Okay I've put off blogging long enough but I've finally found some time to commit to it. I have sooo much to write about that I just kept not doing it. So we'll have several different blogs to go through starting with the beginning of the Cruise.
Devin and I left on Thursday night and drove over to Utah and stayed at my mom's. Emry was Grandma Anderson since the following Monday because I was cleaning construction again. So I was already missing him and having an awesome time not breastfeeding anymore.
Friday morning we got a ride from Nini(Devin's sister in law) over to the train station and we road the front runner into Salt Lake. Then we jumped on a bus and went to the Airport. We flew to Pheonix(which we barely got to in time) then to Fort Lauderdale. We arrived at 10pm and couldn't go to the Cruise Terminal until 1pm the next day. So what does every sane person do in this situation? They get a hotel room. What does Devin and Rachel do in this situation? They sleep at the airport. If we can bestow one moral from this story is NEVER sleep at an airport! Well we spent the night trying to find a cheap hotel(nothing under $190) so then we decided to rent a car and sleep in it because if would be way less loud and stinky than the airport we were at. So we went to the Rental car building and found a COUCH!!! So Devin sprawled out and passed out and I sat in a chair and killed my body. Then a few hours later I got up and walked around and found more couches! and WAY more comfortable and darker area. So we migrated to them and took turns sleeping. Then we got up in the morning and changed our clothes and brushed our teeth and started on our adventure!
Devin wanted to walk the 4 miles to the cruise terminal versus paying $15 for a taxi. We went outside to catch the bus back to the airport terminal so we could catch a taxi cuz heck no I wasn't walking around in gangster florida dragging suitcases. So as we were standing outside we say a bus that said it was going to the Cruise Terminal. Turns out you had to rent a car in order to use the shuttle service. Well that sucked cuz it would have been 20 bucks to rent a car to sleep in and we were going to waste 15 on a taxi. Shucks well we went over to the airport to see if we could call more hotels for the night we came back from the cruise because we didn't want to sit in the airport again. Well we ended up reserving a car at Hertz because they were the cheapest AND would let us utilize the shuttle before and after the Cruise. So YAY! we got on the bus and headed to the ship. We breezed to the loading process and got yelled at several times because Devin still does not have a passport. We were on the ship!!! My last cruise we weren't able to go to our room right away but this one we were able to go to it at 1pm. We got on the ship at 11 so we went and ate at the buffet then fell asleep by the pool. It felt nice to sleep! Then we went to our room and fell asleep til 7 and realized we had already left:( I was sad we didn't get to see us leave but hey we were on our way!
We got upgraded to a Balcony Suite but the balcony was so dirty we couldn't really see anything unless we stood the whole time to see over the railing. They cleaned in the next to last day. The shower was also full of mold so that was kind of nasty. Sad to say we also never saw and animals made of towels in our room or chocolates on our pillows.
We spent a lot of our time walking around the ship, eating and playing games like foosball, ping pong, shuffleboard. Devin also forced me to do Kereokee one night, we were horrible!
Each night they had a sit down dinner you could go to and eat with people. We were at a table with people around our age and not married. My passport has my maiden name on it so the ship thought we weren't married.
The reasons to go on a cruise is usually to have everything provided for you. Food, Entertainment and travel. The food SUCKED! It was rarely warm and tasted weeks old. We called and asked if Devin could get steak everyday and ice cream 24 hours and we were lied to. When he could find ice-cream the machines were broken and came out like soup. Devin had steak once. I lived on Burgers and rolls because those were the closest to American food we could find. Oh did I forget to mention our cruise was an Armenian American Heritage Cruise? Stuck on a boat with 1200 Armenians who don't shower or put deodarant on. So everything was geared towards them from the food to the entertainment. Everytime we went to a show or anything we had to sit through 12 languages before we heard english. Good thing nothing bad happened it would take a half hour before we found out we were sinking or something.
So we didn't enjoy the actual Ship or the Staff(they were rude, horrible, insufferable, and SUCKED at their jobs that we were REQUIRED to tip them for). But we enjoyed a week of relaxing, sleeping, doing nothing, watching tv and just being Devin and Rachel again.
We enjoyed the ports that we visited. First stop was US Virgin Islands, St Thomas. We went on a ultimate tour because it involved a castle. We spent 2 hours at the beach which is way too long for us and then made our way to the castle. We found a 20 foot tower. That was their castle! Ugh and we wasted a 100 bucks on that. But the sights were beautiful and we enjoyed walking around and seeing the island.
The second port was San Juan Puerto Rico. We went zip lining in the Rainforest. This was a ton of Fun! I forgot to mention that we became friends with one of the couples at our table and they joined us for this excursion. It made it even more fun because Chad is afraid of heights. He helped himself get over the fear by making Tarzan sounds as he flew through the jungle. It was hilarious.
