Thursday, March 6, 2008

Back from the CARIBBEAN MAN!

Sorry it's taken so long to post this, but I got sick after we got home and didn't really have the motivation to post as quickly as I would have liked to.
So I was lucky enough to go on a week long cruise with the office that I work for. It's the doctors way of saying thank you for all the hard work that we do. We went to the Eastern Caribbean and stopped in Nassau, Bahamas, St. Thomas, and St. Maarten, both are part of the U.S. Virgin Islands. We flew out from Boise on the 15th of February and I have a really embarassing story to share about that. So I stayed up way too late Thursday night trying to pack and make sure I had everything ready for my trip and didn't get to bed until 2:30. I had set my alarm for 5 in the morning, but when it went off I decided I needed just a few more minutes of sleep. I thought that I had reset my alarm for 5:10, but apparently didnt, because I got a text from Annie at 6:20 that woke me up. Panic mode set in and I was running around the house trying to shower, finish throwing the rest of my stuff in my bag and waking Heather up to take me to the airport. Needless to say I got to the airport at 7:32 and the lady at the counter said I was too late and couldn't get on the plane. Then she proceded to scold me, "why weren't you here on time, you have to be at the airport 30 minutes before the plane leaves, etc." Like I'm the first person to ever sleep through their alarm and get to the airport late. So now I'm getting frustrated and starting to cry, thinking that I'm going to get left behind and I'm not going to make it to Florida to get on the cruise. Fortunately there was another lady at the counter that was a little nicer, and they got me booked on standby for the next flight. I had to call Heather to come back and pick me up because the plane wasn't leaving until 2:00 p.m. And as if that wasn't bad enough, when Heather and I were driving home, around 8:15 or so, the plane that I was supposed to be on, that was supposed to leave at 8, was still sitting at the airport! I kept in touch with Stacy throughout the day to let her know what was going on with me. When I got to Minneapolis I went to the counter to double check that I had been put on the standby list to Orlando, and what do you know, I wasn't. So I explained to the lady my situation and what I had already been through, and bless this sweet woman, she took pity on me and bumped me up to first class! I could have hugged her! I still had to wait in the airport forever though because the flight had been pushed back and we had to change gates 2 times. I finally flew out of Minneapolis around 9 at night. It was great to be in first class though, I got to get on the plane first, was actually served a meal instead of having to pay $2-5 for a snack back in coach and I had plenty of leg room to stretch and sleep and I got to get off the plane first. :) I got into Orlando around 12:30, had to wait 30 minutes for my luggage, and then called the hotel to have the shuttle come and pick me up. About 1:45 a.m. I still hadn't seen the shuttle so I called the hotel again and was finally picked up around 2:15. Then the driver said the hotel didn't even tell him that there was someone there to pick up! I got to the hotel at 2:30 and when I went to check in the lady said she couldn't find me in the system! I so did not want to deal with this right now. I had to pull out my hotel voucher to prove that I was supposed to have a room there, told her who I was rooming with, and then finally she found my name. When I saw everyone the next morning when we were getting ready to take the shuttle to the ship, they all hugged me and said, "oh our lost sheep finally made it, we're so glad, we were so worried!" It's nice to be loved. :) I'm never going to live it down though. So here's some pictures from my trip, enjoy!

Hanging out in the hotel lobby, waiting for the shuttle to pick us up.
Me, Natalie, Colette, and Stacy

Everyone's so excited to be getting on the ship. Sorry it's blurry, we were moving.
Marilyn, Kenney, Krissy, and Dr. Moss

The water slide on the ship. It's not as fun when you have salt water splashing in your eyes and mouth.
Getting ready to set sail!
Colette, Stacy, and Me

Anyone recognize this building? It's the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral Florida.
Waiting to be instructed on the safety procedures.

Colette, Stacy, and Me

Get your own Stacy!

Enjoying a nice walk on the deck, sippin on my virgin pina colada, waiting for the ship to leave.


First sunset on the boat. It was so beautiful!
First night on the boat. It was super windy, but we had a good time walking on the deck.
Welcome to the BAHAMAS!
Anne, Colette, Me, and Marilyn

Colette and I taking the ferry over to Atlantis.


Aquarium at Atlantis
Don't you wish you could live here?

Who knew I would find Switzerland in the Bahamas?

View of the Bahamas from the ship, Atlantis is in the distance.
Our first formal night.

Colette, Me, Stacy, Jason

Dr. Hess and his wife Tammy

Dr. Moss and his wife Krissy
The whole group on formal night.

L-R front row: Krissy, Tammy, Michelle, Marilyn, Anne, Stacy, Me, Colette, Ellen, Jackie, Debbie, Natalie, Courtney, Sherry.

back row: Dr. Moss, Dr. Hess, Caleb, Kenney, Brian, Jason, Jake, Phil, Hunter, George, Chip, Andy, Tony, Randy

Stacy and Jason

Me, Colette, Marilyn, and Kenney. Trying to get some sun, but it was really cold and windy.

Dinner time! Mmmmm!

L-R: Kenney, Marilyn, Brian, Anne, Jason, Stacy, Me, and Colette

Our Elephant towel animal. When the cabin stewards turn down the beds, they leave little towel animals. This is one of the few that you could actually tell what it was.

St. Thomas.

We took a gondola ride up to the top of the mountain for this view, and it was amazing. Such a beautiful island.

In the gazebo at the top of the mountain. Me and Colette
There was a parrot show with all these parrots performing tricks. There was one riding a bike and another one that was racing to put rings on a pole. It was so cute to watch.
Another view of St. Thomas and our ship. Ours is the one in the middle.
Me, Stacy, and Jason, snorkeling at Coki beach.
Taking the taxi back to the ship. The drivers on all of these islands are crazy! They also drive on the opposite side of the road on Nassau and on St. Thomas.

Our taxi driver stopped to give us a photo op. The island of St. John is in the distance.
Sunset at St. Thomas, getting ready to set sail for St. Maarten
Colette, Stacy, and Me
The lights of St. Thomas
There was a show every night after dinner. They had singing and dancing, a magic show, a couple of comedians, and a talent show that guest performed in. This was us waiting for the magic show to start. The guy was kind of cheesy, and he totally messed up one of his tricks, it was pretty funny.
First view of St. Maarten. We docked on the Dutch side of the island, the other side is French.
Me and Colette
Driving to the beach!
Welcome to Baie Rouge Beach! This is on the French side of the island. It was fun to hear people speaking in French.
I could have stayed on this beach all day.
This was supposed to be a non nude beach, but there were quite a few people who were not following that rule. Needless to say, we saw way more flesh than we wanted to. :(

Taking the taxi downtown to do some shopping.
Me, Stacy, Marilyn, Colette, and Jason

Getting back on the ship. Ours is the one on the right.
Colette, Me, and Stacy

Stacy, Me, and Colette at dinner.
If you look close you can see the necklace and earring I bought on St. Maarten. They have a Larimar stone in them, which is a beautiful blue stone that is only found in the Caribbean and is called the stone of Atlantis.

Taking a picture with our server on our second formal night. He was so much fun and when ever you said Thank you to him, he would always say, "my pleasure." We're laughing here because we each had to have a picture with our camera, and Martin kept saying, take your time man, I'm ok standing with these pretty ladies.
Colette, Me, Martin, and Stacy

Mini Golf on our last day at sea.

Me, Stacy, Jason, Phil, and Colette

Picking Stacy and Jason up for our last dinner on the ship. :(
Colette, Stacy, and Me

Mmmm, escargot! They really taste good when they are prepared correctly.
Saying goodbye to the ship, heading to the airport.
Mmmm, I love hot chocolate! We had to get off the ship early, around 9:30 a.m. Our flight home didn't leave until 6 p.m. so we had a long time to hang out at the airport. We wandered around the shops and had a good time taking funny pictures. We had to do something to keep from getting bored. :)
Who's the fairest of them all?

Well I can tell you who's the tannest! Me! :)

Colette, Snow White, Me, and Stacy.