Land Ho!

We returned yesterday from our family Caribbean Thanksgiving cruise and it was great! We left out of Baltimore and the setup was great - drive by the trolleys where longshoremen take your luggage out of your car onto the trucks, then park, and get in line with your paperwork... we were on the ship within an hour of arriving in Baltimore - not bad! The other good news was that we all "approved" of this pic they snapped in the waiting area - so that took the pressure off having to get a group shot we all liked.. whew!

Aren't we a cute family with our matching leis on!??! Carrie surprised us all with the leis before our drive down - how fun! Please note - I am standing in the back and leaning forward which is why I appear to be shorter than Carrie (I am NOT shrinking, as she would suggest!).

Here's a brief review of where we went and what we did:

• Friday, 11/16 - drove to Baltimore, got on our "home away from home", unpacked and started exploring the ship

• Saturday, 11/17 - day at sea, and our first formal night - got all dolled up, Pops was in his tux! :) Was chilly outside, so not a pool day.
  

• Sunday, 11/18 - day at sea - I camped out on a lounge chair on the top deck, listened to my ipod, read my book and got some sun... aaahh.. relaxing!
  

• Monday, 11/19 - San Juan, Puerto Rico - Carrie and I were really bummed to learn that our "Snuba" excursion (like snorkeling but you can swim deeper) was cancelled.. as we didn't like any of the other options, we opted to just go ashore and explore on our own - so Sarah, Carrie and I hopped on a free trolley that took us around Old San Juan - we stopped off at 2 forts and met Mom & Dad at the restaurant Kiril (our waiter from Bulgaria) told us invented the pina coladas.. we tested them and they were GOOD!

• Tuesday, 11/20 - St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Island - Sarah, Carrie and I went on a snorkeling excursion to the island of St. John, so we hopped on a boat and in 30 minutes were in beautiful St John - then bussed over to Trunk Bay, the 2nd most beautiful beach in the world (according to whom I can't recall, #1 was in Australia) - saw some cool fish and coral - hope the underwater camera pics come out ok

• Wednesday, 11/21 - Dominican Republic - Chrissie, Sarah and I went on a Jeep excursion where we got to drive our own 4-wheel drive Jeep through the mud and dirt roads of the DR - ours was the last in the line of 7 Jeeps - we saw men working on a road, farm animals, learned about Dominican produce (bananas, coffee), hiked to a waterfall, and went to a beach - unfortunately the surf was too rough to swim.. the best part was when we passed the ATV tour group and I hit a puddle that splashed them - how FUN! :)

• Thanksgiving Day, 11/22 - Labadee, Haiti - went to Royal Caribbean's private beach - think Disney does a beach. All 7 of us took the tender boat and set up "camp" for the day - Elizabeth really loved playing in the sand - we tried to take her swimming but she wasn't loving that.. came back to the ship, showered and had a lovely turkey dinner that none of us had to cook!

• Friday, 11/23 - Chrissie and I got sick this morning, so we call this day "Black Friday", but not for the shopping... we saw on the tv that if we got sick we should go to Medical.. well unbeknownst to us if you have certain symptoms you end up in ISOLATION for 48 hours.. yep... we were confined to our cabin for the duration of the cruise! Big bummer! Elizabeth was moved into Sarah and Carrie's room, the connecting door was locked :( and our isolation began.. they had a special cleaning crew come into our cabin to change the linen and sanitize the room.. kinda made us feel like lepers! Even the room service people delivered our trays wearing gloves, and they weren't allowed in the room.. sigh.. so today was busy getting better and sleeping.. VERY glad we had a balcony!

• Saturday, 11/24 - Isolation day #2 - by this time Chrissie and I were feeling much better and were hopeful that because we didn't have any symptoms in the past 24 hours (oddly enough, no symptoms since before going to Medical!) that we could be released.. but no - the CDC was involved (yep, the Centers for Disease Control) - we had to fill out certain forms, so there was no getting out of our "detention".. the positive side of this is that we were able to rest and watch Oceans 13 about 4 times (it kept playing on the cruise tv). When the ship started to turn into the Chesapeake Bay it was cool watching the pilot boat come alongside the ship and drop off the "pilot", the guy who "drives" the ship over the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel..

• Sunday, 11/25 - arrived back in Baltimore -Chrissie and I were released from isolation and able to mingle with the rest of the cruise folk just in time for breakfast. We were off the ship and in our cars by 9:30am, home by 11am!
  

When I got home I was sufficiently rested (thanks to the isolation) and full of energy, so I unpacked, did my laundry and started decorating the house for Christmas! By 2pm I was falling asleep on the couch to the classic holiday movie White Christmas.. sigh.. perfection - a Sunday snooze! :)