Bahamas Cruise!

I'm finally going to post our vacation! We went on a cruise to the Bahamas last week. My mom came down from Toronto to visit before we left, then stayed to watch the house and rabbits. It was a nice relaxing week for her. It was nice to see my mom again!Sunday we left to drive down to Florida. The cruise left from Cape Canaveral, which was a 9 1/2 hour drive from home. Sunday was the windiest day we've ever experienced! The car was being pushed all over the road. We didn't want to do the whole trip in one day so we stayed overnight in Savannah, GA to tour around a bit. We went to Tybee Island, which is right on the coast, and saw the Tybee Island lighthouse, the ocean, then went to the Marine Science Center. The historic "River Street" in Savannah was very quaint, with lots of shops and cobblestone roads.

We arrived at Port Canaveral Monday afternoon, checked in and went directly onto the boat. It was huge! We waved goodbye to no one in particular as we set sail and had a blast at the bon voyage party. First thing we noticed, food food food everywhere!Of course, we had to do the Titanic thing. It was a given.Monday evening was spent hanging out on top of the ship, exploring, and well, eating of course!
Tuesday the ship arrived at our first port: Coco Cay island, Bahamas. This picture is of our boat from the tender that took us to the island.
Coco Cay was awesome! White sandy beach, blue water, and an excellent lunch buffet right on the sand. I ate more than I think I ever have at one sitting, no joke. We went to the "straw market" which were little shops on the island, where natives were asking "braid your hair, pretty lady?" all over the place!


We went snorkeling at Coco Cay. It was awesome! I've never snorkeled before, and it takes some getting used to! Your brain says "you can't breath under water," so when I stuck my face in the water I would stop breathing. Had to learn that I CAN breathe, through that tube sticking in my mouth!
Tuesday evening was formal night at dinner so we dressed up fancy. When we arrived back at the stateroom after dinner, we found a cute towel animal waiting for us! That was one of my favorite things about the trip. The crew did a demonstration one evening and we had to attend, so now I am master of creating towel animals! We also attending a Chocolate buffet at midnight, where there were ice sculptures, veggie/fruit sculptures and all the chocolate you can imagine! Yum.
Wednesday the boat arrived at our second port, Nassau, Bahamas. We liked Coco Cay better, Nassau is nothing but shops, at least within walking distance. The one cool thing about Nassau is Atlantis, which is a hotel/casino/aquarium/waterpark on Paradise Island, across the way. This picture of us is in front of Atlantis, the pink building in the background. We toured around the shops a bit, then took a "water taxi" to Atlantis to see the aquarium and waste one whole dollar in the casino. That was fun!



That evening we found another towel animal. What a cute monkey!Thursday was a day at sea, so we relaxed, ate, Cory climbed the rock wall, ate, went to see some demonstrations, ate, and then in the evening we felt sea-sick for the first time really. The boat was really rocky, and we couldn't get out of bed we felt so bad!

Friday we sadly left the cruise and started back home. Our intention was to go to the Kennedy Space Center, but when we arrived, we discovered they wanted our first born for admission, so we took a pic of some snazzy rockets and left. Since we had time to kill, we found another lighthouse on the way back, the Ponce Inlet Lighthouse, right next to Daytona beach. We stopped and had a blast climbing to the top. It was a little steeper than I thought it would be! We had planned to stay overnight in Georgia and finish the last leg of the trip the next day, because we wanted to go to the Okefenokee swamp. We booked a hotel already and had friends we knew from BYU (who live in Florida now) come up to meet us. Lo and behold, after checking in we find out the swamp was closed! They had many fires in the area and the wind that week (which was significant by the way) was spreading the fire around. So we couldn't see the alligators, but at least we saw our friends for the first time in a while!So all in all our trip was excellent! We recommend cruising to everyone who wants a cheapo vacation. Until next time!