Here’s a link to cruisecritic’s round up of the days news about the Carnival Splendor (I posted about this yesterday). For those of you new to my blog, I am a big fan of cruising. I’ve been on three cruises, two on Carnival and one on Royal Caribbean. My most recent cruise was over the summer on Carnival Legend.
Seriously, I love cruising. I love being pampered, I love being on the open sea, I love visiting a bunch of ports in one vacation. I love everything about it! Which brings us to today’s THANKS. I am THANKFUL that I have been so lucky to go on wonderful cruises, and that nothing unfortunate has happened on my cruise vacations! I know people that swear they would hate cruising, and point to stories like this as reasons why. However, thousands of people have wonderful, uneventful cruises each year, and I am so very thankful I am one of those people. I hope to go again soon 🙂 I would love to go on a cruise to Alaska next…
As a cruise aficionado, I was startled today when I heard the news that the Carnival Splendor had had a fire in the engine room and was stranded off the coast of Ensenada, Mexico. I hope all the people are doing ok–it seems as if no one was hurt but that the power and PLUMBING was out. Sounds like a potential nightmare!
I hadn’t been to my favorite cruising site (cruisecritic.com) in awhile, but naturally I went there to check things out. I’m sure there will be more information after the fact from poor folks who were on the ship. Will it be a small consolation that they get offered a future free cruise? I don’t know how bad a ship like that could get without power or flushing toilets…pretty bad, I imagine!!
One of my sisters just got a new kitten. I’m a bit jealous, because her cat is smaller than mine and probably doesn’t take up the whole bed when sleeping (yet). It’s very cute, and I thought I’d post a few pictures I “took” from her facebook page.
I see Leslie was smart and got a fishing pole toy!
This shows you a more realistic "scale" of the kitty.
I look forward to meeting “Albergo” –evidently means Hotel in Italian and is based on a slight misunderstanding while she was booking a vacation in Italy last summer (yes, Leslie has a rough life 😉 ). Anyway, turns out Albergo was not actually the hotel owner’s name, but the name of the hotel–Albergo Barbara. In any case, an excellent name for a kitty.
I just love getting presents in the mail. However, I’m pretty terrible about MAILING presents. In fact, I have a small pile of gifts from my cruise (yes…almost two months ago) that I keep meaning to mail. Or maybe I’ll just wait and deliver them in person. In any case…not the point.
The point: Today I received a small package in the mail from my sister Leslie. Now, she could have waited to give me this in person, but lucky for me she didn’t! She was in Luzerne, Switzerland for a few weeks over the summer.
It's a cowbell and a luggage (violin case) tag!
The package was ringing when I got it, so I knew it was a bell of sorts, but WOW! It’s a fantastic bell.
Just an update post–the last 🙁 from our cruise vacation in August. I got the waterproof camera photos back so I wanted to post a few here.
The first few are from our jet ski tour in the Cayman Islands. We went to Stingray City, which is not a real city–it’s a place where the water is very shallow and tons of stingrays hang around. With the help of the guide, we were able to pick them up, hold them, and “kiss” them, which is supposed to be seven years of good luck!
On the jetski. Our guide had found some starfish for us to hold. Not the most flattering photo ever, but the best we had.Holding a stingray! My turn to "kiss' the stingray. I felt very silly!Chris's turn. That was our guide on the right hand side. He was great!
The next few pictures are from our day in Cozumel, Mexico. We went parasailing and spent the day at Nachi Cocum beach club. I still dream about this day! It was so beautiful, and the parasailing was fun UNTIL I started to get really nauseous. Oops.
On the boat, getting ready to go up in the air!Leaving the boat behind...We took this ourselves from in the air. Our view...the camera doesn't nearly do it justiceSafely back on the boat!Relaxing in the pool after lunch.
There you go. That’s the last of the photos I wanted to show off from our Excellent Cruise Vacation of 2010. If you just happened upon this post I encourage you to look for my other posts of the cruise (Carnival Legend) from August. If you’ve been following along the whole time, I hope you enjoyed it!
I have now taught over 20 new students in the past week. I used to get nervous about new students. Not anymore! I guess experience is the key 😉
I ran three miles today–still not all in a row (meaning I take walk breaks) but it was easy. I could have gone longer. Which is good…as my half marathon is looming. Due to various things (vacation, illness) I am behind on my training. My goal is to finish, that is all. I’ve only been running since May or June, so this will be an awesome accomplishment.
Sometimes my cat is so cute she makes me cry!
I got our waterproof camera photos back today (from the cruise). Some of the pictures are great! I will be posting them soon, just not tonight. Too tired to deal with it.
I found out one of my students and his family are going on a cruise in November. It’s a NCL cruise with a very similar itinerary to mine. SO JEALOUS! I know they will have a fantastic time.
