Our Cruise

Matt and I went on our very first cruise the week before Halloween. This is the first vacation we have taken since our honeymoon, so it was long overdue. It was a good cruise, but it got off to a bumpy start. First, we had to wait three hours in line at the port because the boat was having "propulsion problems" and they wouldn't let anyone aboard until it was fixed. Well, they didn't get it fixed until about midnight that night, so we spent our first night aboard the ship just partying in the Miami harbor. Originally we were supposed to go to Jamaica and Grand Cayman Islands. But because of the delay getting started, we ended up going to Key West and Jamaica. There were a lot of people from Florida who were really upset about going to Key West because most of them had already been there.

This is us in Key West:








There was this funny little toy shop in Key West that we ran across while shopping. As you can tell from the following, even we are kids at heart:





After that we got chocolate dipped Key Lime pie...Mmm.


Then we went to Jamaica, which we were both so excited about. In preparation our landing, I practiced my Jamaican accent all morning. For example, "Stop de boat mon, we goin to Jamaica, Mon." Suprisingly enough, all of the cliches about Jamaicans are true. They all say "Mon," "No worries, Mon," and "Yeah, Mon." In their local tongue, Pattwa, Jamaicans abbrviate all words and sound like they are speaking gibberish. But they all worked really hard to speak slowly and annunciate for us Americans. Immediately, as soon as we walked off of the boat and onto the dock, we spotted the Cool Runnings boat. "Cool Runnings," the movie, is said to have put Jamaica on the map for tourists, so the locals embraced the stardom and made the Jamaican bobsled ride for any tourists who feel daring enough to take a 3,000 ft. ride in a bobsled through the Jamaican rainforest.



After that we took a death-defying ride on a shuttle bus through the local traffic and toured a 17th century plantation. The plantation is still in operation today and is owned by an English family who periodically visits. In Jamaica there is no free public education, and because most families live in poverty, most children struggle to finish high school but hardly any ever go to college. Because of this the plantation's owner opened the only free public school on the island, which is still in use today.

The plantation exports many things: molasses, coffee, various fruits, and spices. While there I got to try to climb a coconut tree. As you can tell I was minimally successful.

Then a little leather-faced Jamaican shimmied up the tree like a monkey. Just put me to shame.





This is the great house, where you can get the only breeze on the island. This is the view of the island from the back porch of the house.




This is me carrying the mahoghany bowl that native women used to fill with fish and then carry five miles up the mountain to give the lady of the house first pick of the day's catch. If you are wondering if it us heavy, notice I am not smiling.


Overall it was a great cruise. More than anything, we just wanted to spend a little time relaxing. We may have been the only ones on the boat who didn't come off with a sunburn, but we were not the only ones who had fun.