saturday 04.24.2010

Posted in new orleans on April 30th, 2010 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: cocktails, cruise, louisiana, mississippi river, new orleans

Saturday, we again walked down to Decatur and found lunch at a restaurant called the Crescent City Brewhouse. Matt’s meal looked especially delicious:

From there, we walked back over to the Marketplace and got tickets for a tour on the Creole Queen. It would take us up the Mississippi to the Chalmette Battlefield and back.

It threatened to rain a few times, but did little more than sprinkle. The boat was great, and the captain’s narrative was way more interesting than I expected. He of course talked a lot about Katrina, and we saw some of the damage from the river.

At the battlefield, we all climbed off and went to walk around. The place was very calm and picturesque.

I learned what ramparts were. I’d never really thought about it before.

We stopped to visit the gift shop, then climbed back onto the boat. Walking on the levee was kind of exciting, too!

The steamboat had us back in New Orleans around 5pm. We hopped off and decided to go get the streetcar down St Charles to see the Garden District. I wanted to show Matt the haunted house we’d stayed in last time!

The cemetery was unfortunately closed, but we got a good view of it. We’ve both visited New Orleans cemeteries before, too. Also, the Castle Inn of New Orleans is now a private residence, and is for sale!! What will all the ghost-hunters do?

We did some more wandering about the Garden District, and headed cityward in search of food. We were slowing down a bit; it was hot, and we’d walked a lot.

I love that you’ll find beads EVERYWHERE in New Orleans. A constant party reminder.

We found a place called Igor’s Bar that was recommended, so we went in for lunch/dinner. After sitting there for a while with no service, however, we got up and left. We headed down St Charles a little further, and wound up at the Avenue Pub. That place was awesome. We had food and beers and enjoyed watching the locals. Then we hopped on a streetcar and rode back to Canal Street.

We dropped our stuff off at the hotel, freshened up (it’s critical in a city that’s constantly hot and 90% humidity!), and headed back out again. At that point, I’d developed some amazing blisters on my feet, so I had to half-limp. How do you get blisters in flipflops? Especially when you wear them 6 months out of the year?

Our next stop on the list (yes, we had a classic bars list – there are a lot of famous places in New Orleans!) was Sazerac. Inventors of the… yep, you guessed it.

It’s the hotel bar at the Roosevelt, which means it was full of people with far more money (and much better dressed) than us. We hardly cared about that, though, because we probably knew way more about its history than they did. The place was pretty full, but we managed to get seats on a coach as people were leaving. Some ladies came in a bit later and asked if they could sit at the remaining chairs at our table; we said yes, but it was a little bit awkward. A couple seats finally opened at the bar, so we left the table to the ladies and took those instead. It’s way more awesome when you can watch the bartenders working, anyway.

We left there with a glass (don’t worry, we paid for it) and made our way to another oldschool hotel bar, the Swizzle Stick. The cutest gay server in the world got us a couple more cocktails, and we hung out for a while. We didn’t want to stay out too late, though, because we had big plans involving a rental car the next morning! We managed to be back at the hotel before 1am, which I believe should earn you a medal in New Orleans.

saturday 12.12.2009 (san juan, boarding the ship)

Posted in southern caribbean cruise on December 30th, 2009 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: caribbean, casino, cruise, ocean, puerto rico, san juan

Saturday morning, we had to check out by 10am. That hurt a little! The perfect cure for a hangover, it turns out, is La Bombonera. We expected to have to wait in line at the most popular breakfast spot in San Juan, but we got a table right away!

After breakfast, we headed out to tour San Juan. We climbed up to San Sebastian and walked across the northern side of Old San Juan (essentially recreating the path I’d taken with Wendy and Stephanie on my first trip there).

We bought tickets to see El Morro; they’re only $3!

This is the view from the ladies’ room at El Morro. You could do worse. (That’s the leper colony in the background!)

It was insanely windy, and I’d already realized that I’d forgotten clips to put my hair up. Cue an entire week of me wearing my sunglasses on top of my head!

Above is the view through the troop barracks; below is the staircase they used to haul cannons up and down! Notice the spots to stop and rest every eight steps or so. If you’re hungover and it’s humid as hell, you don’t even need a cannon to make you want to rest on each platform.

From El Morro, we walked back into Old San Juan and decided to find a spot to sit, have a beer, and finish our Christmas cards. We were supposed to have worked on them on the plane, but I completely forgot. Really, what’s more cruel that mailing Xmas cards to people in Minnesota from the tropics? Sorry, guys.

This guy (called ‘chango’ in Spanish) sat and yelled at us loudly. He’s awesome.

After dropping off our cards at the post office, we walked over to Lupi’s for lunch. I’d heard in more than one place that it was closed, so I was thrilled that that was not the case. It was the same old bar… a dimly-lit Mexican restaurant with the naked lady machine on the bar. We had margaritas and plantain nachos, just like last time, and watched sports on TV.

Then it was time to go see about gettin’ on a boat! We picked up our bags at the hotel and hopped a cab to the cruise port.

We were pretty early for check-in (having learned the value of getting on the ship early), and it was an extremely quick process. We were on board the Celebrity Summit being handed glasses of champagne and ushered to cabin 6097 in no time.

Our cabin was very similar to the ones we’d had on Costa. Enough room for two people, with a nice balcony. And there was more champagne waiting for us, of course. We unpacked our bags, checked out the view from the balcony, and then set out to tour the ship, from the top down.

The ship had really nice pools… in that respect, it was nicer than Costa. No bocce, though! From the deck, we could see the yacht we’d passed on the way there: it’s called the Al Mirqab, owned by the prime minister of Qatar. Big pimpin’.

The lifeboat drills weren’t til the next day, so we were free to wander. We became acquainted with a hot Irish bartender at the pool bar, and then met the awesome Russian bartender at the coffee bar near the game room. We’d be seeing plenty of them over the next week.

Round about leaving time, we brought our champagne up to the deck for the celebration. There was a band playing by the pool, and a parade of boats covered in Christmas lights sailed past our ship in the port. We stood and watched as the ship passed Old San Juan and headed out to sea, then went back to the pool bar for some cocktails. Matt taught the Jamaican bartender how to make Johnny Jump-ups, and we had a long talk with a loud guy from Texas.

After a while, we decided it was time to check out the casino. We found spots at the blackjack table (which had a $6 minimum, not bad). For the first time in quite a while, I ended up winning – not much, I think I had $80 on my original $60, so I decided to leave ahead. I went to get a Rob Roy, and when I came back, Matt was still winning. We both did surprisingly well that night!

sunday 12.13.2009 (st maarten/st martin)

Posted in southern caribbean cruise on December 30th, 2009 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: caribbean, cruise, ocean, st maarten, st martin

One of the few downsides to the cruise itinerary was that the ship docked daily at 7am. If you’re like us and want to stay out late gambling, dancing, and hanging out at bars, that’s kind of rough. But it was our first day, so we were up bright and early! From the balcony, we saw the Queen Mary 2 arriving in Sint Maarten as well.

The ship had experienced an outbreak of novovirus on the previous virus, which meant that for the first three days in the buffet, you were not allowed to serve yourself. You had to point out everything you wanted and be served, including at the beverage stations. It slowed things down, but the situation was understandable.

We got off the ship and headed into the port area. People were being herded toward cabs, but I’d read that it was an easy walk into Philipsburg. It only took about 15 minutes to get there. We made a mental note to return for Rum Jumbie, too.

Even the city beach was gorgeous. Philipsburg is bright and colorful, with the typical beachfront walk lined with tourist shops, restaurants, and bars. We stopped at a bar that was just opening at 10am and ordered a couple of rum punches. It’s never too early in the Caribbean. Also, the bar had a Packers clock. Confusing.

We wandered a few blocks into the downtown, stopped into an awesome casino, and then found a liquor store that seemed to have everything we could ever want for cheap. We were in there for at least half an hour, and they took care to wrap everything very carefully for us. The owner also sold Matt three Cuban cigars, telling him, “one for after dinner, one for before sex, one for after sex!”

A few stores later, we found the famous Juggie’s Place. Their special is a cigar and two beers for $2.99. You can’t go wrong! We were happy to take advantage of the bathrooms, too.

We picked up a bottle of the famous Rum Jumbie (made only in Sint Maarten!), then decided to take everything back to the ship and change for the beach. We walked down to the water taxi stand and climbed aboard. Though there’s a charge to use it, nobody asked us to pay.

We dropped off our giant rum stash, changed clothes, and walked back into the port to get a cab to Orient Beach. The driver, Dan, told us all about growing up in the area, and how much it had changed in the past 50 years. He pointed out everyone’s house, too, including that of the governor’s son and his six wives.

Orient Beach is on the French side of the island (Saint Martin), so we got to visit two countries in one cab ride!

Dan dropped us off at Pedros at the end of Orient Beach, showed us the dividing line between the nude resorts and the regular part of the beach (right next to Pedro’s), and said he would pick us up at 4pm. We’re pretty sure he stayed there the entire time, too.

We had nachos and rum punch at Pedros and enjoyed the view. There weren’t too many naked people, but they still made us giggle every time we saw one. A few crossed over to the main beach and walked past.

Orient Beach has the typical setup where every restaurant/resort has its own beach chairs available; you claim the ones you want, and eventually an employee will come ask you for payment and your drink order. Pedros charges $15 for two chairs, an umbrella, two drinks, and the use of their bathroom, which is about the best deal you can find.

We walked up and down Orient Beach, ending up back at Pedros. Our server, Superman, eventually woke from his nap and set us up with chairs and rum punches. We went for a swim with our drinks, and an errant wave stole half of Matt’s rum. (I’m pretty sure that’s the biggest tragedy you can encounter there, short of a hurricane.)

Superman convinced me to get a Penis Colada. It seemed appropriate, considering the view.

He then planted another penis straw in the sand, and we all sat around laughing about it for way too long. Possibly the rum had something to do with that. Superman eventually returned to his nap in a nearby chair.

We sat around watching the windsurfers and the naked people walking past. 4pm came way too quickly.

Dan drove us back to the cruise port, where we stopped at an Indian grocery for snacks and beverages. We also stopped at the Rum Jumbie stand to actually try some, as we hadn’t opened ours yet. At the gate to the ships, we were told that they didn’t allow open glass bottles, so Matt had to slam his Lucozade. I think that gave him enough energy for the next three days.

We showered and sat on our balcony eating delicious Indian snacks and watching the ship leave port. Once we were back out at sea, we headed up to the buffet, where Matt discovered the sushi boat. It was his greatest day ever. I myself had some pizza. We ate on the back deck, watching the sunset.

Afterwards, we went up to play a very long game of HORSE (it’s hard to play basketball on a ship!), then an improvised soccer game involving a squash racket.

We headed down to the coffee bar to visit our new friend Velika, then went to the game room next door to play Scrabble.

Post-Scrabble, we went to Rendezvous (the midship bar with a small stage) to watch the band for a while, and then headed to Revelations (aka “The Bar at the End of the Earth” -  a way better name) because they had reggae at 10pm. We got a table and met our server, Winston. He was Jamaican, so he knew all about rum punch; he fixed us up with some highly delicious versions, and also a carafe of nuts that quickly disappeared. When ‘No Woman, No Cry’ came on, of course I cried. And then my contact fell out of my eye.

After reggae, DJ Ron Hollywood showed up and started spinning. He was a DJ in the loosest sense of the term, but played halfway decent music anyway. There were very few people there dancing (probably mostly due to the 7am daily port times), but that didn’t bother us. I requested Daddy Yankee, and we danced to it. Then there was Soulja Boy and Jay-Z.  I loved the old folks dancing to hiphop.

Matt made friends with an old guy from Puerto Rico named Jose (who we would later see at that bar every single night). It was hard to hear him over the music and through his accent, but he told a long story about the time he proposed to a stripper. AWESOME.

Of course, we went to bed way too late for the early morning start, but it was worth it.

monday 12.14.2009 (dominica)

Posted in southern caribbean cruise on December 30th, 2009 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: caribbean, cruise, dominica, ocean, snorkeling

We arrived painfully early in Dominica to find this waiting on the dock.  I was not feeling so well.

Luckily, we only had to walk a block to meet Gary from Bumpiing Tours. We’d scheduled a tour of the island with the company based on the uniformly rave reviews online. We were also pleased to discover that there was only one other couple on our tour that day, though they seemed painfully shy.

As we set out, we noticed that most of the houses and businesses had colored flags and banners hanging everywhere. Gary explained that it was election day Friday, and the island turned the event into a huge party. There was a pre-election party with drinking, pot smoking, music and dancing. Then there was the election afterparty, with more of the same. As far as we could tell, the red, blue, and green parties seemed to represent similar things, all with labor-focused messages. Also, Gary told us that traffic would back up completely around the island when one of the party leaders would start a caravan and pick up followers in a giant parade along the way. Clearly, Dominica is awesome.

It’s called the Nature Island, known more for its rainforest, waterfalls, and volcanic features than its beaches. The roads are very narrow and winding, and you drive on the left. I was happy to be in the hands of a professional, though the couple in the backseat seemed afraid for their lives. (If we survived dune buggies and cabs in Mexico, there’s little else that can scare me, driving-wise.)

Gary stopped to pick Ylang Ylang on the side of the road. It’s used in perfumes.

There was a cooler of water, juice, and beer in the van, in which we gratefully indulged. I needed as much water as possible. After 45 minutes or so, we arrived at our first stop in the mountains: the Emerald Pool. It’s about a 15-minute hike into the rainforest, and the four of us seemed to be the only people there.

It’s impossible to capture in photos (just like most of the rainforest – all you see is green). The water is indeed emerald, and there are ferns and runners hanging down from above. It looked like a Hollywood version of the jungle. Even though the water was freezing, there was no way we weren’t getting in there. The other couple hesitated, but we finally convinced them to come in. Seriously, when you have the opportunity to swim in a waterfall in the rainforest in Dominica, you damn well better take it.

We climbed out, dried off, and squished our way along the rest of the trail. Though the port is on the Caribbean side, from the top of the mountain, you can see the Atlantic:

Gary tried to bring us to the Mr Nice fruit stand, but it wasn’t open yet. (Next time!) Matt and I cracked open a couple Kubulis, the beer of Dominica. We liked it especially because there was a map of the country on the front, and we could keep track of our location. We drove back down to the Roseau Valley (where the ship was docked), and Gary pointed out the houses on stilts along the way. People would buy the land and build the upper level of a house, while camping out underneath. When the top was done they’d move in, with the intention of building the lower level when they could afford it. We didn’t see many homes with a lower level, but they were all fairly new in the mountains.

We drove through town and back up into the mountains, headed toward Trafalgar Falls. It’s the most famous destination in Dominica. On the way, Gary stopped to show us an active volcano along the side of the road.

Trafalgar Falls was crowded, as expected. There were several excursions from the cruise ship, and the van driven by Levi from Bumpiing tours, with whom I’d booked the tour. Even the climb up from the parking lot was steep, and the humidity was killing me.

We hiked down to the pools formed by the stream from the waterfall, and Gary helped us get in. I recognized the other group there as the people whose recommendations about Bumpiing Tours I’d read in the first place, on the Cruise Critic message boards. Funny!

The pools were very warm, heated by the volcano. On the right, you can see a man standing in a hole; you can actually climb down there to the pools below. Of course when the Cruise Critic people left and the other couple got in there with us, they refused to go in the hole. We had to, though, even though it bruises the hell out of your knees. It was an awesome massage, with the water cascading from above.

We eventually climbed out, and Gary led us back up the hill. I was pretty sure I was going to die at that point, because I couldn’t stop shaking. I told Gary I had too much rum punch the night before, and he instantly understood. I love the Caribbean.

We finally reached the top, and I got some more water. On the way down from Trafalgar Falls, we stopped at a roadside bar called the River Rock. We got chairs at a table on the patio, where the papayas and passion fruit used in their drinks were growing from trees in the valley. Gary got us a round of rum punches, and then hung out at the next table smoking weed. The couple with us looked like they were going to die of  uncomfortable. I really love the Caribbean.

We climbed back in the van and headed back towards Roseau. Our rum punches empty, we had another round of Kubulis and Quenchi (Dominican juice). Gary took us through the Botanical Gardens in Roseau, where we saw the most-photographed sight on the island. It’s a school bus flattened by a tree that fell on it in Hurricane David.

He showed us the sausage tree, too!

From there, we drove down to Champagne Reef to snorkel. He gave us our passes, and Matt and I headed off down the beach. The couple we were with decided not to snorkel. What the hell?

Champagne Reef is known as such because of the air bubbles coming up from below, caused by volcanic activity. The water was a little murky because the waves were high that day, but we still saw the vents with the bubbles erupting from them.

Levi swam up and said he’d seen an octopus nearby, but we couldn’t find it. I’m pretty sure Matt was really happy about that.

It was hard to get out of the water on the stony beach, but our water shoes helped a lot. Gary led us back to the van, pointing out an iguana along the way. He said that the males are grey, and the females are green and mostly hang out in the mountains.

We drove back into town, and he dropped us off near the ship. We asked him for a dining recommendation, and he pointed us in the direction of La Robe Creole around the corner. It’s well-known, and was excellent despite having the strangest rum punch yet.

I had the vegetarian plate: pumpkin puree with garlic, rice and beans, and spinach. Matt had flying fish. It was fantastic. While we ate, trucks kept driving by with giant soundsystems and bullhorns strapped in the back. They were all stumping for the various political candidates they’d be voting for that weekend.

We stopped in the duty-free shop in town to pick up more rum, including Havana Club (which is illegal in the US, obviously), then went back to the ship right before boarding time ended. They confiscated the rum this time, which was fine: they give it back to you right before debarkation, and we weren’t going to need it til we got home anyway. The Caribbean has plenty to go around.

I showered and took a nap while Matt took pictures of Dominica as we left. This, of course, was the start of my typical tropical-vacation sickness: something about the combination of heat, different foods (sometimes not enough food, because it makes me feel like not eating), hangover, humidity, sunburn, and dehydration always makes me sick. I just consider it an important part of the process, though. (What I didn’t realize til later was that I was also seasick!)

Once I rose again from the dead, we got dressed and went to see Velika in the coffee bar, then to play cribbage. The board was missing its pegs, but there were broken drink picks instead. Matt and I had some great ideas, including his new website: nakedmenblowingtheirnosesintowomensdresses.info (or .mobi). Yeah, I don’t remember where that came from, either. All we knew was that we were for sure getting a book deal out of it.

We stopped at the champagne bar to get cocktails to bring back to the room (and met the bartender Mehmet, who we’d be seeing more of later), then ordered room service.  It took 45 minutes, and we ended up with bread and butter, lemon ricotta ravioli, a fruit cup, a crostini platter, and two entrees for Matt because they’d run out of one. We only ordered about half of that. Needless to say, there were leftovers.

We went to bed a little later, but I was completely unable to sleep. The wind and waves were really bad, and I was tossing around all night. I couldn’t figure out what was wrong, but I was absolutely miserable and my head was spinning. I probably should’ve realized what it was, but I’d never had trouble with seasickness before!

tuesday 12.15.2009 (grenada)

Posted in southern caribbean cruise on December 30th, 2009 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: beach, caribbean, cruise, grenada, ocean

The alarm went off at 8, but we didn’t make it out of bed til 9. I was feeling pretty terrible. At least some delicious gruel helped, and the novovirus scare had finally cleared, so we could serve ourselves.

While Matt showered, I went to the infirmary to tell them about my symptoms. Guess what? Seasickness. They pointed out the basket of Dramamine sitting in the office, and told me to stop by anytime and grab some. I instantly felt better, just knowing I wasn’t going to die.

We got off the ship in St George’s, Grenada. It was raining a little, but quickly clearing. To get into town, you have to go through their giant cruise terminal. It was really nice, though, and crowded with people trying to hop on the wifi network.

We left the terminal, found a Scotiabank ATM, and set off up the hill toward Fort St George, because I’d read that the view was amazing. There’s still plenty of evidence of the effects of Hurricane Ivan, too, which was disastrous in Grenada.

We reached the top of the hill and bought our $2 tickets for the fort. The sun was already coming out, and the view thing is no joke:

We wandered around the fort, which was an awesome mix of picturesque and run-down. The police use it as a training facility.

One of the Brits there told us that the markings on the cannons were King George’s seal.

We left the fort, and headed back down the hill to the Carenage. It’s on the other side of the giant hill from the cruise port. St George’s is a busy, very pretty town.

The Carenage was full of fish boats and the infamous Rhum Runner, and it was packed with tourists, as expected.

We picked up a couple spice necklaces to bring home. I love them.

We then stopped at a little grocery store in search of local beverages, snacks, and spices (Grenada being the spice island, of course). We also wanted local change, as it makes an awesome souvenir. Our bag of mauby, pop, and snacks cost about $15US, and the cashier was amused that we wanted Grenadan change. He also reassured us that it was safe to drink outside in Grenada. You never know!

We headed back toward the ship to drop our purchases off and change into bathing suits, stopping at a little craft/souvenir store along the way. We picked up a bunch of things and continued to the spice market, which was amazing. We just stopped at the first booth, but it was perfect… we ended up with bags of spices, and when we overpaid the seller by just a little bit, he handed us another handful of nutmegs as change. I loved it.

We also stopped to visit Yvonne in the cruise terminal, because we’d promised to (she also sold spices), and then spent quite a bit of time in the souvenir shop in the terminal itself. Grenada is good at selling us stuff, and all of it was awesome.

We changed into our beach gear on the ship, and walked back out to the water taxi. It cost $16 roundtrip for two people going to Grand Anse beach.

Grand Anse is regularly called the most perfect beach in the Caribbean, and it’d be hard to disagree with that.

We got a couple of beach chairs with an umbrella at Lazy Days, and the server brought us rum punch. This time, Matt finished his before going in the ocean!

We swam for over an hour. There was a deep dropoff, so you didn’t touch the bottom within 30 or so feet of the beach. That made for some awesome surf, too.

We dried off, sat around on the beach for a bit longer, and then went to find food. I headed straight for the roti stand:

I had a vegetable and salad (!) roti, and Matt had chicken and chips. We sat around giggling at the rooster strutting around the yard. After lunch, we stopped at a little shop on the beach so Matt could pick up a Carib beer shirt, and then we hopped on the water taxi back to the cruise port. On the way, we eavesdropped on one of our fellow passengers hitting on a dancer from the Queen Mary 2. I also noticed the pile of Carib bottles underneath the pilot’s steering wheel.

Back on the ship, we noticed that the Ocean Village boat next to ours was preparing to leave. The passengers were assembling on the top deck, and they were all holding little British flags. I was a little disappointed that we didn’t get flags (preferable Puerto Rican ones). They started blasting music, and we witnessed the Brits singing and dancing along to songs like ‘YMCA’ and ‘We Will Rock You’. We decided to go up to the top deck to watch, because it was hilarious.

We got a couple of the daily specials – the $5 rum runner – and stood at the railing watching the Ocean Village ship. They had two staff people shouting in megaphones to get the crowd going (both of them wearing British flags), and they tried to organize a yelling contest between the two ships. Lacking a large crowd and our own organizers, we lost by a lot. The Brits seemed to think it was as amusing to make fun of the Americans as we did them. It was awesome. Our ship headed out first, so we waved goodbye to them and headed out to sea.

We returned to the cabin to shower and hang out for a while, then went to the martini bar to try the martini flight, more for novelty purposes than actual quality. It was cute! After that, we got a couple of real martinis and headed to the main restaurant for the first time since we’d been on the ship.

We found our table of eight, and realized there was only one open seat. The very loud group there had obviously made a friend, so we went to ask the maitre-d’ about it. They sat us at another four-person table nearby, telling us another couple had the other seats. But they didn’t show up, so: score.

The main restaurant service was sub-par, to our surprise. It was extremely slow, and I didn’t get the fruit cup I’d ordered. I did get a giant caprese salad and Israeli couscous that was very good, though. Matt asked our waiter, Vasilika, for help choosing between two entrees, so Vasilika just brought both of them. We had panna cotta for dessert, and also got espresso. While the food was good, the time it took for dinner wasn’t really worth it. Especially since, if we wanted fancy food, we could get it via room service for free. The buffet was usually just fine for us, though!

After dinner, we wandered down to Michael’s Club, the fancy cigar and cognac bar. Matt just wanted to pick up matches for his cigar, which we then took up to the pool bar on the 11th deck. They were having an “island party” up there, with a really entertaining band and people dancing. We got cuba libres from the hot Irish bartender, and learned about the wonders of Bacardi 8. And since I’m all class, I took my Dramamine with rum.

We witnessed the ship’s longest conga line (or so they said) from above; why are old people doing the conga so hilarious? We also met a couple from Philly drinking out of coconuts, which obviously we had to partake in. But since I was smart, I also made sure we got a gigantic bottle of water to carry around. Ha!

We headed down to the pool deck to dance. By then, they’d played ‘Hot Hot Hot’ at least three times. Once the island band switched to DJ Ron Hollywood, I told Matt we’d hear the Cupid Shuffle within two songs. And we did, so of course we danced to it. Afterwards, I got my own drink in a coconut. I had to.

Then it was time for bed! We had more islands to visit, after all.

wednesday 12.16.2009 (tobago)

Posted in southern caribbean cruise on December 30th, 2009 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: caribbean, cruise, ocean, snorkeling, tobago

I slept til 9 on Wednesday. I was able to sleep with the Dramamine, but it made my arms feel floppy, and I was really out of it. Thankfully, we had no plans in Tobago but to go to the beach.

We got in a cab to Pigeon Point beach with a driver named Benjamin. As he dropped us off, he asked what time we wanted to be picked up. He said he’d be back at 2pm, or maybe not. It wasn’t quite clear.

Pigeon Point beach is gorgeous.

We went to the dock to get on a glass-bottom boat tour of the reef for $20 apiece. Our captain’s name was Ringo, and he had giant dreads that stood up on his head like a crown. He was fantastic. There were some ladies from the east coast complaining because the boat tour was 15 minutes late. I’m pretty sure they’d never been to the Caribbean before, because 15 minutes late is pretty early.

They took us out to Buccoo Reef, where we could snorkel. The water was really choppy, so we all clung to a long rope trailing behind the boat. It was pretty difficult trying to swim, breathe underwater, hang on, and not touch the stinging coral! We saw a lot, but it was exhausting.

From the reef, we headed over to the Nylon Pool. It’s a very shallow area in the ocean, and the color is amazing.

The bottom isn’t sand, it’s crushed coral. Captain Ringo said it was exfoliating, and helped us all scoop some up so we could rub it all over ourselves. We ended up a boatful of really smooth people!

The first mate sat atop the boat, smoking weed. Irie.

They dropped us back off at the beach, and Matt and I went to the food stand for beers and roti. By then, it was already 2pm. It’s amazing how fast time flies on the beach.

We went to the cab stand and told them our driver was Benjamin. He didn’t show up til 2:45. Had we known that, we’d probably have gone swimming some more! At any rate, he finally showed up and drove us back into town.

We stopped into a few stores at the cruise port, then went to our cabin to shower. I wanted iced coffee, so we went up to the buffet to get some. We happened to arrive at tea time, so of course we had to try that out.

After tea (I want to say that every day), we went out to the back deck and got a couple mojitos while we watched the ship leaving Tobago. We saw the giant ferry that goes to Trinidad in port…

And we saw Trinidad, way off in the distance! I realized that we were at 11 degrees longitude, the farthest south I’ve ever been. And really close to South America.

After sunset, we went to the card room for a cribbage rematch with our new cocktail recipe playing cards, which I of course won. We then went back out to the bar on the aft deck to sample their daily special, the mixed berry mojito. It was delicious, though I don’t know why I was so surprised that they were using fresh berries!

We had dinner reservations at ‘Destinations’ (or as we called it, “Moments”, based on an obscure joke), a casual restaurant that was part of the buffet area. We weren’t exactly sure what was different about it, except that they had a slightly different menu and service. The menu was somewhat disappointing, though, as it had no vegetarian entrees. (Cruise ships are pretty well-known for catering to any diet… I rarely had a problem finding food.) Instead, I ordered two different salads and black bean soup.

Though the place was almost empty, we were seated next to the most fascinating couple, and we couldn’t stop eavesdropping. The guy was a higher-level crew member, and didn’t speak English very well. The woman apparently worked on Celebrity Millennium, and had time off. She kept demanding that he have the captain marry them, because she was mad that she wouldn’t see him again til January. Also, we found out that it cost her $300 to stay in his cabin, and that Captain Yanis apparently was always napping. AWESOME. We really wanted one of those spy listening devices and the recording pen you can buy from Skymall.

Then we discussed the possibility of creating a shipwide food fight, since obviously there was food everywhere you looked. I can’t really explain the details, but trust me: it’s amazing. For some reason, it ended with the lifeboats being full of sushi, and the life preservers full of mashed potato.

For dessert, we sampled a mango cheese tart and had a glass of Prosecco. We then went to shop at the little mall onboard for all our cruise-ship-related souvenirs, then stopped into Michael’s Club to see a purple-hatted lady playing piano and singing Sinatra. It was a good oldschool cocktail bar, but the fact that there were only a few people in there was a little uncomfortable. We decided to go to the casino and play slot machines for a while.

At the appropriately-scheduled time, because they only performed for something like 15 minutes a day, we went up to Revelations to see the Acapelicans. It was mostly due to the name, but we figured they must be important if they had such a short gig. They did indeed only perform for 15 minutes, and we decided to leave immediately afterwards because they were starting the newlywed game. We went to the martini bar, and had the same server as the previous night. Matt said, “In my head I’ll call him the pilot, because he was in charge of our flight.” We had an old fashioned and a french lemonade, and then it was time for bed.

thursday 12.17.2009 (barbados)

Posted in southern caribbean cruise on December 30th, 2009 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: barbados, caribbean, cruise, dancing, distillery, ocean

Barbados was our last stop on the cruise, and we were feeling the combination of too many late nights, too much sun, and the double-bonus sickness. We were supposed to go snorkel with sea turtles, but my seasickness and Matt’s killer sunburn made that seem like a terrible idea. We were totally happy just going to wander around Bridgetown and see the land of rum, though.

The cruise port is a ways from town, and they encourage you to take cabs. That’s not our style unless it’s absolutely necessary, though. We took the path along the harbor and walked. Some other people were going that way, too, but surprisingly few, considering there were five cruise ships in port.

Barbados is a very British island, the kind of place where they still have tea at 4pm every day. Compared to the other places we’d been, it was the biggest city, and by far the cleanest. It was also very busy, hot, and insanely humid. We wandered into a few shops on our way to the Careenage, which was very cute:

Souvenirs in hand, we decided to catch a cab to the Mount Gay Distillery. It was our #1 priority, in terms of things to see in Barbados! On the way, we passed Kensington Oval, the famous cricket grounds.

Mount Gay was a little ways north of town, on a smaller piece of property than I’d expected. Granted, most of their operations occur at other locations.

We got tickets for the tour, and the first stop was the little museum, where they went over the history of Mount Gay. We saw a ton of old bottles (Matt was maybe drooling a little), and even saw one of the oldest pot stills in the world. That was way too exciting.

We then toured the bottling plant, but weren’t allowed to take photographs. The tour guide introduced us to a bottle known as “the one-legged man“: it’s the size of a 12-oz beer bottle, with the same kind of bottle cap. Which means you have to drink it all in one sitting, hence the name. Of course we had to get one of those.

After the tour, they led us to the bar for the rum tasting. We tried the Eclipse and the Extra Old. They showed us the really expensive 1703 as well, but there were no free tastes for that one. It was funny how shocked some of the visitors were at drinking rum straight.

After the tasting, Matt and I shopped like crazy people. We got a bottle of the 1703 (it was $80, but that’s about half the price it sells for in the US), a one-legged man, and various other souvenirs for ourselves and other people. It was by far my favorite souvenir-shopping of the trip. We got a couple of rum punches at the bar, and sat around watching Chelsea-Pompey on TV.

Post-distillery, we decided to walk back to the cruise port and get our stuff for the beach. That may not have been the best decision, though, because it was a lot farther than we expected. And a lot hotter. And it wasn’t very clear how to get there. We managed to find it eventually, though.

By the time we got near the port, we realized that we wouldn’t have much time at the beach before having to turn around and come back, so we decided to hop a cab into town for lunch instead. We got a couple of Banks beers at the port, then caught a cab. Matt asked the driver his name, and he introduced himself as Christopher.

He avoided the traffic on the main streets and instead drove through the neighborhood, where everyone waved and said hi to him. It was apparent that Christopher probably knew 90% of the people in Bridgetown. He told us he’d lived there 40 years, and answered all our questions about hurricanes (they tend to blow right over Barbados, because it’s a reef island instead of a mountainous volcanic one). That’s apparently what also makes for the excellent beer and rum.

Christopher dropped us off at Big John’s, a local fast food restaurant serving all Caribbean food. I was wary til I saw that amongst the many roti options, they had mock duck. WIN. We ordered food and brought it upstairs to eat.

I went for my camera to get a picture of our Barbadian fast food feast, but it wasn’t in its case. In fact, it wasn’t anywhere with me. It was, in fact, in the back of Christopher’s cab.  Suddenly, I had zero interest in eating, and I wanted to cry. If there’s one thing (besides Matt) that I never want to lose on vacation, it’s my camera. Especially after having taken hundreds of photos.

We bundled everything up and ran outside to the nearest cab stand. It was ridiculous to ask about a cab driver about whom we only knew his first name, especially in a city with hundreds of taxis, but we had to try. We asked a couple of drivers about him, and they told us that there was more than one Christopher, obviously. We described him and his car, and for some reason they seemed to think they knew the guy. One of them asked, “was it 334?” (Referring to the cab number.) We had absolutely no idea, but it seemed like a lead. They said that his home cab stand was the one down a couple of blocks nearer the city center, and that we should go there and wait.

Despairing, we walked over to that cab stand. At least ten different cabbies asked if we needed a ride, so we told each of them the situation. I didn’t care if they thought I was a stupid tourist, I was willing to do anything to get my camera back. Everyone we talked to knew Christopher, and assured us that at some point he’d be back in that area. They also all made sure to inform us that someone could’ve gotten into the cab in the meantime, and may have stolen the camera. I was well aware of that, unfortunately.

The cab stand was at the center of a triangle, the intersection of at least three main streets. We picked a vantage point where we could watch all of them, and looked for similar cars matching that number. After standing there for 20 minutes or so, we were approached by another cabbie, so I explained again what was going on. He told us he knew Christopher personally, and asked, “did you tip?” That was the most critical part of the equation, it seemed, both as far as Christopher’s willingness to return, and whether or not the camera might be found. Not that we would consider not tipping a cab driver… but we were extra-glad that we had.

Rodney introduced himself, and said he might know someone who had Christopher’s cell number. He got two phones at once, and took down the number from his friend. It wasn’t til he actually got Christopher on the phone that we knew whether or not it was even the right driver. He told us that my camera was still in the backseat, and I started crying.

Christopher returned shortly afterwards, and I gave both him and Rodney $20 and thanked them profusely. Rodney told us he’d give us a ride back to the cruise port for free. I’m sure he was just in a hurry to get the hapless tourists out of his town, but I didn’t care: I had my camera back, and Barbadians had earned my love permanently.

Matt and I went to the bar at the cruise port, got a table and a couple of Banks beers, and finally ate our long-overdue lunch. I could not have been happier about life at that moment. Here’s the first photo from my recovered camera, the one I’d been intending to take in the first place:

Other people were having an equally great, if different, time in Barbados. We suspected these guys didn’t even leave the port!

After eating, we shopped at various very-crowded shops in the cruise port complex. There were many ships docked there that day, and everyone seemed to be leaving within an hour of one another. We all scrambled to shop, and Matt and I managed to find some really great stuff: a straw purse for his mom, Banks dominoes for his dad, some Angostura orange bitters from the duty-free shop, and then the next greatest thing to happen to me that day: I FOUND GO AHEAD IN THE GROCERY STORE. (It’s hard to explain why I love them so much, but I’ve only ever found them in one specific shop in the Bahamas, and I obsess about them constantly.) I bought six packages, and we hauled our many shopping bags out to the shuttle bus stop.

We crammed onto the bus, rode to the ship, and had to dig several bottles of rum out of our bags so security could bundle them up for us. It was pretty funny. It seemed we were some of the last people boarding, too.

We showered and sat on the balcony to watch the sunset in Barbados. I kept dozing off in my chair, so we went to take a quick nap once we were at sea.

We awoke at 6:30 and went up to the pool deck to take advantage of that day’s $5 drink special. We hung out on deck for a while, during which time I scribbled in this very travel journal. Well, the paper version. There was another sushi boat, too!

We headed down to the coffee bar, but Velika wasn’t working. Matt was embarrassed to order a French Kiss from a male bartender, so he got something else instead. We played a fast game of Scrabble, then went to the room to change for formal night. We had reservations at the Normandie at 9pm!

The Normandie is the very fancy restaurant on the ship, and is decorated with objects from the original SS Normandie. It costs an additional $35 per person, and it’s worth it, especially on formal night. We ordered champagne and were brought the bread basket, then an amuse-bouche of mango soup in a tiny tureen. (I would’ve taken pictures of everything, but I didn’t want to be tacky!) After that, a goat cheese bechamel souffle in a puff pastry cage for me and scallops Wellington for Matt. Then anjou pear in phyllo with a tiny salad, and for Matt a salad containing all the ingredients in an Egg McMuffin, but way better.

The entree was vegetables primavera for me, and steak and lobster for Matt. The service was formal, which always makes me feel a little uncomfortable, but the waiters were very friendly. They even removed the lobster from the shell for Matt. After dinner, they brought us Manhattans from the bar in fancy crystal glasses, and wouldn’t let us refuse to order a dessert, so we chose the miniature dessert sampler to share, figuring it would be the smallest.

They brought a tiered tray of tiny desserts, and we thought that was perfect: we could each have a bite of every item, and not be stuffed to the point of having to vomit in buckets. Then they informed us that wasn’t our dessert, that was the dessert appetizer. Seriously.

The dessert sampler was fantastic, though. And the Normandie is worth it, but you’d probably be better off starving yourself for three days before you go.

After dinner, we went to Revelations for the formal night dance party. The place was packed for once, which was fantastic. There was a huge buffet in the back with desserts and breads (we wanted to die a little), and amazing ice sculptures. We recognized most of the servers and bartenders from other locations on the ship, and Winston from Jamaica was our waiter.

We got a little table, ordered cocktails, and did some hardcore people-watching. I noticed a stir in the middle of the room, and realized it was our bartender, Mehmet, from the bar where we’d had Manhattans a few nights ago. He had what was essentially a fancy ice luge set up for martinis: he’d put everything in the shaker, toss it around over his head with a lot of flair (to the intense delight of every lady who passed), then pour it down the ice luge into a waiting glass below. He was absolutely loving the attention, so I decided to go over there for my next drink.

I ordered a Grey Goose l’Orange martini, and we ended up talking about favorite drinks. He asked about mine, so I told him about the Manhattan I’d had at dinner. It turned out he’d made it to be sent to the restaurant, so we discussed favorite bourbons and such. I told him I preferred Maker’s, so he said we should stop down to his bar the next night and he would make one special for us. Mehmet instantly became my favorite bartender on the ship, and that’s saying something.

I headed back to our table with the world’s largest martini, and it took all I had to not spill it. Walking with a martini glass in heels on a rocking ship? Not the easiest thing I’ve ever done. I found Matt there drinking Patron on the rocks. BIG PIMPIN’.

The band finished up around midnight, and a DJ who was not Ron Hollywood took over. We were just thrilled to be able to stay up late and dance again, because it was the first night of the entire cruise where we wouldn’t be in port at 7am. Hooray for sea days!

The crowd thinned out pretty quickly after the DJ started, but a group of Americans stuck around to dance. We requested ‘Rompe’, and got a bunch more reggaeton. I ended up on the dance floor barefoot in my dress. It was awesome, and everyone protested loudly when the DJ had to shut down at 2am. Regardless, we had a great time.

friday 12.18.2009 (day at sea)

Posted in southern caribbean cruise on December 30th, 2009 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: caribbean, cruise, ocean, swimming

We slept til 10 on Friday morning, and it was glorious. I popped my Dramamine, we had breakfast, and then we went to the theater to see the crew talent show and sendoff. It always chokes me up a little knowing that vacation is almost over. It goes so amazingly fast.

After the show, we headed to the pool. It seemed funny that we hadn’t done that yet, but we’d been in the ocean almost every day, and it was usually dark by the time we were back in our cabin. The waves were pretty high, which made swimming hilarious: you could just float and the movement of the ship would bounce you around the pool. While we swam, Captain Yannis came on and announced we were at 16 degrees latitude. That’s awesome.

We tried out the thalassotherapy pool in the spa, too. It’s open to everyone on the ship. There are reclining chairs built into the hot tub! That may be the greatest invention of all time. I wanted to stay in longer, but there were several signs telling us to only stay in there for 15 minutes at a time.

We showered, changed, and headed to swing dance lessons in Revelations, because we figured it’d be good to brush up on our skills. There were about 20 people there, and at least half of them were incapable of following directions. It was pretty funny. We then went to have salads from the spa buffet, and to balance it out, got margaritas from the bar out back. We hung out on the deck, watching the ship’s wake.

Since we were catching up on everything we hadn’t gotten to do yet on the ship, we headed down to geography trivia a bit later. Matt wanted to stop for a drink at the pool bar, and the bartender asked about my cocktail as well. I told him it was a not-great margarita, so he took it and ‘improved’ it for me. It pays to befriend the bartenders on a cruise ship!

We got 11/15 at geography trivia, which was good enough for us. From there, we went down to the front desk to pick up our ipods for the self-guided art tour. The lobby was decorated for Christmas, which was still confusing to us.

The battery on Matt’s ipod was almost dead, and mine had broken headphones. We didn’t want to wait in the long line again, though, so we worked out a deal that catered to my lack of focus pretty well: Matt would listen to the narration and relate the important details to me in what sounded kind of like stream-of-consciousness beat poetry, and I would take pictures, admire the artwork, and be amused.

So we weren’t being too nerdy about the whole thing, we decided to stop at the bars we passed along the way. It was a pretty excellent plan.

The artwork on the ship was actually great. They focused on modern art, and most of it appealed to us quite a bit. It was a nice change from the usual classical sculptures and such. Some of it is just plain weird, though.

Once we’d viewed all forty or so pieces and explored some areas we hadn’t seen before, we headed up for 2nd lunch. That was our other goal: to have as many meals as possible on the ship that day, just because it was funny.

My second lunch consisted of nachos, a raisin scone, and a little croissant. It was a mix of the Mexican buffet and tea time offerings. Oh, and also a Red Stripe!

Sadly (but not too sadly, considering our day), we went to the cabin to begin packing. We had a lot of work to do protecting all that rum, since it would all have to be checked at the airport.

Because we obviously expended so much energy packing (and making an ill-fated trip to the ship’s store for inflatable bags… they required the pump in the store, so we’d have to haul everything down there), we were starving (haha). We went for third lunch! I wasn’t hungry at all, but I had a roll just for show. Matt had his final sushi boat, and declared that he had eaten an entire sushi armada.

The next time we swung past the cabin, the rum we’d purchased in port had been delivered. We finished packing that up, as well as everything else we wouldn’t need. We had to have our bags out in the hallway by 10 or 11pm, and they would be returned to us after disembarkation the next morning. Everything else in the cabin would have to fit in our carry-ons in the meantime.

We went down to the casino and found seats at the blackjack table. The other people playing were great. One of the old guys had a lucky quarter on the table, and it seemed to help us all: from the original $100, I ended up with $170, and Matt left with $210. I think that’s the best I’ve ever done at blackjack!

We cashed out and went to make our final stop, as I’d promised Mehmet we’d visit him before leaving. (I hate saying goodbye to crew members. A lot.)

We arrived and found him flipping bottles around for the women sitting at the bar. They were loving it, and he was thrilled. He announced that he’d been practicing a lot. I noticed the bottle of Makers sitting out on the bar just for us: how cute is that? He said he also had an awesome martini for me to try, but I told him we had to go get dinner first. We took our Manhattans and headed back to the room to order room service.

Did I mention that you can order room service on the TV? I love the future. We watched ESPN while waiting for Jude (our shy cabin steward) to arrive with our food, which included the cheese plate. Totally not necessary, but I’d been obsessing over that damn cheese plate the whole time.

This photo is an accurate representation of how hard life on a cruise ship is. Matt’s waiting on hold to tell Jude the trays are ready to be cleared. There’s a cocktail on the table and a Cuban cigar on the bed.

We were exhausted by then, but we’d promised Mehmet to return for the special martini. We hung out at the bar for a bit listening to the terrible karaoke below (it was the same Americans we’d danced with the previous night), then said goodbye to Mehmet and headed to bed. We had another early morning ahead of us!

saturday 1.12.08 (minneapolis to fort lauderdale, bon voyage)

Posted in western caribbean cruise on January 20th, 2008 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: caribbean, cruise, florida, fort lauderdale

CRUISE II: THE SEQUEL

starring:

Jenni, Matt, Wendy, Cindi, Jumi, and the S.S. Razzmatazz (also known as the Costa Mediterranea)

special appearances by:

Andre, the assistant pastor, Pepe (gay or Italian), DJ Nick and the Helper Monkey, Niner, Mr. Pizza and Maxine, Jones, Sneaky Pete, Arsenio, Lamp, Imelda Marcos, Dragon Lady and Dragon Lady Junior, Arsenal and Man U, Towel, Roque, Jersey and his family, Patrick Swayze, Bungee Cord, Droopy and Shingles,Ukulele Hero, Mark Boney, Gerald, Rocky, Chris, Jaime, Joseph, Humberto, Falco, Walter from Uruguay, Massimo, the Oesterreicher Dyker, and Disposo.

[To view the entire Flickr photoset, go here!]

Saturday morning, we got up at 3:45am. It hurt, but we survived out of sheer determination to get to the ocean as soon as possible. It was cold in Minnesota. I went to pick up Cindi while Matt retrieved Wendy, then we met at my mom’s; we wanted to bring both our cars out there in case there was a snow emergency in Minneapolis while we were gone.

Our flight was delayed about 20 minutes because they had trouble closing one of the cargo doors. Once they finally got it duct-taped shut, we had to wait for the de-icing truck to spray us off. My irritation over having to wait was mitigated by watching the de-icing process. It was kind of fascinating. However, we had a 25-minute connection in Memphis.

We arrived in Tennessee a little late, and rushed to the gate. Thankfully, most of the other flights arriving were also running late, so we were in no danger of missing it.

I knitted, Matt and I had a snack, we played cards, and then we had a very long conversation with a guy stuck behind the beverage carts trying to get to the bathroom. We talked about tattoos, where we lived, and then our jobs. We did a very good job of not reacting when he told us he was the assistant pastor for a church in St Paul. When we saw him later at the airport, he gave me his card. It was the flashiest clergyman businesscard ever. I’m guessing his church is actually pretty cool.

We got our bags, and took a taxi van to the cruise ship docks. (If you’re going on a cruise, don’t pre-book the shuttle service from the airport. Cabs are about $6/person, at least half the price.) Embarkation was really quick, because we were so early; we were on the ship by 2pm, and ready to start the show.

my fancy new frequent-cruiser card.

We went to check out our cabin, then all went up to the card room to talk to the maitre d’ because, as usual, they’d assigned us to the wrong dinner time, and put us at separate tables. I have no idea how to keep Costa from doing this every time, but it’s not really a big deal to switch to late dinner. It gave us time to hang out and drink coffee while looking at the creepy cherubs suspended from the ceiling in that room we know so well.

After switching to the late dinner, we went up to the buffet for lunch. None of us had really eaten much all day, so we were starving. We took our food out onto the back deck, got us some cocktails (a mojito should always be the first beverage consumed on a cruise), and it was already the best vacation ever.

We found our suitcases waiting in the cabin when we returned. We unpacked, then perhaps removed our clothing and celebrated. Afterwards, we sat on our balcony and watched the people on the two other cruise ships doing their muster drill. Because we weren’t leaving til 7pm (during the first dinner), we didn’t have to muster til 5pm the next day, after leaving Key West. I assume they don’t require it til you’re actually leaving the U.S., but I’m not sure how that works.

matt on our balcony

We went up to the very top deck by the smokestack to meet Wendy, Cindi, and Jumi, who were hanging around like hooligans. After a trip to the pool bar, we found the bocce balls out on the court, so we played. You know what’s hard? Playing bocce on a ship. And it wasn’t even moving yet.

still empty!

cruise ship bocce

As 7pm neared, we went downstairs and took up spots on deck chairs at the back of the ship. Right after dark, the ship started heading out to sea. The whistle blew, and I started crying. I was so damn excited to finally be there with the people I love most.

We changed and headed to dinner, where a bottle of champagne was waiting. The menu struck me as more impressive than last time; I had papaya with Cointreau, broccoli soup, vegetable lasagna, and sugar-free apple crumble. We decided that we wanted fruit with liquor on it for breakfast every day. It was the new cereal.

After dinner, we hung out at the Talia Lounge right outside the restaurant on deck 2. This would later be renamed “Pete’s Place”, but we didn’t know him yet. There was a duo singing the greatest hits of the 70s and 80s, and a few people dancing. After that, we headed to the front of the ship to Giardino Isolabella, one of the few bars Wendy and I hadn’t been to last time. We’d only set foot in the place and noticed that it was 1) pimp, with round booths and a fancy stage, and 2) empty. It was still fairly empty, but we took up a table and ordered drinks anyway.

There were a couple groups at tables at the front, and we soon discovered they were the band. Once they got on stage and started playing, we were the only audience. They were excellent, and we felt bad leaving after a while. We finally clapped a lot and left, yelling to them that we’d be back. We had more important things to attend to, namely the DISCO.

The first night at Disco Selva is apparently always singles night, but we didn’t care. We had a couple singles with us, after all. Also, singles night only lasts half an hour. The place was pretty empty (as it’s wont to be early in the week, apparently); there were some old, definitely not-single people at tables upstairs, and an extremely creepy couple of dudes in a dark corner. We went downstairs, ordered drinks, and hung out to see if anyone would dance.

Our host was DJ Nick, and he was something. He spoke hardly any English, so putting in requests was nearly impossible. The video board was a giant display showing lions in the African savannah, with his name and logo on top. RAWR. The dancing only began once Pepe (the staff member who started the whole “gay or Italian?” inquiry on the previous cruise) came in and starting grooving to Billie Jean. There was also a lot of Fergie, and all in all, the Disco (which you must pronounce ‘deeeee-sco’) was not hoppin’ that night. We headed to bed at 1pm, realizing we’d been up for almost 24 hours.

sunday 1.13.08 (key west)

Posted in western caribbean cruise on January 20th, 2008 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: caribbean, cruise, florida, key west, ocean

Cruises are the only time I’m happy to see the sun rise.

key west

We had breakfast on the deck, and I got to have gruel for the first of, well, six other times. We hopped off the boat and piled into the Bone Island Shuttle (*snort*). I think we were the only people in a good mood; there were some severely crabby old ladies on there with us. How can you be mad about being in a warm place in January?

The shuttle dropped us off in Mallory Square, which is the ultratacky part of town where the main cruise dock is located. It was only 8am on a Sunday, so little was open. This was fine with us, because we intended to do all of our sightseeing first thing, and then explore the local scene. By which we meant the bars. Key West is well-known for that particular industry.

We headed off down Whitehead Street, which parallels Duval.

the mile zero marker on US route 1. matt’s making fun of parrotheads.

‘
the kapok tree

COCK

There are wild chickens all over Key West (as well as cats; feel free to make the same jokes we did), so you hear roosters crowing constantly. I love that.

bahama village: it definitely looks like the bahamas.

hemingway house (we didn’t want to pay admission!)

i want to live here.

wendy, blending

At the end of Whitehead Street, you come to the marker denoting the southernmost point in the continental United States. From there, it’s 90 miles to Cuba. I just needed to see it because I’ve been to the actual southermost point in the U.S., on the Big Island of Hawaii.

southermost is a big deal in key west, apparently.

We walked back down Duval Street, and businesses were starting to think about opening. We stopped into a convenience store for water, because it was kind of ridiculously hot already. I was regretting my decision to wear a long-sleeved shirt that day, having assumed it’d be the least-warm stop we’d make on the cruise. It was in the mid-80s, but sunny and humid.

We also stopped for iced coffee at Dunkin’ Donuts (an establishment we sadly cannot enjoy in Minneapolis; the nearest are in Chicago), and Matt and Wendy posed by their ‘family tree’. I’d explain, but it’s a long story. Also, Wendy has a hard time trying to look badass, and just starts laughing.

We walked all the way back down to Mallory Square, scouting the places we wanted to visit later. We passed Sunset Pier, where the bartender appeared to be setting up, and asked when they opened. She said they were serving food already, but that they weren’t allowed to pour liquor in Key West until noon on Sundays. We told her we’d be back.

We sat on the pier watching the pelicans and sailboats for a while, and I called my mom to tell her she shouldn’t panic over not hearing from me for another week, because we’d be out of the U.S.. We then went over to the Sponge Market to stock up on all the necessary souvenirs, including my obligatory Christmas ornament, in the shape of the southernmost point marker.

On the way back to the oceanfront, we wandered through a garden full of statues, and Wendy and Matt had to have Superbad moments. BOOP!

matt and hemingway

disney ship: we quickly learned that local businesses hate disney passengers. duh.

At five minutes to noon, we got ourselves a table at Sunset Pier. There were already several people waiting there for the bar to open.

We ordered brunch (by which I mean nachos), then drinks. Like every bar in that region, Sunset Pier claims it invented the Rum Runner. Their frozen beverages come with a test tube full of dark rum.

You know what’s awesome? Having a margarita at noon on a Sunday while overlooking the ocean.

After brunch, we headed back down Duval Street, where everything was officially open. We stopped into Fast Buck Freddie’s, where Matt got a pimptastic hat, then headed to the bar I never, ever wanted to set foot in: Margaritaville. But I had to, of course, because it was there, and it’s the original.

It wasn’t bad at all, except for the fact that it was full of families from the Disney ship having lunch while we were on our second cocktail of the afternoon. The bartender was fantastic. After that, it was time for lunch at Willie T’s!

you are here, this is paradise. so true.

The entirety of Willie T’s was outside, and they featured 39 flavors of mojitos. It was instantly my favorite place in the world. We ordered lunch, and hung out watching the Colts-Chargers game on the giant-screen TV. We also filled out our own dollar to post on the wall. We gave our founding father boobs.

When it was time to move on, they gave us to-go cups. I LOVE KEY WEST.

We walked down Duval toward our last destination, the most famous bar in Key West. I stood out front and finished my drink before we went inside, though I doubt they’d actually have cared.

I fell in love with our bartender instantly. She was the best. The house drink is the Sloppy Rita, which isn’t really distinguishable from a regular margarita. Also, I really like that the standard tequila in most places we went is Sauza. I hate Cuervo a lot.

With about half an hour left til the last shuttle to the boat, we headed out, again with to-go cups. We stopped at a little grocery to shop for amusing British foodstuffs like Lucozade, then circled Mallory Square again, looking at cocks. I mean, what?

The shuttle dropped us off about 15 minutes before the ship departed. We took showers and watched from our balcony as we left Key West. We’d have taken the usual post-island nap, but we had to do the muster drill first.

Promptly at 5pm, the alarms went off, and we all put on our life jackets and lined up at the muster station. Sadly, we were at a different station than Wendy, Cindi, and Jumi, so we were surrounded by antsy Germans. We stood there trying not to giggle about everything, listened to the safety announcement in 5 languages, and were finally freed from responsibility for the rest of vacation.

After everyone else had their meat locker time (i.e. when you go back to your cabin after returning from some bar at the port, and take a shower and nap til early evening), we met in Bar Casanova, intending to play bingo. It ended up costing $20/person, so we went to play cards instead. The cruise staff was dressed in clown outfits for some show that night, and one of them came up to talk to Matt about his Arsenal jersey. It turned out he was from London (and thereafter known as ‘Arsenal’, while we called his friend from Manchester ‘Man U’), and he told us about their most recent game. Another female clown came over and plastered herself against the window while he talked. When he left, Matt said, “I just got a score from a clown while another silver clown humped the window!”

We stayed there so late that even the buffet had shut down, except for the pizza station, so we had pizza and salads out on the back deck, after which we wandered around the upper decks of the ship, looking at the moon and stars and basically being really gay. Shut up.

We found what seemed to be the darkest part of the ship up front on deck 9, so we stayed there for a long time. A couple of ladies wandered by, drunk, and we ended up making friends with them, even though one of them told us all about her boobs and the other was from California. (We named them Droopy and Shingles.) We decided to all go to the bar together; the ladies were kind of annoying, but there seemed to be no shaking them at that point. My favorite moment was when I was pondering the drink menu and Shingles yelled, “Have you had an orgasm??” Well, yes! Thanks for asking.

They told us all about how they’d met the performers for next evening’s show (Anthony and William), and how they were the cutest ever, blah blah blah. Wendy and I discussed this quietly at the bar, and when I asked her again who the guys were, she told me it was Carmelo Anthony and A.I.. We then invented the Melotini, which made absolute sense right at that moment:

• 1 part Kahlua
• 1 part Creme de Menthe
• 1 part Grey Goose
• optional float of Hpnotiq

Try it. You’ll love it.

We went down to the main lobby bar, but it was annoyingly crowded with art sale displays and loud people. We returned to Casanova, then went to Isolabella, the pimp bar on the 1st deck. There were a few more people there this time, thankfully, and the server remembered us. Wendy and I decided that Carmelo Anthony was arriving for his performance on a mini-submarine, so we sat there waiting for him. She tried texting him on her Blueberry, but to no avail. Stupid Melo.

We left after a while and went back to Casanova, where the band was playing Italian songs for a large, drunk group of Romans. Old guys kept hopping up on stage to sing ‘Arrivederci, Roma’. It was awesome. And then, Casanova was closing! We’d never seen that happen before! I’m pretty sure that means we won, and it definitely meant it was time for bed.

monday 1.14.08 (at sea)

Posted in western caribbean cruise on January 20th, 2008 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: at sea, caribbean, cruise, ocean

Monday was our first full day at sea, on the way to Grand Cayman. We got up at 9:30, sat on the balcony watching the Disney ship racing us, then had breakfast. After that, it was time for Arts & Crafts class. Beautiful necklaces!

actually, i made an anklet.

After making ourselves some gorgeous jewelry, we went to go sit on deck in the sun and read. We had cocktails and chillaxed. Matt read his book upside down.

Around 2pm, we headed to the restaurant for Wendy’s favorite lunch ever: Mexican buffet!

Full of tacos and carrying drinks, we went to the disco for Italian lessons. They taught us the basics like ‘buon giorno’ and ‘buona sera, comandante!’ We also learned to count, which came in useful in the elevators, where every floor was announced in Italian. Our cabin was on ponte sei.

Completely exhausted from class (ha), we went to have meat locker time from 3-4:30. Then it was time for SuperQuiz!

We lost to the Germans, dammit.

We hung out in the card room playing canasta and hearts, and then it was time to go get ready for formal night, or as Wendy calls it, Fancypants Dinner. We found this guy in our room, wearing Matt’s sunglasses:

We headed to dinner, where there was another bottle of champagne awaiting us. I don’t remember what we ate at all, but I know it was fantastic; Wendy and I thought the food in the dining room was good but not spectacular last time, but it had definitely improved. Their risotto was incredible.

We decided to keep our fancy pants on (or dress, in my case) for a bit and go to the bar. We met Pete, and Cindi tried to get him to teach us to swear in Italian, since obviously we already knew how to say everything else. He pointed out the captain, sitting right behind us, and told us to come back later and he would. Pete ruled. He also told us that the ship did indeed have a brig, but generally only staff ended up there. I want to know more.

We went to our cabins to change back to normal clothes, then went to the Dionisio Lounge on deck 3. We were telling the bartender about how we learned Italian earlier, and Wendy started counting out loud. Instead of ‘nove’, she yelled ‘NINER!’ He started giggling hysterically, and thereafter became known as Niner. He told us, “you guys must be a lot of fun at the bar!”

Cindi decided she needed to drink Disaronno on the rocks (thereby earning her a new nickname as well), and became very chatty with a German couple at the bar. We overheard her saying, “Cindi is a pretty American name!” She was on a roll, and I have a napkin scribbled full of her quotes.

We went back to the cabin around 12:30, entertained ourselves in various ways, and then passed out. We had a date with stingrays in the morning!

tuesday 1.15.08 (grand cayman)

Posted in western caribbean cruise on January 20th, 2008 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: caribbean, cruise, dancing, grand cayman, ocean, señor frogs

Tuesday, another sunrise! This time in the Cayman Islands.

We had breakfast on deck, watching the ship pull into port. We got down to the Osiris Theatre right away, and ended up with tickets on the first tender boat. Cindi wasn’t feeling well and didn’t want to go to Stingray Sandbar, so she decided to stay on ship and meet us later.

We arrived in George Town, Grand Cayman, around 8:30am. The stores were just opening, so we shopped for souvenirs and postcards. We got coffee next door and sat outside, writing to the suckers back home.

On the way to the post office, we found a bank that dispensed cash in American and Caymanian dollars. I got out $20CI (about $30US) and we went to buy stamps. We split up the remaining cash for souvenirs. We then stopped into another store to look at the duty free liquor, and I nearly died when I saw Big Black Dick Rum. Of course I needed some of that, but they were unable to sell it to us because of duty-free laws: it has to be delivered to the ship directly, and the ship needs to contract with the store. They only had it duty-free, too, so I couldn’t just carry it onto the boat just like I always did with my contraband liquor. SIGH.

big black dick

We wandered around the duty-free mall with the rest of the cruise passengers, noted the location of Señor Frogs for later, then went over to the Tortuga Rum store. They had regular and duty-free booze, so I figured I’d just buy the regular stuff. That is, until we looked at the prices for duty-free. It was all ridiculously cheap, and they had stuff I hadn’t seen in the US.

Duty-free shopping: I have finally seen the light. We made a note of what we needed and headed back to the dock to catch our shuttle to the stingrays.

We met up with the excursion and walked to the shuttle buses. It drove us up and across the island to the North Sound, where we boarded a boat after much confusion amongst the shuttle drivers. We climbed up on top at the front, and we headed out toward Stingray Sandbar. The waves were splashing us way up there and our stuff was soaked, but we didn’t care. It was warm out, and there were stingrays waiting to see us!

heading into the north sound

i love the color of the water.

stingray sandbar

As we dropped anchor, we could see stingrays swimming all over the place. There were 4 or 5 other boats there already, and a bunch of people swimming. In places, the water was only knee-deep. We got some barely-audible instructions about not scaring stingrays lest they kill you, and then we climbed down the steps into the water. It was officially the best day of all time.

they know there’s squid in that bag.

stingray rubbing on wendy’s butt

The photographer told us that kissing a stingray was good luck, so they’d hold one up for us while she took our picture kissing it. I couldn’t have cared less whether that was true or not, I just wanted to kiss a stingray! When I told the guy that, he said, “OK! I’m a stingray!”

old couple kissing a stingray

They had a bag of squid to feed them, so the stingrays were freaking out about the food. They kept rubbing up against us with their wings. I’d be trying to touch one of them, and another would rub up against my butt. Consequently, there was a LOT of screaming and hysterical laughter going on at Stingray Sandbar. It was fantastic. (Here’s a video!)

So was the water. There were huge waves crashing over the sandbar, so it was nearly impossible to stand up. We swam out a little ways and bobbed around, jumping over waves so they wouldn’t knock us down. It took me far too long to learn that I needed to maybe not stand with my back to them, because I kept falling over.

Wendy showed me how to hold a squid (by the EYES), and tuck my thumb in so a stingray wouldn’t suck my hand into his mouth. I wasn’t freaked out by feeding them, but I was not pleased about holding a squid.

wendy holding a stingray

They had snorkel gear on the boat, but it seemed kind of unnecessary. Next time, I’d like to snorkel just so I know what I’m taking pictures of underwater.

Our visit with the stingrays was over way too soon. Sigh.

We were mostly dry by the time we got back to the shuttle buses, so we decided it was unnecessary to go back to the ship to change. We hoped Cindi was there waiting at the appointed spot. Matt and I ended up on a different bus than Wendy and Jumi, and it was clearly the good one: the driver sang to us the whole way back. He got applause after every song, and by the time we arrived in George Town, we were all singing Day-O together. It was awesome.

We went back to the Tortuga store to get rum cakes for the people back home, and place our duty-free order. Matt and I got 18-year Tortuga Rum in a barrel, Flor de Caña Centenario 12-Year, and cachaca so we could make caipirinhas at home. My entire order, including rum cakes and other souvenirs, was $90. SCORE.

While we were checking out, a girl came running in to see if it was too late to place an order. Her ship was leaving at 2:30, which was past the cutoff for their delivery. She proceeded to have a tantrum in the store, to the embarrassment of her friends. Seriously.

Jumi decided to go back to the ship to find Cindi, and Matt and Wendy and I headed off to find the British grocery store. It was nowhere to be found, so we stopped at a convenience store to hunt for things like Lucozade and Go Ahead (the snack from the Bahamas that I’ll be seeking everywhere I go for the rest of my life). Then we headed to Señor Frogs for lunch, and to get started on Cindi’s primary goal of the cruise: to drink a first down. Since she was sick and 10 yards would definitely kill a person anyway, we decided to help.

Our server’s name was Jesus. We ordered yards and food, then decided we needed to do a shot, too (it’s tradition, started way back in Puerto Rico!). We asked him what he preferred. He said, “I like blowjobs!”

wendy looking for cindi and jumi from señor frogs’ balcony

We ate lunch, and Cindi and Jumi finally showed up. They had given us beads before, but when Jesus brought them for the other two, we pretended like we never got any. He brought us all one of each color. We were very proud of our beautiful necklaces.

We had 9 yards in Grand Cayman, which meant we were at 2nd and 1 in Cozumel. Not a problem. When we asked for the tab, Jesus also brought us a round of free shots. They were blue, which scared me. But we all survived, far better than we did the tab, which was in Caymanian dollars, with the US total at the end. Challenge: drink 2 shots and 2 yards and then figure out who owes what. It wasn’t pretty.

We had to hurry back to the dock to catch the tender, and were only sure we made it once we saw the line. We wanted to be on the last one, but had to settle for second-to-last. There was a sign at the gate telling us that we were not allowed to bring weapons on the ship, and it was very explicit. Some of the weapons included sharpened sticks, coshes, and knuckle dusters. This held no end of fascination for us.

On the tender boat, we may have been a little raucous; the dudes in front of us were really amused until Wendy accidentally shouted “CLAPPY PENIS!” It was her special code name for caipirinhas, apparently. As we got back on the ship, we passed a wall lined with Tortuga Rum boxes. Hell yes.

We returned to our cabin to shower off the stingrays and have the best meat locker time ever. We awoke again at 7, and I called the other cabin to see if they were awake. Cindi answered, then hung up on me. Wendy called back shortly afterward. We got dressed and went down to their cabin to partake in Fuzzy Tang (Peachtree and Tang); I had my own version with rum and sugar-free tang in an empty Lucozade bottle.

We got food from the buffet, ate on deck, then went downstairs to the card room to play Oh Hell and Slappy (otherwise known as Egyptian Whiskey Rat Fuck).

Once the show started in Casanova, we went over there to watch. It was Italian night, so the competition was for Mr. Pizza. They had to do things like throw dough around, ‘dance sexy’, and sing ‘O Sole Mio’. The winner was a hysterical old guy from Long Island. Every time we saw him after that, he was wearing his Mr. Pizza sash.

After Mr Pizza, we headed to the club. There was much better hiphop playing (instead of crappy Eurodisco), and slightly more dancing. One of our favorite servers, Jones (his real name was Irwin, I think), was working there. Whenever he brought us receipts to sign, he was using a light-up pen, and this was immensely fascinating. There was a lot of dancing, and I really really did NOT want to leave. But it was 2am, and we had a date with a beach in Honduras the next morning.

wednesday 1.16.08 (roatan, honduras)

Posted in western caribbean cruise on January 20th, 2008 by jenni | 2 Comments »
Tags: beach, caribbean, central america, cruise, dancing, honduras, kayaking, ocean

Wednesday morning, we got to sleep in. We had gained an hour overnight, and our excursion didn’t leave til 11. I was too excited about being in Honduras, though (my first visit to Central America!), so I got up at 8, showered, put on my bathing suit and sarong, and sat out on the balcony, staring at the mountains off in the distance. We were going to Roatan, an island off the coast of Honduras, but you could see the mainland from the ship.

Roatan didn’t have its own tender service, so we got to ride in the lifeboats. The whole way there, Wendy and Matt and I giggled about hopping on the Royal Caribbean ship and stealing rolls for the Costa staff to eat. It’s a long story that’s probably only funny to us. Pulling up to the dock, we went right under the bow of the other ship.

The port area in Coxen Hole consists of a giant tent full of vendors, a bar, and a parking lot full of shuttle buses. We were really hoping to get on the Jesus shuttle, but we ended up on a school bus instead. We all got wristbands for Tabyana Beach, and we were off.

We drove along the coast down toward the West End. The homes outside the little port area were as expected: ramshackle buildings on stilts, with laundry hanging all over the place. It wasn’t actually as depressed as I’d have expected, but the whole island is really resort-oriented.

We headed uphill through the interior of the island, and the bus ride all of a sudden became a roller coaster. The bus would come up on a tight curve slowly, the driver would try to peer around the corner, then he’d sound his horn (which was modified to be a LOT louder), and go tearing off. We went up and down really steep hills at alarming speed; I think the bus just needed the momentum to even keep going. It was awesome.

At the top of a big hill, the driver stopped to let cars pass. The view was amazing, and reminded me of Maui.

We passed through the shops and restaurants in the West End, and arrived at Tabyana Beach around noon. I was so excited, I wanted to climb out the window rather than wait for everyone to get off the bus.

We had to stand around and wait for an attendant to get beach chairs for us, but that was fine because there was a bar right there on the beach. I’m considering that as a career option, actually.

Once our chairs arrived, I took time only to throw my bag and towel on one of them, and take off my shirt and shorts. I couldn’t get the in ocean fast enough.

Wendy and I agree that the day we spent on the beach in the Dominican Republic was one of our favorite days ever, so we couldn’t wait to repeat it. This time, though, there weren’t even tiny jellyfish in the water. It was absolutely perfect, and we were even allowed to bring our drinks into the ocean.

We spent a lot of time just bobbing around talking. We practiced wrestling moves, and I killed Cindi like an alligator. I attached myself to Matt in ways that would otherwise have been inappropriate in public. We took off our bathing suits and held them overhead just like I did in the DR. When we ran out of beverages, Cindi yelled, “WALTER!!!” and our server waded out into the water to take our orders. I could maybe live in Roatan.

After a while, we decided to take a break from chilling in the ocean, and go visit the souvenir shop. I’m pretty sure everything in the entire place cost $2, except for the coffee Matt got, which was $6.

The reef is only about 50 feet from the beach there, so we’d thought about renting snorkels. They were $10 each, whereas a kayak was $15. I was nervous about it, because I figured we’d flip over or something. Matt promised we wouldn’t, so we rented a 2-person kayak and set off to see the reef.

Holy crap, it was amazing. I loved it far more than canoeing, and it felt even more steady. In places, we were only a few inches above the reef. I stuck my camera underwater and took pictures.

We returned the kayak with about an hour left at Tabyana Beach. We ran back into the ocean, and it was there that Wendy and Matt and I invented SEAPOUND. It’s not as dirty as it sounds.

wendy doesn’t want to leave

accomplishment!

We got out of the water with enough time to catch one of the last buses. SIGH.

sometimes after a few cocktails, drinking 2 beers at the same time seems like an awesome idea.

wife guard!

have i mentioned that i’m madly in love with this boy? because i am.

We took the rollercoaster bus back to the port, and had a small amount of time to check out the shops in Coxen Hole. We headed into a big building full of little market stalls, and picked up a few more souvenirs. I’d have liked more time to see the town, but that’s good reason to return!

We tendered back to the ship and had some quality meat-locker time til about 7pm, then went to the card room to play Oh Hell. Jones came by and showed us a card trick; it was pretty much the cutest thing ever. We then headed to dinner in the restaurant, and they’d outdone themselves.

I had a fruit salad, a fruit soup that tasted like pina colada, a salad with balsamic vinegar, and a risotto cake with sweet potatoes, cranberries, almonds, and dandelion greens. Everything was amazing. In the middle of dinner, the staff started marching around, and a group of waiters went up to the balcony for SEXY DANCING. So funny.

After dinner, we went to find Pete. He was just waiting to teach us dirty words in Italian.

pete’s italian lessons

Our favorite was vafanculo, the Italian equivalent of ‘fuck off’. When Cindi asked him how to say ‘blowjob’, he told us he’d need to go consult the magazine in his cabin. While we were sitting there, Jones came by to tell us the disco was open, in case we didn’t know!

We didn’t want to go to the disco that early, so we went upstairs to see Niner. There was a guy on the violin accompanying a pianist, and a few people sitting there watching. After a while, we realized everyone was gone, and the two musicians were practicing together. We wanted to take credit for clearing the place out. Also, Jumi got lei’d!

We headed down to the disco, where people were actually dancing for once. We met Rob, Chris, and Barbara (known as Jersey and his crew). Jersey requested the Cha Cha Slide (you probably know this as the ‘everybody clap your hands!’ song), and knew the whole dance routine. By the end of the cruise, we’d seen him do it multiple times, and now the image of a ponytail boy from New Jersey dancing a stiff cha-cha is conjured every time I’m at a basketball game.

Wendy was doing her best to make sure we drank every single beverage on the drink menu, so she stole a sip of Chris’ Budweiser. I was dancing barefoot, and Disco Selva had officially become the Gay 90s. We even had lemon drops. When Soulja Boy came on, we all went out and danced, following the Helper Monkey’s lead. Arsenal and Man U were upstairs watching, but refused to come downstairs and dance.

We left around 2:30, knowing it was going to hurt the next morning.

thursday 1.17.08 (cozumel, mexico)

Posted in western caribbean cruise on January 20th, 2008 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: ATVs, caribbean, cozumel, cruise, mexico, ocean, purple rain, señor frogs

Thursday morning arrived far too early. I got up early, showered, and then went right back to bed. We finally got up about 9:30, and told Wendy, Cindi and Jumi that we’d meet them for the excursion at 11. We had breakfast overlooking Cozumel, and noted with some excitement that we were docked right at Señor Frogs.

We got off the boat, and followed the path into town. It requires navigating a mall built expressly for cruise ship patrons, presumably for those too scared to actually enter MEXICO. Haha. We decided to walk down to the giant Mexican flag, and scope out some of the shops.

this never ceased to amuse me.

We stopped into Cozumel Mart (yes, it’s really called that) and I bought the largest bottle of Evian I could find. Between the hangover and the humidity, I was considering laying down on the side of the road and dying. I drank all my water as we headed back to the dock to meet our excursion shuttle, and I soon determined that the heat was a huge plus, re: sweating off the ickiness. I felt totally fine by the time we headed to the bus.

Another girl on our excursion was not so lucky: she had to have them pull the bus over so she could get out and throw up on the side of the road. We’d seen her at the disco the night before. She looked to be in really rough shape.

Our tour leader was James, and he was awesome. He quizzed us about our knowledge of Spanish (“Do you know tequila? Margarita? Dos Equis? Burrito?”) and introduced the driver as Speedy Gonzales. He told us it was a half-hour drive to San Gervasio, but that Speedy would make it in 20 minutes. He was correct!

San Gervasio is a national park containing Mayan ruins, though the site we were visiting was private lands adjoining the area. I was excited to see the ruins, but let’s not pretend: we were really there to ride ATVs. The history was just a bonus.

We sat and watched a safety video, learned how to shift gears on our ATVs, and then they handed out bandanas to wear under our awesome helmets. I also saw a dude carrying a tiny monkey curled in his hand. SO CUTE.

I’d read up on the ATV tour, and people recommended bringing a second bandana to wear over your face, because the trails are really dusty. However, it had just rained, so that wasn’t a problem. We got mud instead!

We drove down the main paths, and got up some decent speed on our ATVs. I loved it a lot. Then we turned off into side-paths, which were all huge rocks and pits full of water. At times, it seemed like we were riding through rivers. Our legs and feet were drenched in muddy water. It was awesome, even though occasionally I felt like my ATV was going to tip over. Matt said I’d be more likely to slide off the seat, so I started worrying about that instead.

We arrived at a temple that was used as an observatory. One of the guides explained the Mayan calendar, which ends in 2012, and covered a bunch of popular end-of-the-world mythology. He also explained that the Mayans were very short, smart, and cute, just like him.

at the observatory

drawing the mayan calendar

dirty feet

my ATV

at the gravesites

The next site we visited was a series of tombs. They said that the main tomb (and the only one that had been excavated) contained a Mayan king wearing a jade mask, which was now in the national museum in Mexico City. The other gravesites were the members of his family, who were all killed when he died, in accordance with Mayan tradition.

tombs

We finished our ride around 2pm, and I was impressed we actually got to spend so much time riding the ATVs. Half of us had blisters on our hands from holding on, and we were all covered in mud. My Adidas were full of water, and made a squishing sound when I walked. Thankfully, I’d brought flipflops in my bag, so I took off my sneakers and carried them instead. They were gross. If you take this excursion and it’s rained recently, don’t wear shoes you want to keep!

happy goats

our atv photos (jumi bought them)

The shuttle took us back into Cozumel, stopping again to let the girl puke on the street. We walked back down to Cozumel Mart to buy tacky souvenirs, because it seemed to have all those bases covered. We even picked up a bottle of absinthe for $11, and a big mesh bag to carry my muddy shoes in. We were an interesting sight, all covered in dirt and wearing matching bandanas.

Once shopping was accomplished, it was time for the important stuff: Señor Frogs. We were still two yards shy of a first down.

The place was in good form despite being mostly empty. There were two women from our ship being pretend-gangbanged by the servers. Everyone was wearing balloon hats. Also, in the women’s room, there’s a drawing of a dude with a flap over his parts; when you lift the flap, an alarm goes off in the bar. I had to do that more than once because it reminded me of the Safe House.

the view from señor frogs!

DIRTY LEGS

my atv blister!

We had yards and food (only half of which we could eat), and Cindi learned dirty words from the server boys (such as ‘chupa mi pito!’). We had a Minneapolis moment when Prince’s When Doves Cry came on (and I was surprised to realize I know all the words). Once we finished eating, Matt and I made a beeline for the swinging bar stools. Could there possibly be a better idea than that?

We hung out on the swings once the tab was settled and Cindi and Jumi headed off to go shopping and return to the ship. Cindi returned a little while later, handed the bartender (Humberto) a 500-peso bill, and asked, “what kind of shot can I get with this?” He brought her Cuervo. GAG.

Matt and Wendy and I had better-quality tequila, talked to the bartender about Mexican futbol (the local teams are the Orioles de Cozumel and the Hurricanes de Cancun) , and spent far too much time messing with Wendy’s balloon hat. That’s because it was a giant green penis complete with balls and, uh, a white string hanging off the end.

We waited til the last possible moment, then headed for the ship. We could see it from where we were sitting, and were pretty much experts at arriving there late anyway. We learned that in the Bahamas. And St Thomas. And maybe Puerto Rico; I don’t exactly remember that.

sunset in cozumel

wendy’s italian friend with the awesome hair (in the balloon hat)

this picture sums up the cruise:
wendy holding a yard and penis balloon, yelling “I LOVE AMERICA!!!” in front of the coast guard ship.

my bag full of yard glasses, filthy shoes, and awesome souvenirs

Re-boarding the ship, they didn’t even bother putting my bag through the scanner, because the yard glasses would’ve spilled all over the place. To those of you who are warned repeatedly about sneaking liquor and other contraband onto cruise ships: I’ve heard they’ll confiscate it on other boats, but Costa couldn’t care less. I guess that means you should probably just take Costa cruises from now on. You’ll love it, I promise.

I washed my shoes out in the shower, and couldn’t believe how dirty they were. I stuck the showerhead inside them and let it run for a long time, but the water never came out clear. We put our shoes out on the balcony, hoping they’d dry in the sun. Matt also took a picture of me standing naked on the balcony, but that will thankfully not be posted on this here internet. Nobody saw me but him and the pilot boat! I hope.

matt’s shoes

Cindi called me with a quote from Wendy: “Write this in your little notebook! I’m dirty and drunk and I have a big green dick!” Wendy then apparently got in the shower, singing to herself and laughing the whole time. We showered and sat outside in towels, watching the sun set. Once it was dark, we had a very important life goal to achieve: gettin’ it on on the balcony of a cruise ship, overlooking the ocean. Rating: A+++ WOULD DO AGAIN.

We had meat locker time til 8:30, then got up to eat. Everything was closed but the pizza station, where we learned a little-known fact: instead of picking up whatever they have at the buffet, you can order your own pizza. They were way better than the buffet stuff, too. We had dessert out on the back deck, which is where we found Jumi. She said that Cindi and Wendy were still sleeping. We went down to the card room to play Phase 10.

The show in Casanova started at 11, and it was called “Rock ‘n Roll Couple.” It was in the style of all the previous shows, with dancing and goofy games. My favorite part was when they had the balloon game we’d seen last time as part of Sexy Games. I was sad that Wendy missed it, but she and Cindi seemed really, really dedicated to sleeping. And we couldn’t really argue with that, since we were all worn out. Though it was Sexy Night at the disco, we decided to pass and head to bed. Because of the time change, it was already 2am anyway.

friday 1.18.08 (at sea)

Posted in western caribbean cruise on January 20th, 2008 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: at sea, caribbean, cruise, dancing, ocean, toga night

Friday we got up early, even though we didn’t really have to, because it was a day at sea. We watched the documentary about how the ship runs, then sat out on the balcony reading and watching the ocean. It was kind of hard to wrap our heads around the fact that the cruise was almost over.

our cabin!

We had breakfast, then went up to see the ship 3-Day in progress. We’d intended to participate (they were walking a mile around the track), but most of us had lost our shoes in the Great Mexican Jungle Adventure of Aught-Eight.

We decided to go swimming. I’d never been in the pool on the ship! I didn’t realize it’d be salt water. Also, the thing about putting a bunch of us in a swimming pool together is that we turn into 10-year-olds. It’s kind of spectacular.

We got out of the pool after a while, and sat on the deck nearby playing hearts. I actually won for once!

We went to the cabin to change, and found our togas there waiting for us. When we left the cabin, we found Wendy there waiting to scare us. It worked.

We decided to go take a tour of the parts of the ship the rest of the group hadn’t seen before, and also go to the gift shop, since we hadn’t gotten there yet. They didn’t seem to mind that we were carrying drinks. Also, I got INFLATABLE SHIPS FOR $4. Plus my frequent-cruiser discount!

We visited the Roero Bar (otherwise known as ‘the bar where we took naps on the last cruise’), the chapel, and the arcade. Through the arcade windows, we discovered a secret deck for the crew! With a hot tub!

the arcade

crew deck!

“uh, where’d you last see it?”

armonia pool

dear cindi: who toasts with coffee??

At 3:30, Matt and I went to merengue lessons. The teacher was fantastic. He taught us a bunch of moves, one which he just called ‘sexy, sexy, sexy, sexy’. You circle your finger around your head as you turn around in a sexy, sexy, sexy, sexy way.

dance lessons on deck

We went down to the cabin to drop all our stuff off, then headed back up to find everyone else. They were nowhere to be found, but we did manage to wander into teatime. They had tiny sandwiches and everything. We hung out watching the next dance lesson (we’d have participated, but we arrived late), then went to hang out at the pool bar.

the special of the day

We went down to their cabin to see if they’d come back, and found the cabin steward, Towel, in there instead. I think we scared him. We finally located Jumi out on the back deck, then Wendy and Cindi up on deck 10. We went to go play shuffleboard, but were interrupted when we found soccer balls by the basketball court. We played 2-on-2 futbol, to the amusement of the staff, until I tripped and skinned my knee. We then switched to shuffleboard, a sport which requires no running or falling down.

After sunset (sigh), we went to our cabins to change clothes and pack. You have to have your suitcases in the hallway by 1am the night before docking in Fort Lauderdale, which means you have to put any clothes and toiletries you need in your carry-on bag and haul it around with you in the morning.

I’d brought a spare duffel bag, and was glad I had it. All my dirty laundry went in that, and the well-packed souvenirs took up much of my suitcase. Once we’d finished packing, we put on our togas. I love toga night!

best dress code ever.

Wendy, Cindi, and Jumi came to our cabin before we headed to dinner. Wendy still had her giant green penis. We left it behind for Rocque.

jumi is duly horrified.

We did the toga chant going downstairs, a la Animal House. Also, we still had a spare bottle of champagne, so we brought it up to dinner with us. Wendy was embarrassed about carrying it, so she hid it in a drink menu. Not the drink menu she eventually stole, unfortunately.

We were a little early to dinner, so we sat there hassling people who weren’t wearing togas. Some people had even brought their own togas and toga-related accessories from home. It was awesome. At least half the people at dinner were dressed up. The rest of them just didn’t get it.

We also had a very long talk with Mr. Pizza and his wife, Maxine.

Mark Boney exchanged our warm champagne for a cold bottle, and poured it for us. Dinner that night was spectacular. (Below is a picture of the best thing I’ve ever eaten. Seriously.) I also had soup that tasted like Creamsicle, bread with balsamic vinegar and olive oil, and spinach flan. I have no idea how people manage to eat all 6 courses at dinner!

bleu cheese mousse with pickled onions and raisins

After dinner, we went to the Osiris Theatre for the passenger talent show. We’d seen it last time and there were really funny moments, but overall it was way too long. We were excited to find out that there were only 5 performances, and all of them were pretty good. There was a trio of sisters singing a Miami Sound Machine song, an Quebecois guy singing ‘You are my Sunshine’ in French and English, a lady singing a Flemish song, and Ukelele hero.

A guy named Klaus got on stage and told us how he’d been on back-to-back cruises. Last time, he’d dedicated his performance to his fiancee. This time, he was dedicating it to the awesome crew. It made me sniffly. Sadly, though, nobody got sent to the lions.

We changed out of our togas, put our bags in the hallway, then went to make the rounds of all of our favorite staffpeople. Pete was nowhere to be found in his bar, so we asked another server named Arsenio. He told us Pete had jumped overboard. Then Pete appeared and told us that he was a fast swimmer. Arsenio took our picture together, and then a photo of the old Italian guys at the next table imitating our rock hands. It was hysterical.

Sadly, we couldn’t find Niner anywhere, so we headed to the disco for Bye-Bye Disco Time. SAD!

We danced to Biggie and Tupac, and of course Jersey was there requesting the Cha-Cha Slide and Soulja Boy. The place was pretty much empty by then, but that didn’t stop us from Crankin’ Dat. I can only do half of it, but I’m fine with that.

We talked to Jones for a long time, and Wendy, Cindi, and Jumi took off at various times to go sleep. We discovered that the bartenders were unable to light shots on fire, and that made me love Rodrigo and Casanova even more, for allowing Wendy to almost burn up the ship. I want to believe they have that rule now because of her.

Jones hugged us goodbye, and we went to our cabin around 1:30. Then it was time for a fashion show, but that part is none of your business.

saturday 1.19.08 (fort lauderdale to minneapolis)

Posted in western caribbean cruise on January 20th, 2008 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: caribbean, cruise, florida, fort lauderdale, ocean

Saturday morning, the alarm went off at 6:30am. That hurt a lot. We got up, showered, and packed our carry-on bags. I attempted to dry my still-wet sneakers with the blowdryer, with little success. I shoved them in the bottom of my bag with a pair of socks, because the only other footwear I had was flipflops. It was -10 degrees in Minneapolis.

We had our last breakfast (gruel and a croissant with cheese, my favorite) on the back deck. The ship was already docked in Fort Lauderdale. General disembarkation wasn’t til 8:45, so we went down to sit in the Napping Bar. We were all sprawled on chairs, trying not to doze off.

From the ship, we went to passport control. There was a long line, but the officer was just looking at photos and letting people through. We picked up our suitcases, reorganized, and then stood in line for customs. Even though I knew they never checked anything at the cruise ports, I was still nervous. I was over the limit for alcohol, didn’t have my duty-free receipt accessible, and had absinthe, which was only recently made legal in the US. The customs lady took my slip and said ‘thank you’. I was almost disappointed at not having done something really illegal.

We stood at the cab stand forever, because there was much cab-related drama. We finally got two cabs to the airport. I paged through the little advertising magazine, and found the address for Coyote Ugly downtown, plus coupons for free shots. SCORE.

We were expecting airport horror like we’d experienced last time, but it didn’t seem too bad. Cindi and Jumi had an earlier flight, so they went to check in. Matt and Wendy and I were in search of a place to store our bags; we were finally directed to the baggage service downstairs, where they’ll store it for $5 a bag. We then headed to the cab stand, because our flight wasn’t til 4:30.

On the way to the cabs, we had a thought: a cab cost about $50 round-trip to downtown. Couldn’t we rent a car for less than that? We decided to go to the rental car building to find out. Thrifty told us it’d be $50 plus tax; E-Z said it’d be $30. We were set.

We picked up Disposo, our Nissan Versa (we decided what we really needed was a disposable car that we could just set on fire when we were done with it), and were soon on our way to Fort Lauderdale. Disposo was SEXY. Also, while checking him for damage at the rental pickup, we noticed scratches on the hood. Clearly, someone had already slid across it in a getaway attempt. The rental guy didn’t think this was half as funny as I did.

We found Coyote Ugly pretty quickly, but then realized it didn’t open til noon. We set off in search of food. There were a ton of restaurants in the area, but none of them were open. Some didn’t even start serving til 5pm. We were getting desperate! Finally, we happened upon the Las Olas Riverfront, and there was a sign for the Metro Cafe, advertising brunch. We rushed there and got a table. They weren’t actually serving brunch, but we didn’t care.

I think I drank an entire gallon of Diet Coke. Costa doesn’t really have pop, except as a mixer. Also, we had pizzas, even though we’d just gotten off an Italian ship.

After lunch, we walked along the riverfront to see the water taxis and all the people waiting in line for boring cruises. Then we headed back toward Coyote Ugly, because it had just opened. There was only one other dude in there, already sitting at the bar.

I tried to order a mojito, not really knowing the deal with Coyote Ugly. The bartender said, “No, that’s gay.” Wendy ordered a vodka sour, and he wouldn’t give that to her, either. Apparently a vodka-cranberry is less gay, because he allowed her to have that. I got a Jack and diet. He gave us and the female bartender shit constantly. We loved him a lot.

We redeemed our taxi-cab shot coupons (we had no choice, he just poured us Sammy Hagar’s tequila), and he gave me one even though I told him I had to drive us back to the airport. When Wendy and Matt ordered another round, it became apparent that their drink pricing was totally random. We talked to the girl bartender for a long time, then asked her if they had souvenirs. She unlocked the other side of the bar, and we came away with a lot of stuff, including an awesome sticker for Cindi (whose idea it originally was to go there), and underpants that read MONEY MAKER on the ass. I was a fan.

We left there somewhat sadly, and hopped in Disposo to take the long route back to the airport, via the A1A. Have I mentioned that Wendy loves Vanilla Ice? She had to see it. And, surprisingly, it made me actually want to spend time in Fort Lauderdale. The beaches were nothing like in the Caribbean, but they were still pretty awesome.

We arrived back at E-Z Rental Car, blasting Big Pimpin’ by Jay-Z. We did not light Disposo on fire, but we should have. We picked up our bags, checked in (there was NO line at check-in; last time we were there, we stood there for 3 hours), rushed through security, and found Cindi and Jumi still sitting at the gate, looking very frustrated. We’d had lunch, seen the beach, and hung out at a bar, while they’d been sitting at the airport all morning, waiting for a tiny plane.

We sat on the floor playing Phase 10 and laughing uncontrollably, much to the consternation of the women sitting nearby. To deal with the issue of the -10 degree temperatures in Minneapolis, and the fact that I had flipflops and Wendy was wearing shorts, we brainstormed solutions.

WILL SMILE FOR PANTS

Besides pants-panhandling, we devised the pants exchange program. Say you’re flying to Florida from Minnesota in January, just as we did. The second you get to Florida, all you want to do is remove your pants and change to shorts. (I solved this problem by carrying flipflops and wearing convertible capris, but not everyone is so innovative.) On the other hand, if you’re returning to Minnesota from Florida, you hardly want to wear pants to the airport when it’s still 85 degrees, and yet you’re going to freeze your ass off when you land.

Solution: the PANTS EXCHANGE BOOTH. Leave your pants when you get there, and someone else can wear them home. This, we believe, is a fantastic business opportunity.

We’d found out at check-in that our flight was overbooked, and they were asking people to volunteer to be bumped to the next day. Had we found this out as soon as we’d gotten there that morning, we’d probably have taken the offer. As it was, we’d already rented and returned a car, and we were tired and wanted to go home. But we’d still probably have done it for a price, so we drafted a list of demands in case they should ask us again:

I think the best part of that list is that they’re all inside jokes we’d come up with over the past week (some of them that morning), and that nobody else in the world would understand. I’d write out the explanations so I’d remember, but you’d just think we were nuts.

They boarded the flight early, and we all passed out shortly after takeoff. This was remarkable, because I never sleep on planes. I kept waking up because of the turbulence and the fact that the captain wouldn’t shut up. We must’ve slept for at least an hour, though, because we got to Memphis really quickly. I started to notice, too, that every time I opened my bag, it smelled really bad. As in, jungle shoes bad.

We had about an hour and a half layover in Memphis, and our priorities were 1) pants and shoes, and 2) dinner. Wendy and I checked all the stores, and nobody had either of the former, though we did find pajama bottoms with flowers that she refused to buy. We checked all the restaurants, and I’d forgotten that the south doesn’t really know the word ‘vegetarian’. We finally settled on the fast food counter, and I had pizza. Again. I didn’t care. Also, my bag had begun smelling so bad from the shoes that I had to have people stand back when I opened it, and I’d hold my breath. There was no way I was going to be able to put those shoes on for the flight.

I called my mom from the gate, and told her of our shoes-and-pants predicament. When we landed in Minneapolis, she met us at the baggage claim with slip-on shoes for me, and pajama bottoms and a comforter for Wendy. Claudia rules.

And it was indeed -10 in Minneapolis that night. Ouch.

sunday 3.25.2007 (minneapolis to ft lauderdale, bon voyage)

Posted in eastern caribbean cruise on April 1st, 2007 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: caribbean, cruise, dancing, florida, fort lauderdale, ocean

[To see the entire Flickr photoset from this trip, go here!]

Sunday morning at 3:00am (which was still technically Saturday night), I dragged myself out of bed, tearfully said goodbye to my boyfriend (the trip had been booked long before we were dating, or I wouldn’t have subjected myself to an entire week without him), and drove to my mom’s house to catch a ride to the airport. Wendy, Stephanie, and I piled our gigantic suitcases into the sexy red Neon, and we headed to the airport.

I don’t remember much of the flight, except that Wendy and I probably giggled like retards, and our flight attendants were named Ginger and Mike. I only know this because it’s the first entry in my travel journal. In Philadelphia (the flight wasn’t exactly direct), the pilot told us we were 17th in line to take off. I’m pretty sure Crashy Airlines (i.e. AirTran) doesn’t often get precedence on the runway.

wendy examining the map of st thomas

We arrived uneventfully and only a tiny bit late. Outside the airport, we got ourselves a cab and rode to Port Everglades; it’s about a 10-minute ride, and cost $15. It’s kind of ridiculous that the shuttles charge $20+ a person.

Porters at the entrance to the dock took our bags, and we headed into the embarkation area. There was a long line, but it moved fast, plus everybody was just really damn excited to be going on a cruise. We gave them our tickets, registered our credit cards, and headed toward the ship. They took a really gay picture of us holding a lifesaver, gave us handwipes for our own personal cleanliness, and suddenly we were on the ship.

We stood in the lobby, not really knowing where to go. It’s so huge and ornate that’s confusing. We asked a crew member, and were pointed in the direction of our cabin, where Wendy’s birthday surprise awaited us:

birthday cake for wendy, a card from the captain, and champagne.

The champagne didn’t last long, and the fact that there were only two glasses wasn’t really a problem for us. We scrambled around the cabin, investigating every very exciting thing we could find (the tiny bathroom, the minibar, the cruise itinerary, the note from our cabin steward, who was quickly renamed Il Duce for reasons that are still unclear). The minibar was locked, so putting in a request to have it unlocked was our first order of business.

They had put us at the regular instead of the late dinner, so we set off to find the maitre d’s station, as noted on the map. They switched our mealtime, and we set off to wander around the ship until it was time for the muster drill.

docked at ft lauderdale

Promptly at 4:30pm, we put on our very sexy lifejackets and headed to our muster station. They lined us up three deep, and we tried really hard to restrain our laughter. The ship started moving, and just then, a little boat sped past us on the way out of the harbor. The girls screamed and flashed their tits. We hooted. The others around us were not as excited.

muster drill

lobby bar

We went up to one of the top decks to check out the view leaving Florida, and of course attend to the important business of getting us some cocktails. The bartender made me a mojito with Equal instead of sugar, and I’m pretty sure the guys behind the bar were the nicest people we’d ever met.

leaving ft lauderdale, with mojito

We sat out on the back deck watching the land receding, then found a table where it was less windy. The bartender came and asked if we wanted another round, remembering both my name and my drink. We were instantly in love with the cruise.

We went to our cabin to unpack before dinner, then went to explore the ship some more. At that point, it seemed incomprehensible that we’d ever learn how to get around it all. There are still a few places I’m pretty sure we didn’t manage to see over the course of the week. We did a great job of finding awesome hangouts, though.

Dinner was at 8:30, and there were people lined up outside the doors of the two-level restaurant when we got there. We had an 8-person table, so we were seated with a family from Chicago. They had two really cute little girls, who were both dozing off on the table by the end of the meal.

They brought us another bottle of champagne at dinner, to celebrate Wendy’s birthday. We shared it with our tablemates. Then the food started arriving, and holy crap. It seemed natural to pick out one item for every course on the menu, but it was SO MUCH FOOD. There was even a sugar-free dessert.

We wandered around after dinner, looking for a bar with no smoking. There were a bunch of old people tangoing in the piano bar, and we stopped there for a drink. It was a pretty boring bar, and we made a point of dissing it every time we walked through for the rest of the cruise. Hey, the piano guy was not awesome at all. It happens.

We went into the club, which had just opened to the public for the night; it had been singles’ night before that, and now it was time for DANCETERIA 3000 (I just made that up). We had awesome shots called the Woo-Woo, and then Wendy and I headed downstairs to the light-up dance floor. There was a huge projection on one wall that was just film of people on the ship and excursions. So funny. There was hardly anyone there at all, and we slowly realized that most of the people dancing were actually crew members. They’re there to get people involved!

Stephanie didn’t want to dance, so we headed down to a lounge at the other end of the ship (one for which we were predestined, but we didn’t know that yet). The old white-haired doctor was sitting near the bar, drinking, surrounded by ladies. It was awesome.

monday 3.26.2007 (at sea)

Posted in eastern caribbean cruise on April 1st, 2007 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: at sea, caribbean, casino, cruise, ocean

We didn’t sleep very well the first night because of the rocking of the boat, so we awoke fairly early and went up to breakfast at the buffet. I was thrilled because it was definitely European-style: fruit, croissants, and cheese. Also, gruel. I still daydream about it sometimes.

Sigh. Gruel.

We went down to one of the lounges to try out Super Quiz. We’re generally pretty good at trivia, but it was definitely geared towards old people; there are only so many Rat Pack questions younger people can answer. Team Awesome did alright, though.

After trivia, we decided to go lay out in the sun on deck chairs. I dozed off while reading. After an hour or so, Stephanie and Wendy were starting to turn colors. We went in to have lunch at the buffet, and were far too excited about the many, many dining options, including sugar-free dessert. We went back to our freezing cabin (we set it that way intentionally), stuffed, and Stephanie declared that she felt like a roofied cube steak. Our room instantly became the meat locker, and naptime was henceforth ‘meat locker time’. We made sure to have some every day, and this always involved turning on the TV to the boat channel that showed where we were in the Caribbean, and had Italian opera playing in the background.

I don’t really recall when this part happened, but we were apparently drunk in the afternoon that day. I have a photo of me giving Wendy the finger while she’s sitting with the minibar door open. Given the time we spent on the cruise, however, us being drunk was not a surprise. It was more shocking to be totally sober after noon.

We went to go play canasta in the card room, an activity that would also become a daily ritual. We’d sit in the same area, order drinks from the same waiters (who we got to know pretty well), watch our favorite bartenders, eat boatsnacks (the spicy peanuts were the best), put our feet up on the fancy chairs, and play cards. It was awesome. This particular time, there was a group of old people playing, too, and they were thrilled that we knew how to play canasta.

mojito!

Later in the afternoon, we went to the casino and played video poker for a while. Stephanie won, and bought us another round of drinks. (My travel journal at this point says “quadriplegic”. I’m not sure what that’s about, and that’s probably for the best!) We went to go tour more of the ship, and found the library, where the computers were. I sat down and emailed Matt to let him know we were alive, and find out how the Gophers were doing in the NCAA tournament. Let’s just say I was glad I wasn’t home to see it.

We went back to the cabin to get Wendy’s special water (Patron in a plastic bottle). Wendy and Stephanie examined their sunburns. Around dinnertime, we went back to the buffet; the main restaurant is nice, but it’s so much food, and takes a couple hours for dinner. We only ate there twice during the cruise. We had various items, including pizza, and ate out on the back deck under the canopy. It had rained during the evening, so the deck was wet. Also, the darkness on the ocean is kind of amazing. You can’t see anything else around you, just the lights of your own ship.

After dinner, we returned to our new favorite bar. The bartenders were Rodrigo and Casanova (he had a real name, but it was Bar Casanova, and that suited him better). Wendy had a major crush, because they were awesome. We sat and watched the goofy show going on behind us, and then suddenly the bar was full of people exiting the show in the theatre. The cruise entertainment staff was dressed up in Elvis-era clothing. One of the dudes let me feel his rubber Elvis hair.

Deborah, our ‘English-speaking hostess’ from Australia, was all over the place. We loved her, her awesome accent, and the fact that she told us that the cruise ship can afford to lose 10% of its passengers in ports (if, for example, they’re late back to the boat). She did a round of shots with us, and taught us a new toast that would change our lives forever:

UP THE BUM, NO BABIES!!

She left us with, “see you at the disco!” and headed off to harangue the doctor, who was again at the end of the bar.

wendy and, uh… never mind.

We went back to the cabin, fully intending to go to the 50s dance party at the club. But when we got there, I found couch cushions stashed under the bed, so of course we had to do the obvious: play American Gladiators. This also became a daily tradition. Wendy laid down on her bed, so I beat on her with cushions. We never made it to the dance party.

tuesday 3.27.2007 (puerto rico)

Posted in eastern caribbean cruise on April 1st, 2007 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: caribbean, cruise, ocean, puerto rico, san juan, señor frogs

We got up at 10 and had breakfast at our usual table, which was against the window so we could see the ocean. There were birds diving into the water, fishing, so we stood and watched them for a long time.

We sat out on the deck reading in the sun until it started to rain, then went to play canasta in the card room. There was a big group of old people from Long Island in there, arguing loudly. Since it was close enough to noon, we decided to have some drinks. Wendy set out on a mission to consume everything on the cocktail menu. It was substantial, so we all pitched in.

As we were eating lunch, we started to see land. We went up to the top deck to watch the approach to Puerto Rico, and then ran to our cabin to grab our things and line up for our first stop in San Juan. It was very exciting, and we were prepared.

san juan, puerto rico

We got off the boat around 4:30, after standing in line for almost half an hour. They were handing out ponchos as we left, even though it had stopped raining. In the customs building (where we expected to have to show our passports or something, but no), we were handed free samples of Bacardi, and a million flyers for local services.

We got our bearings and set off up the hill to San Cristobal. We couldn’t actually go into the fort, because there was a long line of army trucks exiting, but we walked around the back of it to overlook the ocean. It was gorgeous. I took approximately 10,000 photos.

san cristobal

We walked along Boulevard Del Valle toward El Morro, following my map. I loved the colors of the buildings, and the overlook from the city wall.

off boulevard del valle

mercado street

We got to El Morro just as San Felipe castle was closing, but that was fine; we wanted to cover as much ground as possible before it got dark. We took seats on some rocks near the castle and watched the sun set over the ocean.

Grateful for the fact that domestic rates still applied in Puerto Rico, I called Matt. I missed him a lot. Also, I give props to Wendy and Stephanie, who had to hear about how much I missed him at least a million times over the course of that week. They were very nice about it.

We headed back toward old San Juan, stopping to see the city gate and the cathedral. There were wild cats wandering everywhere.

plazuela de rogativa

the moon and san juan cathedral

Once it got dark, we decided to find dinner. There were a couple recommendations in our guide, so we walked to both of them and found them closed. We wandered all over the place looking, and were kind of dying of hunger. Before stopping, we ran into a liquor store and I picked up a couple bottles of rum to bring home.

We decided on a place called Lupi’s, which had Mexican food and a sports-bar atmosphere. We had amazing margaritas and tostones (on the menu as ‘plantain nachos’). For dinner, I had enchiladas, and I asked the bartender what the best rum in Puerto Rico was. He said it was Don Q, and made me the best Cuba Libre ever. After eating, we scooted down the bar to play Naked Ladies (you may know this as ‘Erotic Photo Hunt’ on Megatouch machines). We couldn’t have been more excited to find it in a bar in the Caribbean, and the dudes sitting along the wall behind us were quite amused.

After dinner, we headed to the destination toward which we’re inexplicably drawn: Señor Frog’s. Wendy had never been there, after all.

They had a slightly different drink policy than other Señor Frog’s: instead of having a pre-set selection of drinks in yard glasses, you could get anything you wanted. Premium liquors ran $17.50 a yard. It was like Christmas!! We took full advantage; I had a Cuba Libre with Diet Coke, Stephanie had a Long Island, and Wendy had a scary-looking fruity thing. We had Frog Legs shots, then something blue. Behind the bar, they were having contests for free shots. It was typical Señor Frog’s, which is to say: awesome.

Debating whether to order another round, Wendy announced, “hey, we’re not driving! Captain Giuseppe is!” We ordered, then asked our server if it was ok to bring drinks outside in San Juan. She told us sure, that anything goes! I told her I loved her. On the way out, though, the doorman told us no, we had to drink them inside. We sat near the entrance finishing our yards as the DJ played Sexyback. We loved Puerto Rico a lot.

no black men in the water.

We headed back toward the ship, stopping at a mailbox to drop off postcards. I may have been somewhat drunk, as I kept asking Wendy if we’d mailed our postcards yet, even though we’d just done so. When we got near the dock, Stephanie said, “what’s that thing floating in the water?” I yelled, “THERE’S A BLACK MAN IN THE WATER???” I may never live that down.

We boarded the ship, and had to show our passports to the security guards. I was nervous because I had bottles of liquor in my bag, and they’re supposed to take them and keep them for us until we returned to the US. They didn’t say a thing while xraying our bags, though, and they were amused by our collection of yard glasses. We staggered to our cabin, and didn’t even hear the boat’s giant whistle leaving port.

wednesday 3.28.2007 (st thomas)

Posted in eastern caribbean cruise on April 1st, 2007 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: caribbean, cruise, ocean, snorkeling, st thomas

We were up at 6am to prepare for our excursion in St. Thomas, but the ship wasn’t there yet. We got dressed, washed out our many yards in the shower, and put them in the closet. We had breakfast as we were arriving in port.

As instructed, we went down to the Osiris Theatre to gather for our excursion. They gave us numbered stickers, and we sat waiting for our group to be called so we could all leave together. We got off the ship and walked a short way to a waiting catamaran called the Dancing Dolphin. The captain introduced himself and his two assistants, and we were off.

We sat on the deck with our feet dangling over the water for our hour-long trip to the island where we’d be snorkeling. It was unbelievable. The skies had been overcast, but the sun came out right as we neared our destination. The girls on the boat were handing out snorkeling gear, and the captain announced that it was their intention that this excursion would be the most fun we’d have on our entire cruise. We were somewhat doubtful about that, primarily due to how early it was in the morning, and the fact that we weren’t swimming yet.

They gave us some basic instruction, taught us the sign for SOS, and then it was time to go. We had the option of jumping off the side of the boat or going down the steps into the water. We chose the steps.

One of the girls led us around the inlet, showing us where to find sea turtles, pointing out features of the reef, and feeding the fish so they’d swim around us. She told us that if we put our heads underwater, we’d be able to hear the sound of parrotfish biting pieces off the coral. They sounded exactly like Rice Krispies popping.

Wendy and I had both purchased cheap underwater camera cases that were little more than a thick ziplock bag with a plexiglas lens cover. Terrified of destroying my camera, I’d tested mine multiple times in the sink to make sure it didn’t leak. Though it was a little difficult to work the camera controls, it was one of the smartest purchases I’d made for the cruise. I’m so glad I had it for swimming with sea turtles.

the dancing dolphin

When it was time to head back, we got on the boat and were promptly handed glasses of rum punch. The second our glasses were half-empty, they’d hand us another glass of rum punch. Suddenly, we understood what they meant about this being the best time we’d have the whole cruise.

pouring some out for our absent homies

The girls working on the boat were awesome. They came around, applying temporary tattoos, and making sure our drinks were constantly full. We met some dudes who were passing out beer they’d found at the bar. One of them had a temporary tattoo on his forehead.

We quickly learned that they were Brad and Jamie, brothers-in-law from Tampa Bay. They were with their families, including a bunch of kids and grandpa. We loved them. By the time we got off the boat, we’d been invited back to their room for a party. Wendy and I had to split up the numbers of the cabin so we’d remember it: I took 72, and she took 92. We were drunk and sunburnt and it was only 10am. It was the best day ever.

We went back to our cabin to change quickly, then headed out again. We walked to the Skyride, for which we had pre-purchased tickets on the ship. We rode up to Paradise Point, taking pictures the whole way.

our ship, with charlotte amalie across the bay

There was shopping and a bar up at the top. I called Matt again while watching a lady wrangling a bunch of parrots and cockatoos. They kept yelling ‘hello!’ at me whenever I walked past. I’m not sure if he understood a lot of what I was saying, because it’d been a very long morning already. We bought souvenirs and sat in the shade at the overlook, because the sunburn was getting critical. We were all feeling kind of ill from the heat.

Once we started to feel better, we set off on a very important mission: our friends Bill and Katie had been there just a week earlier, and they’d left us a note under a rock at the top of the hill. We had specific directions from Bill on how to find it.

It was unbelievably hot and humid, and we were already dehydrated from the rum punch. As we climbed the nature trails and up above the gazebo, we were pretty sure we were going to die. Wendy and I split my entire bottle of water in just a few minutes. But we found the note, and left another one in case someone else should happen by. It read, “Hello, strangers! This is what happens when awesome worlds collide.” We included an email address.

We climbed back down to the shops and headed to the bar.

Why? Because we needed some limin’, a Bushwacker, and a Blowjob in Paradise, of course. They came with ugly souvenir glasses and everything!

On our way back down the skyride, we rode with a lady who was on our 44th cruise. She was a wedding planner from Boston, and showed us the bon voyage necklace she’d gotten for her first cruise at 21 years old. Holy crap. It would have been pretty awesome, but she also seemed kind of nuts.

We rushed back to the dock and got there right at cutoff time, but there were still several people arriving. We went to our cabin for the best meat locker time ever: TV turned to the boat-map channel, Italian opera playing quietly in the background (we liked to believe it was the captain singing as he steered the ship), us napping in our freezing-cold room. I have to confess, I do still crave meat locker time occasionally. As usual, we were asleep by the time the ship left port, and we didn’t feel it moving.

We awoke at 6:30pm and went up to the buffet for dinner. Wendy and I were both sick from sunburn (and possibly rum punch), so we had to force ourselves to eat and drink water. We went down to the card room and played canasta for a while, saw Rodrigo and Casanova, and were done by 10:30. We were exhausted. We showered off the smell of sea turtles and went to bed.