'05 Cruise!

I just got back from my cruise a few hours ago! It was a blast!!! I must say, Key West and Nassau kind of disappointed me. But CocoCay was soooo awesomeeee. Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself.

Day 1 (Monday) - Miami
I woke up at 3:30 AM on Monday (after going to bed at 11:30 on Sunday night), and Donny and his dad picked me up at 4:30. We met up with Megan and Jake (who were on our flight) at the airport, andur flight left at 5:55 AM (yeah, sick) for Ft. Lauderdale. Once we got there, we met up with Tyler and Jon and caught a shuttle to the Port of Miami! I was actually kind of nervous getting onto the ship. I was positive that we would turn into the next Titanic, even though I know that like, that NEVER happens anymore. I saw the lifeboats hanging off the side, and I instantly thought 'oh no. I hope there are enough for everyone.' haha like, what? I'm pretty sure they have that figured out by now. Anyway, here's our ship, the Majesty of the Seas:


Well, thats as much of it as I could fit in one picture haha. Anyway, the ship was gorgeous. And there was always something to do. The food at dinner was deliciouuuus (I literally had steak 3 of the 4 nights... oops?). The rest of the food was so-so, but there was always some place open to get food, so that was nice. At dinner, I tried a few new things... scallops (it was a scallop risotto), oxtail broth (i dont even know what that is, honestly. Even now that I've eaten it haha), and... ESCARGOT. Yes, I tried escargot. Honestly, it wasn't that bad. I don't know if I'd choose to eat it again, but I could handle eating it again. It probably helped that it was drenched in butter and garlic... mmm. Oh, and I also tried lamb... I did NOT like it. The texture was gross.

Anyway, so the first day we set sail at I believe 5 PM, so we all watched that. Then we just explored a bit and went to dinner at 8:30 (that was our dining time every night). I truly don't have any clue what we did the first night. Oops?

Day 2 (Tuesday) - Nassau
The next morning we docked in Nassau. It poured until like, noon, so that sucked. We finally got off the island and went to the straw markets (kind of claustrophobic and stressful, plus they all just sell the same stuff) and bought me some band-aids. The night before, someone knocked a heavy metal boxy trashcan onto the top of my foot and it was a REALLY deep gash and it pretty much bled for like, 2 days straight. Gross. Then we went back on the boat for awhile, collected everyone, and went to SENOR FROGS!

The bar had a GORGEOUS view... it sat out on top of the clear blue water of the Bahamas! Senor Frogs and when we played Quest (I'll get to that later) were probably the two best memories of the cruise haha. I mean... it all started when the boys bought buckets of beer, and the girls (plus jake :) ) bought something called 'The Yard' which was basically just a HUGE glass... I got the house margarita, frozen. It was DELICIOUS but it took me ages to finish. We watched a mom get drunk off her ASS and make a total fool of herself in front of her two young daughters. Sad, but also sort of hilarious. Then some employee decided to nominate Donny to participate in a chugging contest... he came in 2nd! Then the same employee created a 'Free Shot Conga Line' in which we all just... literally did a train around the bar, and at random points, employees would be waiting with a bottle of SOMETHING and they would squirt it into our mouths. I literally felt like it was the crazy college spring break I never had haha. It was insane. Then we of course had all had a biiiit to drink and ended up dancing like fools on the dance floor. Keep in mind that we were pretty much the only people dancing. Whatevs. It was SO FUN oh my gosh.

That night was our formal dinner, which was nice! We went to a laaaaame show afterwards. Donny and I left like, halfway through it because it was so dumb. It was like... a bunch of 70s songs, and it was beyond cheesy. We didn't really do a whole lot else the rest of the night, I don't think.

Day 3 (Wednesday) - CocoCay, Bahamas
I would say this was the best day, overall. I LOVED CocoCay, which is Royal Caribbean's own private island. It's tiny and cute and I love it. The unfortunate part was that it felt like it was 120 degrees outside. Note to self: Never, ever take a cruise to the Caribbean in the summer. I couldn't be out of the water for more than probably 5-10 minutes. It was that hot. I, of course, got burned... it's already pretty much gone away, which is nice. Other 05 cruisers were not so lucky, however. Donny's back is burned to a crisp, and others had various other body parts burned haha. I bought a Coco-Loco (the drink of the day on the cruise) and it was probably the most delicious drink I've ever had. I honestly had no idea what was in it (other than rum), so I just Googled it... here's what I came up with:

• 3/4 ounce dark rum
• 3/4 ounce coconut rum
• 1/2 ounce cream of coconut
• 1/2 ounce papaya nectar (optional)
• 1/2 ounce orange juice
• 1/2 ounce pineapple juice
• 1/4 ounce grenadine
• 1/2 banana (optional)

The only thing I'm confused about is that my drink had like... orange... sherbet in it or something. Whatever. It was so damn good.

Anyway, so there's that. My graduation present to Donny was one of the 'excursions' offered by Royal Caribbean... we went snorkeling in CocoCay! It was SO FUN, minus my mask kept leaking and I kept inhaling salt water. We saw a sting ray, TONS of schools of fish, and just lots of pretty, pretty fish! We also saw sea urchins... Katie found a starfish... it was just so fun! After snorkeling, we ended up having to put our lounge chairs in halfway in the water because, like I said, we literally couldn't NOT be in the water. It was fun though, and so, so relaxing. We had to go back kind of early though... Donny and I waited until the very last second to board the last boat back to our cruise ship (it was tendered further out in the ocean). That night, we went to a Newlyweds-ish game and it was just so freaking hilarious. Then we played Quest. Ohhhh, Quest.

Our group (10 of us) was group 4... and I found this description online: "Basically it's a form of a scavenger hunt - but with a twist. Points are awarded in this form - 1st person to arrive with the items gets 10 points. 2nd person - 5 points. 3rd person - 3 points. Everyone after that gets 1 point. When you arrive to the cruise director (the one on the microphone), you are to present your number and show him the items. Once that item is pronounced 'CLOSED', no more can be accepted." It started out with tame things... "I need one business card," or "I need one picture of a child." Laura, Donny, and Sam had all been on the cruise before, so they knew what a lot of them were going to be, so we came prepared haha. We were BY FAR the most intense group! I'm sure everyone else hated us. '05. Anyway, it eventually turned into like, 4 people on our team being in their underwear, boys demonstrating on other boys their favorite sexual positions, boys demonstrating on GIRLS their favorite sexual positions, girls showing tattoos and piercings in scandalous places... oh man. It was seriously one of the funniest nights of my life. I was dying of laughter. Katie just... took so many for the team haha. We saw her underwear so, so many times. She also bit a hole in Jake's sock... yeah. I dunno. hahaha. Some picture highlights:



I think it's safe to say that we absolutely dominated the game. We won with like... 70 points. The 2nd place team didn't even have 45 points. Like... absolute destruction. It was so fantastic. When they announced that we were the winners, we were SO obnoxious and like, shoved people out of our way to rush the stage and cheer and chant 'O-H' 'I-O' and oh my gosh it was just a fantastic moment.

Day 4 (Thursday) - Key West
Okay, there's basically nothing all that fun to do in Key West unless you have unlimited money and can go parasailing or something. We walked around, but it was miserable because it was so hot. Donny and I eventually ran into everyone else (minus Megan and Jake, who were off snorkeling and catamaran-ing) and went to the original Margaritaville, which was fun. Donny and I got the house margaritas and they were delishhhhhh. I guess they should be, since the place is called Margaritaville. Anyway, Donny and I were sick of it after that, so we headed back to the ship and packed, since we had to leave so early the next morning. We had our last dinner (where I had my third steak in 4 days...), and watched a decent comedy show. Then Donny and I headed to bed since we had to get up at 6 AM!

Day 5 (Friday) - Miami
We arrived back in Miami this morning to a beautiful sunrise. We were up early to take advantage of the 'Express' checkout or something... turned out to be not worth it at all, since we ended up sitting on Royal Caribbean's shuttle to Ft. Lauderdale for an HOUR. Omg it was the most annoying thing in the world. Luckily we got to the airport on time and got home with no problems.

I'm sorry this is the longest post of all time. Summary: the cruise was awesome, ridiculously hot, tons of fun, relaxing for the most part, and I hope I can do it again soon :)