if we would have drop down bunkbeds for the girls. Thankfully, it was a couch that pulled out. When we booked, we obviously couldn't book it with all four kids in the room with us so we had to book it with Calleigh and Aubree in my parents' room. They offered for them to actually stay in there but we didn't have a connecting room (none available) so I knew the girls would want to stay with us. It all worked out because the girls took the pull-out, Brady was on the floor, and Colby was in his pack-n-play. I was even successfully able to find closet and shelving space for all of our clothes and gear. So yes, it's possible to fit six people, even comfortably, in 175 square feet of space! Now, once the boys get older and want to sleep in actual beds, we might have a problem.
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All
aboard! I love Winnie's expression. It's like she's saying "I have
to put up with these clowns all week?" |
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I
was SO happy to see this view when we opened the door to our stateroom. |
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| My parents' room next door. |
Since our luggage hadn't arrived yet, the first order of business was to eat. Probably would have been either way. The Windjammer Cafe was on Deck 11, one deck below us, but at the other end. Both decks have a lot of space open to the outside (pool was on Deck 11 and walking track on Deck 12) so in order to get there, we had to walk outside each time. It was very windy (around 40 MPH) a few of the days so getting to the food was an adventure at times. One particular time, Colby had his Crocs on with the straps up instead of behind his heel and right as Duncan was getting to the door to get to the restaurant, the Croc came off and the wind started whirling it around the ship. Duncan went after it and saved it just before it went overboard! Phew. But now we know how people accidentally fall off the ships. All this time I thought it was because they had too much alcohol and were acting dumb. Ha!
The Windjammer Cafe...hmmm. It was good but sometimes it wasn't. Don't get me wrong. I was just happy to not have to cook so I would have been satisfied with whatever. The main problem was that it was exceptionally busy. I came to the conclusion that while the cruise line industry is making these ships bigger and bigger so that they hold more people, they aren't increasing the size of the eating area proportionately. I NEVER remember being on a ship (I'm guessing I've cruised like 10 times by now) and having the buffet area be so crowded. Sometimes we couldn't even find a table and you were always bumping into people. The buffet, or course, provides you with the advantage of getting your food "right away." You don't have to go to the dining room and wait to order it and then have the courses be served one by one which can be slow at times. But, buffet style with little kids is also stressful because you can't go through the line with the kids (not with those crowds). So one parent waits at the table with the kids while the other parent goes through line to get the kids' food, deliver it to them, and then goes back to get their own food. By the time said parent sits down to eat, the kids already want something else or they're done. It's quite a predicament. I say all this not to complain, because again, I DIDN'T HAVE TO COOK, but to just expound on what it's like to eat somewhere with toddlers.
The food itself was pretty good but I found myself not spending too long looking at all the options once it was my turn to get my food because in your mind you're thinking, "Okay, I have exactly four minutes and thirty-eight seconds to get my food, get back, and eat before anyone needs me to do something for them." Sometimes it turned out to be even less than that. One thing I noticed is that they didn't have any signage indicating whether something was vegetarian or not. They've probably never had that but I had eaten at Sweet Tomatoes the week before and noticed all their signs clearly show that and it was SO nice. Near the end of the cruise, an employee in the Windjammer came and asked me how my experience was and I told them about this recommendation. He took out a pencil and paper and wrote it all down and took my name. I was really impressed that he seemed to actually care about my opinion. If someday you take an RCI cruise and find they have added this feature to their signage, you have me to thank! In the meantime, I'm pretty sure that the Cream of Asparagus soup we all ate had chicken stock in it. Cluck, cluck.
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| Eating at the Windjammer |
There certainly were a lot of food choices but Royal Caribbean hasn't met the likes of Brady Grodack. Let's see. I'm pretty sure this was the entirety of his meals for the duration of the cruise: cereal, fruit, bread, pizza, french fries, chocolate donuts, and ice cream. Oh, and he ate pancakes the last morning. I'm not even exaggerating. He ate pizza every single night. Things did start off really well when we got him to try a piece of kiwi and he dipped his french fry into ketchup. That was a pretty big deal. But that was the end of his "adventurous" streak. In case you were wondering, he did not have second bites of those items.
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Little did we know that first night
that we would see this exact meal six more night in a row.
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| Brady wasn't the only one who enjoyed a few donuts. |
If Duncan and I had our way, we would have eaten all of our meals in the dining room. Our tables were on Deck 3 in the Leonardo Dining Room. But, the reality of it is, you'd probably also go crazy doing the dining room that many times because the kids do get a little stir crazy. Actually, the three older ones did really well. It's Colby Cabot that causes the problems. Two is such a fun age...said no one ever. They get upset about the dumbest stuff and you hate to give in to them but if you don't, they'll scream their heads off and everyone will stare at you with the look as if to say "Poor lady. But what did she expect with having so many kids??!" Mostly I had to pacify him with my phone. I tried to hold him off as long as I could each meal with books and toys but he got bored of those eventually. I do hate to be the person who resorts to electronics at the dinner table but boy, did it make things so much more pleasant.
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| Brady always wanted to sit next to Camden. |
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| Love my boys! |
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He's
like, "What? You want me to be quiet and play with this darn shark
for the next two hours?!! Nonsense I say!" |
We did have two tables of eight and we quickly discovered that they had different waiters. The first evening, Duncan and I sat at Table 311 and our waiter introduced himself as RJ from the Philippines. I told him he had a lot to live up to since our very good friend was from there and he was a great guy. I'm not sure that RJ ever lived up to that...maybe I put too much pressure on him. In actuality, he probably did a great job but he was living in the shadow of Peter, the waiter from India at Table 312 who was just a terrific guy all around. He is just the kind of waiter you dream about having...very personable and attentive to your needs. He took down everyone's name the first night so he could call them by name and when he found out most everyone was vegetarian, for the rest of the cruise he would bring us out an Indian entree (along with the entree we would also order off the menu) even for those that got the short straw that night and sat at 311. He would also have fruit and appetizers ready and waiting for the kids and on two nights, he brought us out giant trays of egg rolls and samosas as soon as we sat down. If he was working us for an extra tip, mission accomplished! Since we all wanted to sit at his table, we had to rotate each night who sat where to keep it fair. The assistant waiter was Lui, who was 22 and from China. He was so smiley all the time and friendly and we all just loved him. It's funny because when we did our Alaskan cruise, many moons ago now, we have not forgotten the assistant waiter we had then, Katut. This is why I will never do the freestyle dining - - I like coming to the same table each evening and having the same waiters so that you can get to know them.
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| Table 312 |
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Some of the dining rooms on cruises
have been so gaudy and ugly but I thought this one was quite lovely (it was
three stories).
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| One morning we convinced the others to eat in the dining room so I could enjoy the thick french toast. |
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| Samosas end egg rolls. |
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| Peter |
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| Lui |
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| RJ on the left. |
Not all of the dining room staff were quite so charming. There was a 20-something woman assistant waiter for another table who would now and then do something for our table. On Friday, the girls were sporting their braids that they had gotten in St. Maarten. This lady walks by and notices Acadia's (who is FIVE) braids. She fingers them and says "Oh, aren't these sexy." Did I mention Acadia is FIVE? Awkward!! But it doesn't end there. She starts getting chit chatty and says "When I got on this ship, my sister's baby was only a week old. I did a web chat with them and when I saw my niece who is now four months old, I said 'Who the f$*% is that???'" Except she didn't say "f$*&." She said the actual word. Thank goodness she had a bit of an accent. But who says that to a table with a bunch of little kids???
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|
So
RJ did do a magic trick one night which was cool but the lady in the background
is the offending lady in this story. |
But, enough about the food and dining experience. Our first stop was to be the next day, Monday. We were stopping at Coco Cay which is Royal Caribbean's private island in the Bahamas. The only other time I've been on RCI, which was my honeymoon, we skipped it due to weather. Well, as they say deja vu all over again. As were walking into the dining room to check out the menu Monday morning, the captain came on over the loud speaker and informed us that they had to cancel the stop because it was too windy. We had to tender in at the stop and it was just too dangerous for those boats. We were obviously disappointed but it was indeed windy so it was understandable. The whole thing did give us a good laugh though and became a running joke for the rest of the cruise.The captain must have come on about three more times to make the same announcement and he would also emphasize that the other ship, a Carnaval, that we could see next to us wasn't making the stop either. Carnaval shares the other half of the island. He also mentioned that this was typical of the "winter season" to miss the stop. Anyway, the captain was Norwegian and had a bit of a thick accent and tended to draw out his words and make big pauses between words which unfortunately set him up for some good natured imitation by a few men of our group. "Gooooood moooooorning, ladies and gentleman. I am....afraiiiid to inform you....that as uuuuusual for this time....of yeaaaaar.....we have hit an iceberg....and willll not...be able....to ssssstop at St. Thomas.....but don't worrrrry....so didddd...twoooo other shipppps." Anyway, we got some good mileage out of it.
With that option now out, we looked to fill a day at sea. I thought about putting on my bathing suit, grabbing my Kindle, and relaxing out in the warm sun. But then I remembered that I had four children. Shucks. But wait! There was an Adventure Ocean club. You could drop off kids who were 3+ and potty trained from 9:00 - 12:00 and then from 2:00 to just about whenever. The groupings were ages 3-5 and then 6-8 as it pertained to our kids. It was a good thing that the cousins were there because I'm sure Brady would have never done it by himself. But he had Acadia with him so it was all good. Within a few minutes, I was down to one kid. So I settled for lying on my bed, in my clothes, but I did have my Kindle! Colby is quite good at entertaining himself with his trucks and books so I will say that the time was pretty relaxing.
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| He would set all his cars up on the ledge next to the window. |
In the afternoon, as was our custom for our sea days, we would do the pool. Now, I think I mentioned that I was worried about Colby and the pool/potty training situation. My understanding was that there were no pools that the kids who weren't potty trained could go into. I had read it in a review done by a traveller who had gone on our exact ship a few months previous and then it also rang a bell from when we cruised when Calleigh was 10-months old. I was prepared to stick Colby into the pool with no diaper (they couldn't wear swim diapers) and hope no one would ask me if he was potty trained. Well, here I was pleasantly surprised again because they DID have a pool for the unpotty trained. It was shallow and warm and perfect for a 2-year old. It even had some little waves because of the natural rocking of the boat. Colby and Winnie brought their toys in there and had a grand time. All that "stress" for nothing!
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| The kids' pool area |
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| Adult pool area (but kids were allowed) |
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| Winslow and Colby in their pool. |
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| The moms hanging out at the kiddie pool. |
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| Practicing their snorkeling |
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| They had soft serve ice cream right next to the pool so one afternoon we let them have it (No, we aren't mean but they were also having ice cream every night at the dining room!) |
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| They spent a lot of their time in the hot tub. Apparently this was right after having the ice cream, by the mess on Brady's face. |
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| But they also enjoyed running around in the splash play area too. |
On Tuesday afternoon (which happened to be Duncan's birthday), I was with Colby for his nap and Camille was with the kids in one of the wave pools in the non-kid section. As the story goes, the kids were practicing their snorkeling when Camille noticed that Aubree's mouth seemed to have some blood on it. Low and behold, it turns out Aubree's tooth had come out. That darn tooth has been hanging by a thread for the last week and I was getting sick of it. Calleigh had apparently bumped into Aubree's mouth with her snorkel which must have finally jarred it lose. Unfortunately, they didn't know where the tooth was. Calleigh put her snorkel back on, dove in, and what do you know, but comes up with the tooth. Somehow she had miraculously seen it on the bottom of the pool (along with an earring and some trash). A baby tooth is very tiny and would blend in with the white bottom of the pool so it seemed highly unlikely it would be found but she did it. Makes for a good story to lose your very first tooth on your dad's birthday and lose it in a cruise ship pool! Somehow though, Aubree was distraught about the whole thing although I'm really not sure why. She started crying really hard and Camille told me she was desperate and ended up telling Aubree she would probably get some extra money for the tooth because of the circumstances. Uh thanks Camille! But no, that was fine. Camille finally had to come knock on the door and get me out of the room (Colby thankfully didn't wake up) to try and comfort Aubree which I was eventually able to do. Incidentally, Duncan was enjoying his birthday gift - - a massage at the spa - - during this time which was why he was no help.
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| Calleigh looking for the tooth? Not sure this is the exact picture. |
Wednesday was our first stop - - St. Thomas.
We didn't have a set plan going in (we knew we didn't want to do any ship
excursions because they're so pricey) other than to perhaps get some rental
cars and drive to the beach. That is exactly what we did. My mom, Ricky,
Ana, and Shawn went out first and found two mini vans at Budget right off the ship. Of course, we did not have any car seats or booster seats with us
which made things interesting. According to a posted sign, it appeared
that kids under three were supposed to be in a car seat and they had them for
rent for $7.50 a day - - but they only had one. We gave it to Winslow so
that meant Colby was on my lap for the trip. I'm sure that was like a
dream come true for him. Indeed, during one leg of the trip, he took a
nap up in my arms which was admittedly kind of nice. The kids were really
confused, "You mean, we just sit on the seat without our booster
seats??" I couldn't help being a little nervous especially since you drive
on the opposite side of the road (even though the steering wheel is still on
the same side). But all went fine.
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| Coming into port. You can see another cruise ship in the distance. |
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| Duncan drove the red one. |
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| Yeah, this was pretty nice. |
The first beach we went to was Secret Harbor and
it was fantastic. The water was really calm and there was terrific
snorkeling for those inclined (that did not include me). We got the girls
snorkel gear right before we left and Calleigh especially took right to it
which wasn't a surprise since she's a big swimmer. We had brought their
life jackets with us which was a big help. We stayed at the beach for
quite a few hours and ended up eating lunch at the restaurant there (there was
also a hotel there). The servers weren't exactly friendly but the food
was really good. I had a kale salad and it was probably one of my top
three things I ate while on the cruise. Poor Duncan had gotten burned in
2006 on a cruise when he ate something on a beach in Cozumel so he just
didn't know what to do this time as far as ordering. He finally settled on a cheese
pizza. Fortunately there were no ill affects from that and anything else
he ate on the whole cruise (he didn't eat any meat during the entire week) so
now he can no longer say "I get sick every time I go on a cruise."
Phew because I was sort of "sick" of hearing that.
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| Not too shabby. |
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| Lathered up and ready to go. |
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| Our spot. The beach wasn't that big so it's a good thing it was a "secret." |
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| A wedding took place right next to us. |
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| A good time was had by all. |
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| Driving from one beach to another afforded us some beautiful views including our ship in the harbor. |
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| Closer up of our ship. |
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| My four favorite men. |
The second beach was called Magen's Bay.
It wasn't nearly as calm but I really can't tell you much more about it
because I pretty much missed the whole stop since I stayed in the van with
Colby who had fallen asleep on the way there. Yes, I may have drifted off
a bit also. But hey, I'm on vacation!
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| Duncan insisted on putting zinc on the kids' faces which apparently you aren't supposed to rub in? I just think it looks weird... |
Thursday was our second, and last stop - - St.
Maarten. While I'm pretty sure I had been to St. Thomas before, I
definitely knew I had been to St. Maarten. That time we had rented
mopeds to get around. Clearly, that wasn't happening this time. We
opted to just take a taxi to a beach (rather than rent vans again) and stay at
that one beach for the day. We really wanted a calm beach again for good
snorkeling. They had a big taxi area set up with a bunch of people
waiting. We asked about a calm beach and a worker there said we needed to
go to "Little Bay." We waited in that line but then another
employee said "Oh, it is really crowded at Little Bay right now so you
should go somewhere else." Yet another employee said we should go to
Dawn Beach instead. A taxi van pulled up and we asked the driver if Dawn
Beach was calm. He didn't really reply but we didn't press it because we
were distracted with getting settled in the seats. The guy (in his 50's)
seemed to be pretty nice and Ricky (who was sitting in the front seat) chitchatted
with him on the way there. As soon as we pulled in after about a 15-20
minute drive, we could tell right away that it was NOT a calm beach. At
all. Obviously, we were not pleased. The trip was $6/person and were we
going to have to pay now again for him to drive us somewhere else. My
parents got out to talk to the driver who had gotten out and we could tell the
discussion was interesting. The gist of it was that he said it wasn't his
fault that he brought us there because it was the workers at the taxi stand who
told us it was a calm beach. He had no control over what they told us.
Meanwhile, another couple came up from the beach and they were very
upset. Apparently they had been deceived as well and wanted to leave
immediately. The husband saw Ana and started speaking in Spanish to her.
She later told me that he said to her, "They brought us here to kill
us." Finally, my parents got it worked out with the driver and we
squeezed in the disgruntled couple and we all headed to Little Bay where we should
have gone in the first place. It was not particularly crowded there - - I
figured it was probably all a scam to get people to take more expensive taxi
rides.
Little Bay was not as calm Secret Harbor but it
was still beautiful and the kids very much enjoyed the waves - - although
snorkeling was limited. They even had chairs and an umbrella you could
rent for $15/day for the set. It was nice to have a seat this time.
The guy in charge of renting them out was not nice at all though.
Duncan and I had asked for some and through a mix up, he gave them to
someone else and there weren't any more available. I said to him,
"If any become available, please let me know." He just says
"Nope." I said further, "I don't mean now, I mean like
later on today." He repeats, "Nope" and just walks away.
About thirty minutes later, a little rainstorm came through and a bunch
of people left and suddenly, what do you know, chairs were available, including
ones right next to us. We snatched them up and I moved the umbrella on
our own. I so wanted to say something to him when he strolled by later
but I took the high road.
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| Little Bay |
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| Can't go to the islands without getting your hair braided. She wanted $3 a braid but we talked her down to $2. |
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| They all got matching braids. |
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| My parents and us (at seperate tables) ate at the restaurant on the beach. It was horrible! My parents waited 45 minutes for their nachos and we waited an hour for our meal. Thank goodness the kids could just play on the beach while we waited. |
I had been waiting with great anticipation for what
the ID requirements would be when were in St. Maarten. I can't remember
if I wrote about it but we had massive confusion over whether we needed
passports for the kids on St. Maarten. The Dutch embassy said we did, the
US travel website said we did, but the cruise lines said we didn't (because we
were on a "closed loop" trip). After spending hours of research
on it I still never came up with a definitive answer but decided to just spend
the money and get them because if there was an emergency and you needed to fly
you'd need them. Plus, maybe we would travel by plane somewhere in the
next five years anyway. When we disembarked, all we did was have our ship
card scanned as we exited the ship. That was it. Then, to get back
into the cruise terminal area, I noticed a lady who seemed to be checking
something. We got out the kids passports thinking we would need to use
them. But as Calleigh and Aubree presented them to her, she waved her
hand and said "I don't need to see those. Just your ship
cards." We ended up showing no form of photo ID whatsoever the
entire day. Apparently St. Maarten doesn't care if you come or go from
their country as long as you are there to spend money.
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| After the beach we walked around the shops near the ship for a few minutes to find some pins for the girls' collections. |
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| This picture made me laugh. The kids were looking right into the sun and they didn't handle it well except for Calleigh. |
One thing that caused a bit of gossip had to do
with our twin ship parked next to us. It looked virtually identical to
ours and was named "Navigator of the Seas." As we were waiting
in line to get back on our ship at the end of the day, we noticed that the
workers at the gangplank for that ship, which had no people waiting in line or on it, seemed
to be scanning the horizon as though looking for someone. We surmised that the
ship was getting ready to depart but some passengers were missing. Before
we boarded, saw them pull up the gangway without this missing person appearing
and a few minutes later, the ship pulled out of port. We were all
speculating that someone most have gotten left behind. The next morning the
word on the street was that two ladies had been drunk and had gotten in the
line for OUR ship thinking it was theirs and hadn't realized their mistake
until their ship had left. Who knows if it was actually true but the kids found
that info quite entertaining. If was true, we can only hope they had their
passports on their person.
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| I suppose it could be a LITTLE tricky but it does have the name of the ship right there on the front in big letters. |
After Friday being another typical day at sea
(meaning fun around the ship), it was Saturday, our last day. It being
Sabbath, we obviously had a different schedule. As I mentioned earlier,
we had met the Adventists in line at the beginning of the cruise. We
somehow didn't cross paths with them during the week but we knew they were
planning to have "church" in the chapel at 11:00 on Sabbath morning. It
ended up being a group of about 40 of us because they had a bunch of other
people traveling with them. One such couple, we discovered, was from
Michigan and knew Rad's wife Jen and had helped with the flowers (if I'm
remembering correctly) for their wedding. Also, very interestingly, their
daughter Emily was about to be starting a 3-year internship in Finance at
Florida Hospital. Yes, the exact thing I did many years ago. One of
the young ladies in the group got up and led out out in song service, my mom
did a children's story (about our rabbits that died when we were kids - - we
were laughing so hard that she chose to tell a story about dying pets), and
Shawn spoke for about 20 minutes. Honestly, it was probably the highlight
of the trip for me. There is just something about getting together and
worshipping with strangers that makes it extra special. Even though we
didn't know each other, we share this common bond and it was like we weren't
strangers at all. I can't really describe it other than it's
just....amazing. We chitchatted with each other for awhile afterwards (we
joked about whose room we were going to go to for haystacks!) and my mom
invited them to do a Bible scavenger hunt at 3:00 that she had already planned
out...which they did. We had been a little concerned that Sabbath would
be a long day but it ended up being perfectly fine.
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| Camille and the kids went up front to teach them "Milk" |
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| Children's story |
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| Shawn doing his sermonette. |
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| Making new friends. Not sure why Calleigh's expression is so sour. The two girls on the right are sisters whom we discovered are homeschooled. |
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| The Svendsens (people who were in line behind us) |
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| Had to settle for the Windjammer rather than haystacks. |
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| Watching Daniel and the Lions Den to pass some time. |
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| The winners of the scavenger hunt. I'm sure it helped that there were only two of us because we could get around much faster. |
A few other things about the trip that I'll keep brief:
- Interestingly, we ran into some other folks we knew too. Camille noticed this young teenager early in the week and thought "She remind me of Julie Nephew." Sure enough, later on in the week, she did see Julie Nephew and the girl turned out to be her daughter. I knew Julie from Andrews when we played on the same intramural team. She was on the cruise with her family including her aunt and uncle who happened to live in the same neighborhood as Ron and Elaine.
- I can't believe I did but I went an entire week with no internet, texting, etc. I do love news and such and really wasn't excited about being cut off (we are cut off at our cabins in Nova Scotia but I can text and we do go every couple of days or so to where we can get WIFI). To get access on the ship it would be $20 a day and you had to get it for the whole trip. So that wasn't happening. I think the worst part was not being able to communicate with each other on board. We did get CNN in our rooms but I was always in there with the kids and I didn't want them watching the news.
- Case in point about the communicating - - my parents watched the kids a few nights so that the younger set could all go out in the evenings. We had a baby monitor in our room and my dad watched it from his room next door while my mom stayed in the Brace room. Of course, there was absolutely no way to reach us if something were to go amiss so you just had to hope nothing would. On one of the nights, we got back and knocked on my parents' door to let my dad know we were back but he didn't answer. I realized he must be in our room and sure enough, there he was holding a crying Colby. I felt so bad! Fortunately he had only been at it about 10 minutes but still...Electronic devices are good people!! (That shout out is to all the people who think it's nice to not use them for a week).
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| Hanging out at Sorrento's Pizza one evening |
- Speaking of my dad and Colby - - Colby is obsessed with him. Every time he would see my dad, he would shout "Papa!!" and go running over to him to be picked up. He always wanted my dad to read him a story. If Colby was grumpy or whatever, we would just say "Look, there's Papa" and he would go jump on him and be alright. I love it.
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