The Cruise

Finally revisiting some promised updates... the Cruise.
-Went to the Western Caribbean the first week in May. It was awesome! Being my first cruise, I was afraid I might get seasick, but it didn't bother me at all, weirdly what bothered me most was being back on land, where you still felt like you're rocking. I didn't like that too much, because it's the same feeling I get when I'm dehydrated. The other downer to the week was I forgot to put sunscreen on my stomach the first day, and while the burn wasn't that bad, a few days later I decided to run a 5k on the top-level track and it made the burn start to peel prematurely, so the last 3 days, it felt like I was walking around with my internal organs exposed to the elements. K.O. points to the Caribbean sun. I'll get a rematch again sometime though, because other than the sea legs and the sun burn it was up there on the list of most awesome adventures I've taken.
Great things about the trip:
-Haiti= went ziplining on the world's longest zipline over water
-Jamaica=bought a hookah and laughed as the customs people were trying to get me to call it a 'bong'. Didn't fall for that trick. Now I'm thankful that I had some hippie friends in college that told me the only difference between a 'bong' and a 'waterpipe' is the name, and a 'bong' is illegal in the U.S.
We also climbed up a waterfall in Jamaica. I saw my life flashing before my eyes a lot during that expedition, but I made it to the top okay. Sadly, the 70 year old in front of me did not. He's okay.... just had to quit after the first part of the climb. (I wanted to as well). Because I was under the impression that it was going to be a leisurely hike BESIDE Dunn's River Falls. Wrong. It was IN the falls. Basically rock climbing in the middle of a terrentual downpour, hoping for your life that no one above you falls, because they're taking everyone below them out with them. Yeah, it would never fly in the U.S. But hey, I survived, so i feel ultra bad ass.
-Grand Caymans=did some ocean kayaking and then coral reef snorkeling on the "divorce excursion". They only had two person kayaks, and well, when you're already exhausted from climbing for your life the day before, and you feel like your kayak is just going in circles, there was a lot of "Stop hitting my paddle!", "You're not doing it right!", "Just stop. I'll do it myself!".... I'm cranky when I'm tired.
-The food= completely awesome, completely too much, hence the need to run the 5k.
-The entertainment= I learned how to play casino black jack, and it only cost $200 to learn! HA! Good thing I'm good at Hold'em and was able to win my losses back. My favorite source of entertainment was the piano bar with Matt Yee. We went to see him perform almost every night. He did an "Adult Sing-Along" show, which basically meant a bunch of people singing oldies and getting plastered. The worse we sang, the more he made us drink. Which obviously meant a downward spiral of more howling and more drinking. Good times though, good times.
-The foreigners=no need to explain, there were plenty of stories that ended with "....foreigners". Just like I'm sure there were equivalent amounts of historias that ended with "... américains"
My favorite story being the adorable 3 year old german boy in the elevator practicing his numbers. He completely mixed up his zwölf with his elf.... foreigners.