Anniversary Cruise

 I'm still playing catch up and today, I wanted to report in on the cruise Jeremy and I just went on for our 20th anniversary. It was a magical trip in every sense of the word, I'm fairly certain it was the best vacation I have ever had, but don't tell the kids that we had so much fun without them. We have been home for a week and already the details are slipping away so I will try my best to get it down before I forget even more.

The trip got off to a bit of a rough start with a very delayed flight. We were supposed to leave here at 11pm and fly overnight to Boston. Unfortunately, our flight was very delayed. We didn't end up leaving PDX until 1:30am. We then had a VERY tight timeline for catching our connecting flight in Boston. It was tight enough that once the plane landed the flight crew asked everyone to stay put to allow those of us trying to make our connection to San Juan to get off the plane first. We made our way to the front of the plane, but unfortunately the airport crew had an extremely difficult time attaching the gangway so that we could deplane. Once we were finally allowed off, we had to sprint to our next gate (thankfully only a few gates down) where we found a fully boarded plane waiting for us. The second flight was uneventful and we finally made it to Puerto Rico.

The first day is Puerto Rico is a bit of a blur. We had mostly been awake for 36 hours. We took an Uber from the airport and the driver ended up not actually dropping us at our hotel. He told us we were there, but when we got out, we were not. We had to drag our luggage about a 1/4 mile to the hotel, which would have been more fun had the roads not been rough brick/cobblestone. We got settled into our hotel, found some food, and did a little shopping/walking around. It started to rain that evening and we were beyond exhausted so we ended up going to bed before 9, which was really crazy considering that would have been 6pm our body time.

The next morning we were recharged and ready to spend the day exploring San Juan, since we didn't have to be to the ship until 3pm. We spent much of the day wandering around old San Juan, ducking into shops with AC whenever possible. We visited an old military castle/fortress, Castillo San Cristobal, which was not only really interesting, but gave us incredible views, including our first peak at our ship. We found an amazing little hole in the wall place to eat and had empanadas, fish and shrimp tacos, and traditional Puerto Rican beans and rice. Eventually, we made it to our ship and were on our way.

Our first morning of the cruise, we awoke in St. Thomas, USVI. We had heard that St. Thomas is very touristy and not the best of the Virgin Islands, so we had planned to immediately head across the island and take a ferry to St. John. We had to take our life into our own hands just a little with a taxi driver who thought he was a race car driver in order to make it to the ferry, but in the end it was worth it. We took the ferry to St. John and then another taxi to Maho beach. St. John as a whole is incredibly beautiful, most of it is a state park. At Maho, we found an incredible beach that is designated a sea turtle sanctuary. We snorkeled around and saw sea turtles for the first time. Unfortunately, we didn't get to stay as long as we would have wanted because we knew the ship was two taxi rides and a ferry away and the last thing we wanted to do was miss the ship on the very first day. We did make it back though and were rewarded with our very first towel animal. We ended the night with formal night on the ship.

Day 2 was our anniversary and it found us in St. Croix. This was the only day we didn't really have a plan for, but it ended up being magical. The beach at the port is fantastic, so we didn't have to take a taxi. We spent the day snorkeling and spent probably a good two hours following a couple of sea turtles around. We also saw some amazing fish and huge starfish. Since we were so close to the ship, we didn't have to worry about missing it and even were able to walk back and have lunch mid-day. The only downside was that we spent so much time in the water that we both got pretty sunburned without realizing it.

The next day was St. Maarten/St Martin. The island is split and half owned by the Dutch and half by France. We spent less time in the water this day, which was welcome as we were babying our sunburns. Instead we took a island tour and got to see both the French and Dutch sides of the island and learned all about the history of the island. We stopped at several prominent sites throughout the island, including an iguana farm. Our last stop was at Maho beach (not the Maho beach on St. John). Maho is famous because the airport is right next to the beach so the planes fly right over your head as they land. It was unreal! We also got to watch a plane take off. That was an adventure because we didn't realize how strong the jet stream would be off the back of the plane. Our hats immediately blew off and mine ended up in the ocean. It was difficult to even stay on your feet.

The second to last stop was Antigua. This was the only island where we had booked an excursion through our cruise company. We had planned to snorkel with the stingrays. This ended up being way more amazing than I had anticipated. We started with a bus ride through the island. We got to learn about the island along the way. We then took a boat ride out to "stingray city". We got off the boat in the middle of the ocean. It was a shallow area at least a mile from land on any side. The stingrays could best be compared to cats, who like to come up and rub against you. They were very eager to let you touch them and we even held a few. It was something I never thought I would experience. Antigua was also the only place we saw jellyfish.

Our last island was Barbados. He we look a taxi to Carlisle Bay. We spent the day at a resort there. They had an ocean slide, ocean trampoline, and rope swing. We also were able to take a boat ride out to a shipwreck and snorkeled around the shipwreck. I was not  sure I wanted to get back on the boat because I knew the fun was coming to an end. At least we came back to a towel surprise.

All good things must come to an end. And so it was that we spent the last day of the cruise at sea and then started our journey home. The only good thing was at the end of it all, we were rewarded with getting to see our kids again. That made it worth it to come back to real life.