All good cruises must come to an end!

 Our last cruise day was on Princess Cay and it proved to be a gorgeous day to play in the sun and sand and water.

Our next cruise begins on January 7--a twelve day cruise around the Hawaiian Islands and on to Tahiti. Stayed tuned for our cruise updates!

We got back to Ft. Lauderdale and Caryn and Brayden picked us up at the docks. Brayden's question: "Are we going to bake cookies today?" Yes sir, we sure are--a double batch of sugar cookies to cut out and decorate (of course there is the eating of dough and mouthfuls of colored sugar). But we ended up with some beautifully decorated cookies.

Antigua/St. Thomas

The sun was shining on beautiful Antigua (pronounced Antiga) and its 300 and some beaches, but we had to hit the shopping area first. Unfortunately the shopping area had none of the quaintness and charm of Old Quebec City and the taxi fare to a beach started at around $12 per person so we opted to catch the sun on the ship.






The view coming into St. Thomas is welcoming...to all three cruise ships in port and to the private “duck” planes flying in for “business.” Brayden would love to watch this plane land on the water!

Booze is cheap on St. Thomas so we prepared for the future. We’ve been to St. Thomas a couple of times so again we chose to darken our tans shiptop with the beautiful blue waters down below.

St. Lucia/Barbados

Our second port was St. Lucia and we decided to just
take a short walk around the shopping area and spend the day on board just lazing around a “not so busy pool” and watching a movie on the big outdoor screen.














Today we visited Barbados and took a taxi van ride around the island. Again our driver/tour guide was excellent and filled us in on information about the city, towns, and countryside.

 We passed some monkeys looking for some handouts of banana
 

and spent some time in the beautiful blue water on the white sand beach.

Caribbean Cruise--December

 How  does one spend a couple of weeks in December to avoid the traffic, malls, and stress of Christmas?

A wonderful 10 day cruise to the southern Caribbean on the 3000 passenger cruiseship Emerald Princess.

We left Ft. Lauderdale and spent the first two days at sea--just a little windy, slightly wavy, a little overcast and sometimes rainy. But we found plenty to keep us busy and we did spend some of our time outside.

Our first port was the beautiful island of St. Kitts. We took a tour around the island and learned much about its history,  culture, and geography.

Here the Atlantic Ocean is on the left and the Caribbean Sea is on the right.

Snow comes to Florida!!

Welcome to winter--in Florida! The snow is falling, the palms are green, and the temp is about 78 degrees. It can't get better than that!!

 ...And this is how they do it--truck in a load of block ice, block off a 10 x 40 feet section of the street, then crush and blow the "snow" to about a foot deep. Invite all the kids from Miami to come and play.

Brayden had collected the parts to make a snowman, so when their 10 minute time in the snow came, they made a snowman!!

Happy Holidays to Everyone!!