Vacation rundown

Ok, now that I have a little time, I'll give you all the highlights and lowlights of the trip (you've already heard a few). As I mentioned before, our Eastern Caribbean cruise turned into a Western because of Hurricane Rita. Instead of enjoying 2 days at sea before heading to St. Maarten, we docked at Castaway Cay on Sunday morning. Brian and Noah had a fishing excursion and Emily had a teen excursion involving biking, snorkeling, and kayaking. I didn't do much of anything; I guess that was to prepare me for the rest of the week. That night, none of the kids ate dinner with us; the 3 younger were in the clubs and Emily ate with a new friend and her family. We were able to sit with a pair of sisters whom I had met online before the cruise and had a great time, never lacking for conversation. They turned out to be good companions for the rest of the cruise as well.

Monday was our sea day. Not a lot to say about it, except that was the first night we had our new servers due to switching to late seating from early. Things did not go well, and we asked to have new ones for our next dinner. Of course, that dinner was the one after I broke my foot, and I already posted about how great our server was that night. He never disappointed us for the rest of the trip. Also on Monday, because of our dinner troubles, we missed the comedy show that night (our meal took much longer than it should have), but bumped into our dinner friends from Sunday night and wound up going back to our suite to play cards (SkipBo, for those who are into details). We ordered up sodas and cookies and had a great time with Jenny and Melissa (the sisters).

Our Cozumel excursion was canceled because of rough seas and wind, so the main attraction of the day was shopping. Big deal. Brian wheeled me around Cozumel, boys in tow (Halle in the club, her favorite place to be). I just don't get into shopping, especially with every shop having someone out in front trying to lure us in.

Thursday was Brian and Emily's horseback riding excursion in Costa Maya. Despite coating himself with OFF, Brian still managed to get eaten alive by insects. He came back with one eye swollen and had to take Benadryl and use an icepack to get the swelling down.

That night's entertainment was Gary DeLena; he did a family show early on, plus one for the adults later that night. Both were fun. Gary was on our first cruise as well; he did some of his old stuff, but had plenty of new to keep us laughing. He even picked on my husband, because we were sitting in the front row along with Jenny and Melissa. (Note to guys: don't sit with 3 women in the front row of a comedy show if you don't want to wind up as material for the act.) Gary was also part of the Farewell Show on Friday night. The Farewell Show was great... I was actually in tears; I didn't want our cruise to end. More tears that night at dinner when the servers did their parade of nations singing "It's a Small World." Heck, I'm getting verklempt just remembering it.

Despite the mishaps, it was a good time overall. Aleks, our server from Croatia, worked tirelessly to make our dinners enjoyable. Sonja and Erika, the concierge team, were also wonderful. Every day, there was some kind of treat in the room (food, arcade cards for the kids, hidden Mickey scavenger hunt). And our suite was unbelievable. I cannot imagine not getting it again. Hopefully we will be back onboard in 2007.

I'll try to post pictures soon.