IslandBoundMama

It's almost time!!!! Wishing you a great trip!

This is so exciting!!! The sky isn't looking too friendly, but who cares...it's vacation time!!!

I'm in my dry dock phase after having our vacation last month. We don't know what our plans are yet for next year and it's oh so depressing. Take heart in knowing your blog is keeping me alive! lol

Enjoy, enjoy, enjoy!!!! Can't wait for your updates!

I know you are over the moon excited and counting down!! We just had a 3 year dry dock and thought that was bad....you beat us with the 8 years. Enjoy every minute and can't wait to hear all about it!

Loving your review! That cathedral is breathtaking!!! I'm always fascinated by old structures and architectural detail....I could take pictures all day! I'm also a huge GOT fan!!! Tracking those places down would have me side tracked all day. Following along.....

Just an update to say my first day back at work was torture and I'm already in cruise withdraw. That is all.

Took a night time stroll on the boardwalk area and met a lost crab...live bands playing here and there.

You have got to go...this place is soooo nice! Every little detail of the hotel was thought out so nicely. I knew the minute we booked for one night we would regret it.

This resort is BEAUTIFUL!!!! I’m making some sand art to take home too. I love it!

Getting off the ship was a breeze this morning until we got outside to the rideshare area. The porter took us to the wrong place and when our ride came, the cop threatened to give him a ticket if he stopped. We were routed to the right area and ended up canceling our first Uber because he never came back for us. We got a new driver after what seemed like forever and we are now enjoying our stay at Margaritaville in Hollywood. The fish is in the water already.

We said our goodbyes to our waiters and enjoyed one last night time stroll through Central Park and our last sunset before disembarking. ?

We were killing time waiting for kids club to open because my son became obsessed with wanting to always be there. Wrestling broke out and I don’t even know why.

On Allure, the lollipop was present on the 50th birthday cake, unlike Navigator.

I forgot our formal night the evening of Puerto Rico, day 5. Lobster was good and in one of the pics you can even catch a slight glimpse of @CruisingKat(Kathy).

Last port stop was Labadee. It was a normal beach day, beautiful day with no rain. Hubs and lil guy did the aqua park and we somehow managed to miss the bbq. I was waiting for them to finish the aqua park. We walked over at 2pm and everything was gone already. We stayed in the Columbus Cove area. Since we’ve personally last been there, they added beach swings and some more cabanas.

Oh my goodness...what were the odds of that. Here we were talking and I didn’t know. We enjoyed talking to you and the family!!!

Our next port was Puerto Rico which is one of my favorites. We did the Rainforest Drive excursion. We had an excellent guide and the Rainforest is breathtaking. Guess what???? I even had time for my pina colada at Barrachinas!!! Hubs and lil guy continued back to the ship while I browsed for souvenirs. Suddenly a torrential downpour came and I was soaked. It was so heavy it was hard to see.

Yesterday was our first port day. We chose to take a taxi to Mullet Bay Beach. I was going to go to the beach at Holland House, but after hearing talk of the water there failing toxicity tests I didn’t want to chance it. Mullet Bay Beach was absolutely gorgeous. The color of the water there is something out of an advertisement. We ate at Rosie’s snack shack there. Two chicken and rice platters, an order of fries, a beer and a soda cane to $24. Some catamarans came and anchored for about 30-45 minutes. We scored free rum punch from their staff because their people weren’t swimming out to where the cooler was. That was a win!! We snorkeled and saw a few different kind of fish and some crabs. We have only had one other ship docked with it’s there...MSC Seaside.

Our door decorations and a gorgeous sunset and rare full family pic...

So....we went to see the show in the aqua theater and I ordered myself a pina colada. There was a broken chair next to me that everyone kept trying to sit in. My husband and I had to keep telling people it’s broken. An elderly gentleman came and my husband was trying to tell him it was broken and the gentleman couldn’t hear so hubs starts using hand motions and whooooosh...there goes my nice, new and very cold pina colada all over my lap. I had just enough time to race back to the room, quick change and brought a towel back with me to sit on because my seat is now also full of pina colada, but there was nowhere else to sit because it was a full show. What an amazing show!!!!!! The way they manipulate the pool to have water, not have water, etc.....just amazing!!!! To pay back hubs for spilling my drink, I lied and told the “bearded lady” it was his birthday. The pics are blurry, but it was so worth it! ???

I also love the little hidden treasures throughout the ship. If you look down into the telescopes you find scenes such as this:

I love the wall of door knockers. They instantly reminded me of that movie the Labrynth with David Bowie. Anyone else a fan of that movie?

In Izumi, our chef was great, funny and gave lil guy so much attention. He let him go behind the grill to try to flip the egg, etc. It was so much fun.

Our first two days were sea days and we spent time taking in the ship, swimming, saw Mama Mia and enjoyed Izumi (our only specialty night. The key lime pie in the MDR is one of my favorites and we tried Johnny Rockets for breakfast for the first time. Not too bad!