A couple months ago, Doug reached out to Trav and Bron and invited us on the cruise his business, Orthopeneurs, rented out, but wasn't able to fill. We only had to pay the taxes, the rest was covered. The guys were stoked about it but we were going on a cruise to the same place literally two weeks after this one. It did not make sense to me to buy plane tickets and have Trav take time off work and have to kill myself to get my school work done ahead of time, to make this happen. Oh and have the kids miss school. But like I said, the guys really wanted to do it, so we said yes. We used points to get the plane tickets. In hindsight, I'm glad we did. It was a smaller Royal Caribbean ship called Serenade of the Seas and it was 90% ortho and dental people on board. We put all the kids in one room and Trav and I shared another room. We flew to Tampa on Tuesday, Sept. 17 at 3:10pm and stayed at a hotel with the Shaheens and Megan's brother's family. We ordered pizza for the kids and left them to go out as adults to dinner at a pretty sketchy bar that ended up being pretty good. We got on the ship the next day at noon.
We had to wait a couple hours to go to our rooms so we went straight to the Windjammer for lunch. The workers dancing and handing out hand sanitizer saying "Washy washy, happy happy!" had us laughing.
Oh boy, it was HOT outside! Hot and humid! It was so fun to see Rach and the kids and hug and catch up! They had their entire extended family on the ship so I didn't think I'd get to see Rach much but we actually got to spend quite a bit of time together.
Tanner and Navee looooved the arcade. Of course it wasn't free so they just pretended until one day they discovered that their cruise ID cards worked just like credit cards. Tanner had $30 of fun!
These two had a great time together all week and would even go to the kids club at night most nights!
Every night in the dining hall, the kids all sat together at one table and us adults sat at another table. It was so fun eating food I didn't plan or prepare and getting to visit with friends every night! Bring on multiple appetizers and desserts!
The first night, Doug's band, Relapse, performed. They do cover songs and Doug is one of the singers. He is a performer and we had a great time singing along and dancing! Even the kids enjoyed it.
Tanner really wanted one of Doug's costume hats from the show and was THRILLED when Doug gave it to him on the last day.
Daytime was spent at the pool after a morning workout. The cruise life is nice!
This was a show with a juggler/comedian one man circus something or another. He could balance a spoon on its handle on his nose and then did a feather and invited anyone up who wanted to try. Bron won!
One night they had a hypnotist. It said the age requirement was 16+ so I thought it was going to be raunchy and didn't go. But our kids snuck in! I went in, trying to find them and stayed for the show. Luckily, it was totally PG and some of the boys ran down to dance with the hypnotized guests when audience members were invited to do so. It was all really funny.
We sailed all day Wednesday and Thursday, stopped in Cozumel on Friday, sailed on Saturday and departed on Sunday. Cozumel was SO beautiful! The blue water and light sand looked like a postcard. We almost melted from the heat waiting for the Shaheens and Steels to get off the ship! We booked an excursion to swim with sharks and sting rays. The location was 5 min. from the port.
The Mexicans running the show were funny. Claiming they were a rescue business and some of the sting rays are brought to them but some of the sting rays just "find them". Then something about touching the sting rays along their belly where they are ticklish, but if you don't want to pet the sting rays you can pet the Mexicans and they are ticklish too.
I'm not sure why they dared everyone to lick the sting rays!
Overall, it was a fun experience. We got to snorkel with the sting rays and sharks but the nurse sharks weren't real lively. Then we go to swim and play on the trampoline for a while before being taken back to the ship on what was essentially a 15 min. booze cruise! But hey, even sober, we had lots of fun dancing!
Oh yeah, and they had a crab race!
🎵This is how we dooo iiiitttt! 🎵
Escargot anyone?!
There was a balloon drop on 80's night! Super fun besides the black lady I apparently angered because she was sitting in the middle of a dance party and my bum was in her face... even though she was a table length away from me.
Nights were for second dinner, hot tubing, lots of laughing and telling old stories. The Shaws, Shaheens and us were inseparable in dental school. We always went out together on the weekends, spent holidays and celebrated every birthday and special event together. It was so fun to be back together again.
Bron never gets enough snuggling! Megan is not a "toucher". We were laughing so hard.
Sunday was problematic because we had to be off the ship by 9am but our flights weren't until 8pm and we had all our luggage! We brainstormed many options and landed on Bron booking two rooms at a Marriot hotel downtown with his member rate and sneaking us all in just so we could have the day at their pool. It was only a half mile away so we figured, easy peasy, we'll just walk. Um, 0.5 miles turns into 7 when you have 12 children and 25 pieces of luggage! We were a SIGHT. Like middle class homeless refuges truckin' it through a very upscale part of town. We didn't think the rooms would be ready but figured they could at least store our bags. Well, were in luck! They had two rooms ready at 10am and they were veddy nice. Veddy nice. We descended on that fancy pool scene of thong clad influencers with our dozen, wired children like seagulls on unattended French fries. It was a roof top pool that overlooked the harbor. The kids had a ball. We bought ridiculously priced pool food and lounged all day. Then went back to the rooms to shower before heading to the airport. Even at the airport the kids were inseparable. Always hard to say goodbye! What a great warm-up cruise, haha!
These two got name bracelets in Cozumel. And I got me some Mexican vanilla!
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