June 9th

Big day for us.  We started out by attending Peter and Ben's T-ball Game. Peter started off with an infield single.

 Ben followed by a swinging bunt single.

 After the game, we waited for team photos.

 That night we attended my 40th High School reunion. I saw a lot of old faces, emphasis on the old.

 Sunday morning, we went to church with Tim, Tiffany, and their family.  Tim welcomed Sierra into mortality by giving her the Name and Blessing ordinance

 I did catch Hunter sneeking into the team snacks for the t-ball game.

Three Day weekend

What do I do on a three day weekend? I don't usually do a whole lot.  This weekend I:

Worked on a painting (no, its not done yet)

Went for a walk with my sweetheart.  I delight in watching her take pictures of each little flower along the way.  On this walk, there weren/t too many, but in Hawaii ...

On the walk we saw a tough looking guy, at least until we looked at his dog...

The lush river of re-claimed water

We also skyped with our new granddaughter Sierra. She mostly slept.  I also registered for my 40th Highschool Reunion, and made some preliminary vacations plans for 2013. 

I also spoke at a single adult fire-side on the Miracles of the Savior.

Not much - but it was very relaxing.

The Fire Guy

I have told a few of you that the boat caught on fire, but that we were okay.  I suppose that I should fill you in on the whole story, at least as much as I know, and from my perspective. 
We signed up for dinner with different peoples and different times so that we could meet new people from around the world. After the second couple, we took a couple of nights off and just ate at a table by ourselves. 

I digress

Friday evening we were sanding in line for dinner.  Suddenly, the ship started to shudder and shake. About 8-10 seconds later, the engines started again and off we went.  Then the emergency signals started to go off, asking for certain crews to report to certain emergency areas.  We found out later that the cooks immediately wiped their hands, and marched out of the kitchen.  The emergency signal was sounded three times, about two minutes apart.

We then got an announcement from Captain Jonny - the Norwegian guy who drove the boat.  He said that there had been a report of a fire in engine room # 1, so they had shut down engine room # 1 and had switched all the controls to Engine room # 2.  All engines were functioning properly but there was an investigation going on in the engine room.  Over the next 20 minutes, the fire doors were all closed and the ship started going backwards.  We got a few more announcements from the Captain and some other officers, explaining that we there had in fact been a fire, but that it was now out.  The crew were all asked to avoid deck 2  so that the appropriate people could finish their investigation. 

During all this time, Kayleen and I were most impressed by the professional behavior of all the crew and officers.  The people who didn't need to be on deck 2 were level headed and trained in what do do, what to say, and how to act.  Some of the passengers did freak out, but Kayleen and I knew that there was nothing we could do to change the situation.  As we were eating, the cooks all came marching back into the dining room to rounds of applause. 

Seriously, the food was awesome, but I digress again.

The rest of the evening was pretty uneventful.  We talked about the peace that comes in knowing that should this be the end, we are unafraid to meet our Savior.  It was a profound experience in several ways.  We were thankful that it wasn't worse.  We were fully on the sidelines - no control or influence in any fashion - except to negatively impact the attitudes of the other passengers.  It was good for us to recognize and talk about a time - in the future - when we really will go Home.  It strengthens my resolve to try to do better, but to remain unafraid of what the next life will bring.

Days 4, 5, 6, and 7

A few Postcard quality pictures from St. Thomas

Rocky Coast of the Caribbean Islands

Harbour on the Dutch side of St. Maarten

This just reminded me of a beer commercial.  Still, the sun was hot, the water was amazing and many of the people, including me, looked like beached whales.

This is a kind of weird barrel cactus on St. Maarten.  This was on the French side of the island.  Each barrel looks like it has a small saquaro cactus on type.

The smart natives and tourists were in a sail boat.

Caribbean sunset

The pool on the ship on a beautiful Saturday afternoon.  It was hard to find a place to sit, stand or layout.

This is the park in the middle of the ship.  The video below shows Kayleen coming overtowards me on the zip line.  This is just about the take-off perspective for the zip line.

And this is Kayleen on a Zip Line.  I did follow, but its hard to run the video while holding on for dear life.

Day 2 / Day 3

Tuesday we sailed from Bahamas to St. Thomas.  We were at sea all day.  We sat by the pool, relaxed, napped, ate, relaxed, sat by the pool, and ate, not necessarilly in that order. The cruise line has the Dreamworks Characters appear from time to time on the boat, so we got some pictures with the folks from Madagascar.

I couldn't get this guy, whatever his name, to turn around so that I could get his face.

On Wednesday, we were in beautiful St. Thomas.  On the way in, we saw some seabirds that were flying by the ship, and then would suddenly dive down 10 or 15 feet into the ocean, and come up with a fish. 

We boarded a "Pirate Ship" and sailed out to Turtle Cove.  The snorkeling was completely different than snorkeling in Hawaii. 

The crew were a little crazy.  On the way back, they tried real hard to give as much rum as possible to the passengers.  Kayleen and I declined.

The water was warmer and clearer, the coral was different, and the fish were smaller. We got some pictures of a Manta-ray, some small turtles, and some different kind of fishes. 

 St Thomas was a very friendly island.  Of the three we visited, this would be the one I would like to go back to to see more of the sights.

Day 1 / Day 2

We flew into Fort Lauderdale on Saturday and checked into a Hotel.  We took a walk and snapped a few photos, mostly of Cruise Ships in port.

 We saw heard the horn blow and watched the ship back out of port and leave for the exotic destinations.  We woke up Sunday morning excited to go.  It was a little earlier than we were used to, but we had plenty of time.  After breakfast and another walk, we packed up and took a shuttle to the Cruise Port.  We were pleasently surprised by the lack of people in line.  We checked in, showed our passport, got our sail pass, and were directed upstairs to wait until we could board.

 We only waited about 10 minutes before we were called.  We boarded the ship, and went up to the Windjammer Cafe for a bite to eat.  By noon we were on board eating lunch.  It was amazing.  The buffet variety was extensive and the quality was awesome.  We had our muster drill, which proved comforting later in the drill.  At 5:50 we heard the horn blow, and promptly at 6:00 PM, the shipped backed out and off we went, for our own exotic destinations.

We had a dinner reservation at 6:00 PM, and shared the table with a couple from Wichata, Kansas and a couple from Tampa. Good food, good conversation, and exciting times.  I went for my first ever massage that night, while Kayleen had her hair cut and styled. 

The next morning, we woke as we were docking in Nassau, Bahamas.  Our snorkeling outing was canceled due to high winds and high surf. 

We got off the ship and hooked up with a taxi driver just off the pier.  His name was Quincy.  He took us around the island, showed us the the good, the bad, and the ugly. We visited an old English fort - Fort Fincastle.

 We walked down the Queen's staircase, which was built as an escape route from the fort down to the ships in the harbor. 

We drove over to Paradise Island to the Atlantis Resort.  It is a huge place with its own beaches, pools, acquariums and water-sports parks. 

The resort would not let us down to the beach, but we did get in the back door to see the sharks, stingrays and swordfish in the aquariums. 

  We got back to the ship about 1:00 PM, ate lunch, cleaned up, and spent some time relaxing at the pool.  We went to see the Broadway production "Chicago" in the late afternoon.  It was a little different than we had expected, but very well done and very enjoyable.

At dinner, we shared a table with a couple from British Columbia and another couple from Orlando.  The conversation was not nearly so stimulating, but we had a good time.  That night we went to see the Aqua Show, which was a combination of acrobatics, diving, gymnastics and comedy.  We got to bed late, but it was a great day.