3 Year Anniversary-Celebrating on a Carribean Cruise (Part 1)

We took ALOT of pictures.  I know you might not be all the interested in looking at them, but since this is my scrapbook/journal, I am going to include most of them.
May 30-July 7, 2010

We had been cruised the Mexican Riviera 2 years ago with Royal Carribean and so we decided that this year we would cruise the Carribean. We took a redeye flight to Miami, FL and left at 12:30am.  We tried to sleep some, even though we had a layover in Georgia, but I don't think it went very well.  Luckily we were just excited to go on the cruise and it didn't matter that we were running on little sleep.  Because of the luggage fees and restrictions on weight, we weighed in our bags at home on our scale to make sure they wouldn't surpass the 50lbs limit.  We were very close as I remember them being 48 and 47lbs.  Trav was able to bring a bigger variety of clothes because he didn't have to carry the blowdryer, straighter, gel, shampoo, conditioner and all the other extra things girls have to bring.  That took 20 of my precious pounds.

Waiting at the Georgia Airport (Layover)

Waiting for the shuttle to pick us up and take us to the port.

Headed out from the port with Miami in the background

Miami Beach was BEAUTIFUL

There were only so many set times where people could go and ice skate and so we took advantage of one of the first time slots just to make sure we would get in.  We had a great time regardless of the fact that the ice rink wasn't super big and we had to wear helmets.

Wanted to show the decor of the ship, but apparantly we are covering it up. :)

The first night was formal night. 

First of many towel animals. I'm not even quite sure what it is.  Maybe a gator?

Trav rockin on the Flow Rider.  I didn't dare give it a shot.  I really regret it now.

Watching people on the Flow Rider.

In the Theater

The Turtle.  Notice how nicely our bed was made.  This was done both after we got up and got breakfast and then they folded them down later that evening before we got back from dinner and theater.  It was AWESOME!

One of the many performaces they had on the Royal Promenade.  This platform was a bridge above everyone heads that moved up and down.

The Royal Promenade that went down the inside center of the ship.  It had lots of gift shops and little restraunts to eat at.

St. Martin/St. Maarten

The reason why it has two ways of saying the island name is because one side is owned by the French and the other side is owned by the Dutch.  It was really funny because every time our bus tour guide said it he would say Saint Martin and Sint Maarten really really fast.  We finally caught on to what he was saying by the end of the tour.

Arriving in St. Marin...I didn't realize how foggy it was.

Ready to go on the tour

This was a statue that was in the middle of one of the roundabouts.  It is of the people from years back when they used to harvest salt.  There was a huge salt bed to left of the statue.  That was there main industry, but now it is tourism.

The scenic look out and our ship in the distance. 

The monument marks where the dividing line of the island is for the French and Dutch sides.

We explored the marketplace.  I am standing in the middle of the marketplace.  It was really cute how it was set up surrounding this sort of ampitheater and gazebo.

So when we took our first stop the tour guide said you could shop at the marketplace, go see an old fort up on the hill, or go to a nicer mall with air conditioning.  Of course, everyone headed to the local marketplace.  We decided that we take the hike and go see the old fort.  The only other people up there was a newly married LDS couple that just happened to be honeymooning on St. Martin.  They were nice enough to take the one picture we had together at the fort. We were really glad we did.  Even though it was more like the remenents of a fort, it had a spectacular panaramic view of the island.

Our next stop was Orient Beach and the Boo Boo Jam Beach Grill.  We ate good meal and then enjoyed our time swimming in the waves.  The ocean was absolutely gorgeous.  These pics do not do it justice.

In all the reviews we had seen on Orient Beach they said that part of the beach is a nudist beach.  As you can see in the picture below, the beach went a long ways around.  We luckily did not see any nudist, but people at our dinner table said they had.  Sidenote: Not quite sure why they call in Orient Beach when it is not even near the Orient?

We really enjoyed our time at St. Maarten.  The tour bus ride with stops turned out to be great choice!

It was quite funny to see our ship compared to the Princess ship that came in that same day.  Our ship was HUGE!  It was currently the largest ship sailing the seas besides RC new ship Oasis.

2010 Carribean Cruise (Part 2)

San Juan, Puerto Rico
aka hottest place on earth.

I know that you won't be able to tell in these pictures (thank heavens), but we are sweating almost through and through.  So before we left my mom said that she and my dad had visited Puerto Rico awhile back on one of their cruises.  She said the only thing she remember was being so dang hot that it wasn't even enjoyable.  She said nothing about anything that they had gone to see.  I wasn't prepared for as hot as it ended up being.  We were lucky that we had decided to do a guided tour because we were bused up to the first fort.  It was mostly up hill.  Once we got off the tour guide said that we better have enjoyed the ride because it was walking from here on out.  You will see in the later pictures that from the first fort we could see the second fort we were going to way in the distance.  I was not looking forward to the walk.  Not because of the exercise part, that is just fine, but the fact that I would be sweating thoroughly the entire time.  When we had just headed off to the second fort we were really lucky to have a trolley stop right next to us.  The tour guide said we could hop on and he seemed to know the driver and we didn't end up having to pay anything.  It was much appreciated, even though it wasn't air conditioned!

In both of the forts, there were many tunnels that were really cool.

Where the soldiers would sleep.  Doesn't look very comfortable at all.  They told us that this was used back in the 1600's, but they had also used it during WWII.

The large round things are water tanks.  One cool thing we learned is that they built all of the things on the fort around the water collecting system.  When it rained over the castle, the water would collect and they would store it.  That is how they got their drinking water.  There were waterways everyone and they did a lot of special little tunnels and maneuvering to ensure they collected all the precious rain that poured onto the fort.

The fort was once surrounded complete by the wall you see in the distance.  As the old city of San Juan grew, they opened it up for more development area.

It is hard to tell just how big these forts were, but they were huge.  Look at the wall compared to the people.

These were some original paintings that were in the prison cell.  They are of ships.  They turned off the lights while we were in the prison cell and it was basically pitch black with a little tiny hole way up above letting in the littlest amount of light.  I can't imagine how horrible that would have been. I couldn't believe how well these drawings were preserved.  It was really cool to see them up close.

The architecture of these forts was incredible.  I absolutely loved all of the archways.

This is the one of the lookouts that is famous in San Juan.  The shape of these lookout cubbies is what San Juan is known for.

In the picture above, you can see the other fort way out in the distance with the tiny white thing coming out the middle. 

I will tell you to look in the back drop where you will see the second fort.

This was at the entrance of the second fort.  You will notice a lot of children behind me.  I think we were here on "San Juan Elementary School Field Trip Day to the Fort".  Seriously!  There were a gazillion kids.

The picture with the orange cones in it is a tunnel that we walked down on stairs.  If you look hard enough you can tell that it is really long and super steep.  They said that they had to wheel the cannons up and down the middle smooth part.  I can't imagine how hard that would have been.

This was a new technology of its time.  Before they came up with this circle that the cannons could rotate on to get the enemy at different angles, they had to have different openings all along the castle where in each opening was a cannon.  With this new technology they could have one cannon that would rotate.

I felt like I was standing in a life size rook chess piece.

We had to get a picture of Trav in front of the Puerto Rico Drug store.

This was part of the Ice Show on the cruise ship.  It actually was really great!  I wish I would have got a picture of the act that went on while all of the ice skaters were changing costumes.  This guy was in a metal ring that had poky things on the outside that stuck to the ice. He would roll around the ice in it. You know when you spin a quarter on its end and as it slows down it starts to go in a more horizontal circular motion.  Well this guy did that in this ring.  It was so cool.  This is the best I can describe it, but I hope it will spark my memory every time I read this to how cool it really was.

I loved the towel lobster!

This was our dining group.  Jason and Melanie (Florida, on their honeymoon), Sarah and I can't remember his name (Canada, they were dating), and me and Trav.  We loved our table.  Jason was absolutely hilarious and kept us laughing our heads off all dinner long.  I definitely looked forward to our table discussion at dinner.  Usually for dinner you go, you eat, you small chat, you leave asap.  Well with our group being so much fun, we turned dinner into a 2 hour ordeal every night!  I'm really glad we got put with such awesome people!!!

Catch Up Time

So I have hardly blogged a thing since the beginning of summer.  It has all been for a very good reason...I have been too busy having fun with Trav.  I have just loved every minute of the summer and I am very sad it has come to an end.  The only good thing about everyone going back to school is that this semester I don't have to because I am done for life!!! And it is finally hitting me that I actually earned a bachelors degree. But anyways, there are alot of fun posts about our summer to come.  It is catch up time.

4th of July Festivities

The 4th of July is an awesome holiday!  Not only because it involves fun family traditions, but because we celebrate our freedom in this country and the men and women that fought for it.  I'm very grateful I was born in the United States with all of these privilages and freedoms.

Well this year we were supposed to celebrate the holiday with the Guymon side of the family, but this weekend happened to be when Ray needed to herd the cows up onto the mountain for the summer, so we actually ended up spending it with the Tidwell/Ford side.  We started out the morning going to the Centerville Parade, which is tradition.  My grandparents still rope off an area in front of the white church on Main Street for us to come last minute and set up our chairs.  We like this spot because it stays pretty shady for the duration of the parade, although this year it was so nice outside, we were almost too cold in the shade. 

Josh, Shane, Brooke, and Travis smiling quickly because I was interupting their parade watching.

Brooke, Brianna, Amanda, Kevin, and Kathy

Brianna, Amanda, Reed, Sheri, Grandma Ford, and Grandpa Ford getting ready for sirens to begin.

After the parade we headed over to see my Great Grandma Ford.  The last time I had seen her was on Mother's Day and she was doing really well.  When we got there on Saturday, July 3, I couldn't help but cry.  She wasn't doing so well and she had lost a lot of weight.  We couldn't understand what she was saying, but my mom said to her, "We love you Grandma" and she responded with "I love you too" and that was all I needed to hear and understand from her.  That made me happy. I really love my Great Grandma Ford and I was always glad to see her sitting in the chair as I walked into my Grandparents house. Even though  it is sad she passed away yesterday (July 6) and is no longer with us, I know that she is happy and healthy in heaven and she gets to meet my sweet Great Grandpa Ford, Keith, who she has lived without for the past 10 years. I couldn't be more grateful for what I know happens after this life.  It makes death temporal, and it gives me comfort to know she is in a much better place.

On a happier note, after that we went to KFC to pick us up some chicken.  Our family and Kathy's family went to Bountiful Park to eat our food at the bowery.  Me, Trav, my dad, and Shane had a good time throwing the football around, and then I played frisbee with Kathy, my mom, Brooke, and Brianna.  It was the most enjoyable 4th of July weather that I can remember.  It lingered right around 80 degrees, so we were able to enjoy the outdoors all day.  After the park, we went back to my family's house and had a BBQ, played "nines", and several games of volleyball.  I didn't even realize this until the next day, but we didn't do our own fireworks and we didn't go see any fireworks.  I kind of missed that part of Independence day.  I guess we'll have to see if we can work something out for Pioneer Day.  It was such a fun and eventful day, and I'm glad we have a reason to celebrate....freedom!

**More pictures to come...hopefully**

Manti Pageant

This year we decided to go to the Mormon Miracle Pageant in Manti.  We went on Friday, June 25, 2010.  We drove down after I got off work and stopped at the Malt Shop on the way into town where we ate cheeseburgers, fries, and shared a delicious oreo shake. 

We arrived in our seats about 45 mins to show time.  There are a total of 14,000 seats set up and I bet there were about 14,000 people there.  I have seen the pageant before, but it is funny how it seemed like a whole new production to me.  It was so good!  I just loved it!  It goes through the story of Joseph Smith and him going to the Sacred Grove, and then receiving the gold plates and he begins to translate them.  This is when the play shifts to Book of Mormon stories, and then they shift back out to when Joseph Smith gets martyred.  Then they walk through Brigham Young becoming the 2nd President of the Church and the Mormon pioneers crossing the plains.  It ends with a husband dying on the plains and reunited with his wife in heaven.  They light up the temple and have angels singing on the right side of it.  It was so spiritual and I loved how much I learned and how my testimony was strengthened.  I recommend to go when they get a chance because it is free and I couldn't have spent my weekend doing anything better.

After the pageant, we drove over the mountain to Huntington to visit Trav's family.  Trav and his younger brother, Mark, played in a golf tournament and their team took 2nd place.  I spent a lot of time chatting with Marian and helping her with dinner.  We ended the night playing Apples to Apples with Adam, Heidi, Ashley, and Austin, and it was full of fun and tons of laughs.  Overall, our visit was too short, but we always enjoy spending the weekend with them.