Bahamas Cruise Part II

Our second day we docked in Nassau. Cal and Reed were up till about 2am or later.  We did out little routine of getting water sent to our rooms, plus breakfast items for lunch, then after getting ready headed to breakfast, then left for the day.  The ships' docks are right there connected to the town, which made it really convenient to get off the ship.  We had to wait for our driver to pick us up as we were renting UTVs to drive around town. Cal and Reed took the opportunity to nap.  We weren't sure when the people were coming, but thankfully another family was renting from the same company and they had cell service and called them. 

And we were off to explore Nassau!  Lee ended up paying for international cell service so we could use GPS on his phone.  It was interesting to drive on the left side of the road. I must say it was pretty easy for me because I was just following Lee.  The guy who showed us how to use the UTVs gave the comment, right side is suicide. This will come in handy when we drive in Ireland and England this summer. 

We drove around town and then went to the Queen's Staircase. I thought there were some off roads we could go on, but we didn't research it or plan our time out to do that activity. But someone at the rental place said there weren't back roads to drive on...but I am sure there were. 

Always fun seeing old churches. 

My brother recently started working for KPMG.  I thought it was fun seeing an office in Nassau!

Made a little stop at a beach. 

We stopped at Fort Montagu to walk around and eat lunch.  

We also booked some jet skis to ride around in the ocean. We were supposed to meet them at Cabbage Beach.  We finally found it and had to pay a toll to go over a bridge, which was fun but we weren't expecting to use up cash we had on hand. Then these people showed us where to go to park on Cabbage Beach and we probably didn't have to but I tipped them as well.  Lee then found out at the jet ski tour had been rescheduled and wasn't at Cabbage Beach anymore.  It was at Fort Montagu! Crazy. So we went all the way back to where we had just been. 

The jet ski ride was fun. I thought they would take us around the edge of the island and point stuff out to us.  Clark and Lee did a jet ski tour in Key West and did that.  This one was still fun. They way things worked out Reed ended up getting his own jet ski. At the end when it was time to go back, for some reason Reed didn't get the message and drove far away from the beach. I chased him down with Elden and FINALLY caught up to him to say it was time to go back. 

We stopped and bought ice cream.  There were very few things I purchased on the cruise (outside of the cruise fees). Ice cream was one of them. 

The ship we were on--the Norwegian Sky.

Cal and Reed doing sudoku.

That night we scheduled to eat at a grill place to get burgers.  The kids had an activity and we ended up just eating wherever. Lee and I did stop by that place.  The burger wasn't very good...neither was the nacho cheese sauce.  We didn't really eat anything there. 

Love the big windows to see the ocean.  The ocean is so huge!

We then met up with the kids for a Broadway spotlight melody thing.  A group of four people sang a sampling of Broadway songs from different plays. We were really excited about it.  Especially when we got there--they started with Les Misérables, then Phantom of the Opera.  They were really good! Then....it went south.  We didn't even know the other plays they were singing songs from. They were inappropriate for sure.  It was awkward because most of our group was on the front row and there weren't very many people in the audience.  But I just thought, I need to do something-they are my kids and I can't just sit here letting them and me listen and see inappropriate music and dancing. I went and got them and we left.  They were confused why we left, they thought it was going well. Haha. 

Love looking over the dessert menu! After the failed Broadway event, we went out for dessert--which we had planned on all along anyway. 

Then more fun at the hot tubs, Entourage and ice cream!

A glow dance party was the event that night.  They got these fun glow sticks in a mini white "pool noodle". 

The last full day was at the private island Norwegian Cruise Line owns, Great Stirrup Cay. This morning we didn't need to order breakfast items to our room because they had food on the island for lunch. Another early morning!  This was the only day we needed to take a tender from the ship to our destination. 

First up, zip lining! 

I was going to book us a private cabana and so wished I would have.  I originally decided not to because it was pretty expensive.  Either $300 or $600 or something. But once we were at the beach I SO wish we would have!  The beach was super crowded.  Plus the worse thing about the whole trip was the attire, or actually the huge lack of attire the women were wearing.  We found out that the ship we sailed on tends to attract college students on spring break.  I feel like that was the majority of the people.  They were great and all, no complaints about any rude behavior or wild partying.  But their clothing choices were horrible.  Even at the beach some mom were wearing horrid stuff.  Ugh.  SO wish I would have booked a private cabana!  I even asked that morning, but of course they were sold out. Next time I'm for sure booking a private place. Even Cal and Reed saw some inappropriate dancing at a 18+ party/karaoke thing on the island.  

The water was beautiful and most of us went snorkeling.  Haley, Reed and I were able to see things they sunk on purpose like a giant skull, an anchor, some mermaids and one more item that I can't remember. That was fun. We also rented paddle boards and then these full body floats. There was another extra expense. 

After zip lining Shanna realized she forgot her swimsuit bottoms and Cal never even wore his swimsuit because he didn't want to go swimming.  I should have brought it.  He does this often and almost always wishes he had brought his swim suit. So Lee went back to the boat to get the stuff, which took awhile.  Haley was going to go along to get her camera I think, but then she couldn't find her room key.  Thankfully it was in Elden's bag I think. I put it in someone's bag when we went zip lining.  That took extra time to figure out that Haley couldn't go with Lee. Lee found us after lunch.  Lee and I found the taco shack and I went with him to the buffet. 

A couple nights ago we met PJ's parents (PJ was in the Entourage group). Then last night I saw his mom and asked if we wanted to meet up for dinner.  The kids had a table together and then we adults and their little girl shared a table.  

After we took a few pictures and the kids had fun doing another scavenger hunt, playing games and receiving awards. Elden won the Smash Brothers tournament and Reed the best dance. Shanna won something too but she can't remember it right now. Lee and I also took a walk on the open deck.  We did that a couple times. One evening we also sat by the pool and played a game with Haley and Elden...I think it was Elden!

We then picked out the photos that the cruise people took.  We had a BIG photo credit and should have taken advantage of it more, but we didn't.  We had to get a minimum amount of photos so we just ordered multiple copies of a random photo.  Look at the photo bill!  Gasp!  Thankfully it was all free for us. They delivered our photos later that night or the next morning. 

Mix was the Entourage director. She's from the Philippines.  It was fun to talk to some of the employees here and there. Like the ones at the private island stay there for a few months at a time just living there and working. Every time anyone walked into the buffet area you would get your hands sprayed with hand sanitizer.  The ladies manning that post would say: "washy washy!" or "healthy healthy"!  It was very cute. The staff on the ship was awesome. Very nice and attentive. 

Our last morning arrived!  *Cry*.  I had heard that you leave your luggage outside your room the night before, but then I found out that there an option to just take your own luggage with you, which I loved.  So that morning we packed up, had breakfast and took our luggage with us. We got off the boat very quickly and went through customs really fast. 

We then waited for the shuttle to pick us up.  It was funny, a taxi driver told us that we should wait in this certain area.  We called the parking garage and they told us a different place.  But the taxi driver said that guy didn't know what he was talking about and that we should go to the place he said.  Well, the taxi driver was right, not the person at the parking garage who should have known! We found the place and made it to Chevy.

We then headed up to Georgia to drop Reed off.  We stopped at Culvers for lunch and then hung out at Lois's for the evening.  We left about 7 or 8pm to head back so Cal could get to a training he was a part of for Young Men.  But this happened in South Carolina...next post...