The last pictures in the previous post were taken probably half hour before we boarded our cruise boat. We got to the boat dock half wet with sand in our cracks and our hair in shambles! Haha! We were both in our swimming suits and ready to continue with our vacation....in the Bahamas!
We got on the boat and the first thing we did....all you can eat buffet baby! We scarfed down some food and then began our self-guided tour of the boat. A couple of years ago we went on a cruise with Jordan's parents and sibling and the boat we went on was much more massive than the one we were on, but we still wanted to check things out and get a good idea of what the boat had to offer. We roamed around for a little while, napped, read, ate some more, you know all those kinds of vacation-y things.
After dinner that night we went to the triple feature show! The first show was a two person group called The Dancing Gauchos. It was a husband and wife couple that performed with drums and whips and some fire at the end. They were, as you can probably tell by the name, Spaniards and they had so much energy and they put on a great show! The second act was your typical acrobatic show and the third was a comedy show.
The entertainment was fun, but we were a little disappointed once we compared it the amazing cruise we went on a couple of years ago. At any rate, the pizza cafe we visited after the show was delicious! We, once again, stuffed ourselves and headed back to the cabin to get some rest before we arrived in the Bahamas.
WELCOME TO THE BAHAMAS!!
Our view from the ship
Gearing up to go on our adventure for the day
When we arrived at the island we had to sign up to go on one of the excursions set up by the cruise line. Since the boat was tied up at a ship yard 12 miles away from the nearest town we really had no choice but to sign up for one of the excursions if we wanted to get off the boat and see the Bahamas. We signed up for the cheapest possible excursion which, for us, ended up being a wonderful day! Our excursion took us to one of the resorts that was right on the beach. In addition to having the beautiful beach to walk on and the ocean to swim in there was a rockin pool area, a little restaurant, a volleyball area, and a shopping center just a ferry ride away. The picture up above was our first sight of the Bahaman beach we spent the rest of the day at....gorgeous huh?
After pinching ourselves, we picked a little tiki hut and set up camp for the afternoon. Oh, it was bliss! The weather was gorgeous, the water was warm, and the sand was white white white!
We spent probably an hour and a half or so on the beach and after some swimming and napping we wanted to try out the pool area. This was the lazy river/ shallow pool area we sided up on.
This was the beautiful resort right next to the pool area...I think this is where we'll book our next vacation!
As we were checking everything out like the lazy river and the volleyball net over the water and the cool tanning slabs that were submerged in the water, we found these cool man-made caves that you could go in and get out of the sun!
This was an entrance to one of the several man-made caves that were in the swimming area.
Here was one of the smaller caves.
Looking out of the cave.
Oh yeah, there was a water slide too!
My crazy husband shimmied up a palm tree and pulled off a couple of coconuts just so he could drink the milk!
Once it was time to head back to the ship we hopped on a little water taxi (above) and traveled across the water way to the shopping area and bus loading station. Our day on the island was so beautiful and we could not have asked for a better time! If we had the option of going back one day I would absolutely go back in a heartbeat!
Back on the ship we cleaned up a little and headed to our formal dinner. Delicious salmon and a wellington was for dinner and for dessert we got a special "Happy Honeymoon" dessert!
After such a good dinner, this is what we came back to! Such a nice surprise for our last night on the boat.
The next morning we got off the boat and headed about 2 hours up the coast of Florida to Orlando. We found our hotel, dropped off our stuff, and headed up to Disney World to meet up with Jordan's cousin, Lyndon and his sweet wife Chelsie.
"Where dreams come true!"
Oh ya know, just boppin' around the shopping center of Disney World and we so happened to bump into Buzz!
Stitch was spitting out water and it felt so nice on that hot muggy day.
This is a family made completely out of LEGOS!
Another lego creation...
...and another!
As I said before, we spent several days with Lyndon and Chelsie. Most of the time I didn't have my camera with me because it was just too heavy to lug around so unfortunately I didn't get pictures of some of the things we did and saw. Jordan and I decided not to pay to go into any of the parks, although I would have loved to go to Epcot, but despite that fact we did actually go around to almost all of the resorts and walked around and saw what they had to offer. We walked around Downtown Disney a couple times and went in all the shops, we visited the resorts The Grand Floridian, The Swan, The Dolphin, Animal Kingdom Lodge, Fort Wilderness, Port Orleans, the Polynesian Resort, Old Key West, Yacht Club Resort, and that about covers the resorts we visited! Each one was unique in its own way and it was so neat to see how different they each were.
One of the coolest areas we visited was The Boardwalk. We visited this on our last night there and were able to see all the night time lights, street performers, and even went in some really neat souvenir shops!
In addition to walking around and seeing what there was to see at Disney World we also traveled out and about while we had the rental car. We drove about an hour east of Orlando to Coco Beach and spent the day out there wave jumping and building sand castles.
Chelsie and me
Lyndon and Chelsie
Body surfing/sand up the shorts
Me and my hubster
Action shot
While we were in the Coco Beach area we stopped by a manatee preserve and luckily enough I got a picture of the elusive animal!
This was the beautiful boardwalk that also doubled as the observatory.
The Manatee
Yup, you bet...that is the fin of a manatee! Haha, I know you can't tell what it is, and it could even be a fish jumping out of the water, but I'm just going to say/hope it really is part of a manatee.
So folks, that is our vacation! We had a blast and we would definitely go to Florida again! The weather was gorgeous, the people were great, and there was so much to do.
Hope you enjoyed reading about our vacation!
