Mom, Lars, and I left Kalispell at 7 yesterday morning on a flight to Salt Lake City. There we met up with Britta and James before we took a flight to Dallas. Once in Dallas we boarded the next plane headed to Puerto Rico. The entire plane had been in their seats for 20 minutes before we were told that some maintenance needed to be done and then we would be on our way shortly. Well, every half hour or so the update from the flight attendant informed us that it would be just a little longer. That went on for two hours. We sat on the plane for about 2.5 hours and never left the gate. Eventually we were told to get off the plane so we can switch to another one without maintenance issues. We get on the new plane 4.5 hours after we were originally supposed to depart. The flight went smoothly, and we arrived in Puerto Rico.
 |
| Here we are patiently waiting a take off that never happened. |
In the morning Mom woke us up to get breakfast while it was still being served. We came right back up and slept again until 1:30 when Papa showed up. We all headed out for a walk to find some lunch. We decided on Wendy's for our first meal in Puerto Rico; very ethnic. It started pouring while we were eating so we sat inside a while until it calmed down. Out walking adventure continued down the street and to a couple of souvenir shops and eventually the beach. A very calm afternoon including card games after Lars got a hair cut from this barbour shop in a basement.
We decided to eat dinner at this ritzy place called Budatai. Everyone else was dressed up and we were just in jeans and shorts and sandals. The food was really expensive, but it was very good. We walked over to the Ben and Jerry's across the plaza to get ice cream, of course. A great first day of vacation.
December 22
This morning Papa decided we would walk to Old Puerto Rico town to see the castle/forts. It was supposed to be a 30 minute walk, but it took the 16 of us 2 hours instead. We toured the Casadella de San Cristóbal first. There were lots of stairs and old rock walls. We walked down this old cobblestone street to get to another fort. It was long and we were hot and sticky, so about halfway Mom bought us all fruit-sicles . We get to the Casadella de San Antonio del Morro and walk around big rock walls and stair cases again. The coolest part was being able to see far into the distance on the horizon of the ocean.
December 23
This morning we all slept in and just lounged before we headed to the beach. The surf was very intense; the little girls were getting knocked over. We had sand in our suits all afternoon from the waves. We hopped in a taxi to head to the port where our cruise ship was. The security we went through was like at an airport. The ship is huge! 14 stories tall. After we dropped our bags off in our rooms, everyone went their own ways to explore the boat. Mom and I explored the spa and entered in a raffle to sin some free spa treatments. We didn't win, but we did get a discounted special for a full body massage. We met up for dinner at the Pacific dining room. The food was perfectly proportioned, just enough for one person to eat the food. Nothing too exciting happened after dinner. There was a dance party on the pool deck as the boat pushed away from the dock. I was the only one who really got in to it though. Kira and Tyler thought I was nuts. And we're cruising on the ocean!
December 24
This morning the ship docked at St. Thomas. The family got off and took a taxi to Coki Beach. There was some snorkeling going on, but it wasn't the best. Still a lot of fun though. It was James's first time snorkeling! The waves were great and the water was a beautiful aqua blue. Everyone was just happy to relax in the sand.The taxi ride back to the ship took forever. There was some incident ahead of this long line of cars. Apparently the police were arresting somebody, or something like that.
Back on the boat we had dinner. I ordered shark and lobster fritters for my appetizer tonight. Something a little more adventurous. They were actually pretty good. In the middle of dinner, the waiters of the whole Pacific diner started dancing to a song that was playing. So funny. After dinner Kira, Tyler, Britta, James and I walked up a few floors to the Adriatic Lounge to watch a comedy show. It was pretty good. A little scripted, but still funny. There was another show right after the first, and we decided to stay because it was a different comedian. This guy played more off the audience and had us laughing the whole time. Just for fun we ordered drinks to get the full experience of seeing a comedian in a lounge on a cruise ship (the non-spirited drinks of course.) We were all so tired from playing in the sun all day that we didn't really do much after the shows. All the kids put their shoes outside the doors so that Santa can come fill them with candy. It was something they did in Nicaragua 2 years ago and can't stop talking about it. Lars and I put out one of our shoes, too. It is Christmas Eve after all!
December 25
So the kids put their shoes outside the doors last night. There was candy in them this morning, but not without a story. After the parents put the kids to bed and went to get the candy, they filled the shoes and proceeded about their evening activities. On their way back from something my uncle Brian noticed a shoe tipped over with the candy gone. He was frustrated that someone would take a kid's candy. Well they didn't know what to do, so they decided to go do something else while they thought about the options. When they got back from that, they noticed another shoe tipped over without any candy. This time they were mad. Dela and Brian were headed back upstairs to get more candy, when they walked by another kid's shoes outside a door with the candy that had been stolen! It was only a room a few down from theirs; did the people think that they wouldn't notice? So Dela and Brian took their candy back and put it back in their own kids' shoes.The cruise ship was sailing all day, so we just spent it laying out at the pool. While we were sitting on the pool deck today a couple got engaged! He proposed with a mic right in front of the band. Then some chef came out and did an ice carving of an Indian head. Kind of cool. Mostly today I just read The Perks Of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky and took naps in the sun. I did get a little crispy, but hopefully by the end of the week it will be a tan.
.jpg)
Some dance show was performed tonight; City Lights I think it was called. They had dancers and a couple of lead singers that did show tunes, broadway, country, swing, modern, all sorts of stuff. My favorite were the country and swing numbers. The costumes were amazing. So many changes and just all together over the top. A very well done show. Point for Carnival Cruises.
December 26
The cruise ship docked in Barbados sometime last night. A few of us went ahead and started walking to Carlisle Beach. We weren't sure how far of a walk it was, but usually that's how these things go when we're with Papa. We found the beach after walking through a run down part of town. The beach was beautiful. The most clear and light aqua blue I have ever seen. The sand was really fine and almost white. It was really hot today though. I spent most of my time in the water where it was cooler. Lars rented a wave runner for a half hour and took it out in the bay. He seemed to be having fun. The kids buried each other in the sand. I think they dug 2 big holes they climbed in. Everyone was turning in to lobsters, so we decided to head back.
The show tonight was the world's fastest juggler. He did some pretty sweet tricks. Throughout the show he juggled clubs, 3 and 5; glow in the dark balls, 3, 4, and 5 at a time; 3 sharp machetes; ping pong balls with his mouth, 1, 2, and 3; 3 wooden blocks; and a been bag, bowling ball, and machete all at the same time.
December 27
Today the ship was docked in St. Lucia. Our family got up early to catch a boat that would take us out scuba diving. Dad had to miss out on the trip because he had a flight back home. We were supposed to go on this 'premium dive' around some mountains and cliffs, but the boat that was needed for that dive got resurfaced yesterday and wasn't ready for passengers. Anyways, we just went diving their regular dives. It was about a 15-20 minute ride out to the spot where we could dive. The Bay of Pigs I think it was called. The first dive was over a sunken ship about 60 ft down. We were under water for about 40 minutes that dive. James isn't certified to dive so he went out snorkeling instead. It was only his second time ever snorkeling, the first was a few days ago, and he saw an octopus! After everyone was back on the boat, the dive crew gave us fruit juice and sandwiches for lunch, which had some sort of sunflower butter on it. Quite tasty.
 |
| Britta |
 |
| Me |
 |
| Lars |
 |
| Lars |
 |
| Mom |
 |
| Britta |
 |
| Mom |
 |
| James |
 |
| Lars |
 |
| Britta |
 |
| Mom |
 |
| The biggest flounder I have ever seen! |
 |
| Lars, upside down |
 |
| Britta |
 |
| Me |
 |
| James |
The show tonight was all Rock music. Once again, the dancers were great and the costumes were spectacular. they know so many shows! Afterwards, a few of kids ended up in Britta's room to play cards for a few hours before everyone trickled off to bed.
December 28
St. Kitts today was fun. We started the day looking for our tour guide/bus driver. Once we got off the ship, we had to make our way across a courtyard full of guys wanting us to take a picture with cute little monkeys. Once we found our bus driver, Scotty, we started our island tour of St. Kitts. There was a lot of slavery history of the people there, but they didn't seem to be ashamed of it like Americans are at times. Our first stop was at a batik shop. Batik is made by putting wax on white cotton and then dying the fabric. The wax seals the cotton fibers so the die won't get where the wax is put on.
Our next stop was The Brimstone Hill Fortress National park. The fort was built to hold British troops. The bus then took us to a little cliff that had lava rocks on the beach below. There was tried this ginger no-bake cookie sugar blob thing. It was very surgery and tasty, but at the end there was a spicy punch because of the ginger. Scotty got us back on the bus and we drove to a beach to playoff a few hours. Some of the kids went snorkeling, some swam, some didn't. It was another hot sunny day to play in the sand.
After dinner Mom , Papa, and I walked through an art gallery show of Thomas Kincade paintings. I think this pieces are beautiful; Papa thought they were dumb. There was one that I really liked. It had flock of sheep walking through a gate into an open door to a house where Christ was standing in the doorway. The house was the only source of light in the picture; the sun had just gone down. I think I looked at it for 10 minutes. After the gallery Mom and I walked to the jewelry store. Yesterday they had a sale on rings (I got one that looks like blue topaz) and today they had a sale on bracelets. I got two that are really elegant and sparkly.
For a show tonight it was a magician who had some pretty great allusions. My favorite parts were when he involved the audience to help him do some tricks. His motto was, 'Magic doesn't make people happy, laughter does!' He was a great performer and had us laughing the whole time.
December 29
Once again we got up early this morning to start some adventure. Today we were on the island of St. Maartin. We walked over to some docks and found a pirate ship which Mom had rented for the day and climbed on board. The ship first took us to a snorkeling spot where a sunken helicopter and sunken submarine were. It was pretty sweet. Kira, Lars, and I each dove down tot he helicopter cockpit and swam through it. Back on the pirate ship we all jumped off the very front of the boat a couple times. I finally did my first back flip! Once everyone came back from snorkeling, the captains and first mate dropped the sails and we sailed like real pirates. The captain had a grill on the back of the boat, so he BBQed up some chicken wings and ribs for us for lunch. The pirate sails took us right by the airport, which was right on the sand on the beach. The planes were flying right over our boat, as if they were doing to crash into us. We stopped at another snorkeling spot next to some rocks. There wasn't anything too spectacular, but we did see a puffer fish. We think we saw a yellow-footed boobie, if they exist, on one of the rocks just staring us down. All the kids took turns jumping off the font of the ship. Two random girls that swam out to our boat from the beach asked if they could jump off, too. It was a fun, relaxed day. The pirate ship then headed back to the docks where we had to say goodbye.
December 30
Originally this morning we were supposed to get off the ship at 8:30, but at 7 there was an announcement that propels who didn't have valet bags (us) had to disembark by 7:45 or wait until 11:30. Some of our group had plans to catch to the later time wouldn't work. Everyone quickly got out of bed and flew around the rooms getting everything together. And we made it! We all hopped in a taxi bust hat took us back to the hotel we stayed at before we left for the cruise. After storing our luggage somewhere we walked down the street to the beach and literally stayed there all day. Most of the kids were happy enough to play in the sand. Some of us played cards while others took naps. Just completely relaxed and not stressed. After a quick lunch at Wendy's, we headed back to the beach for on last round of sandy suits and jumping waves. Lars and some if he other boys aerated building a giant sand pile. After about a hour they had one that was probably 4.5 feet tall. We all started helping to shape the pile into some big sea animal. It turned out to to be a giant sea turtle. People walking along the beach kept stopping to take pictures of our sand sculpture.
December 31
We traveled home today, well attempted to. We left our hotel in Puerto Rico at 6:30 this morning. At the airport everything went smoothly. 6 hours later is when we landed in Dallas is when we ran in to problems. The flight we were supposed to get on had been changed to depart a few hours later than when mom originally books the flight. Consequently that gave us 25 minutes in Salt Lake to get from the A concourse all the way to the E gates. Mom was worried that the flight from Dallas wouldn't leave on time and we would miss our flight completely. And that's exactly what happened. The plane in Dallas had issues and we left a good hour and half later than scheduled and missed our flight to Kalispell.
Now we had to figure out how to get home. Usually there is a midnight flight to Kalispell, but because its New Years Eve it wasn't running. The next flight is usually at 6:30 the next morning, but that also wasn't running because of NYE. So the next flight was at 1:45 on the first. But that one was completely booked because the previous toe flights weren't running. We had to start getting creative to find a way home. Many ideas were tossed around, but we ended up renting a car one way to Kalispell and started driving. At this point we had been traveling for 15 hours already. 3 hours down the road we stopped in Idaho Falls forthright night. It was only 9:30 there, so we stayed up a bit longer to watch the ball drop in New York. Then the three of us fell asleep almost immediately. And that wrapped up 2012.
No comments:
Post a Comment