A few weeks ago I had the amazing opportunity to fly to Ft Lauderdale Florida and meet my friend Misty for a week of fun in the sun.
Misty is one of my closest friends from NYC and is a actress/singer with a 10 month contract on a Holland America cruise ship as a lead singer in their evening shows. She is amazingly talented and is getting to do what she loves to do while sailing to beautiful places around the world. A perk of her gig and a perk of being her friend is that I got to join her for a week aboard the ship as a free guest! Yes it was amazing!
This trip was an answer to prayer on so many levels. I've been wanting to take a fun tropical vacation for awhile but logistically just haven't been able to make it work. Although this trip was booked before I knew I was moving to Birmingham, it ended up being great timing for me to step away from my new life and spend time with the Lord and with a friend who knows me well.
Our first stop was to a private island in the Bahamas called Half Moon Cay. It was picture perfect with clear water and pristine beaches. We laid by the water all day, swam, walked along the beach, listened to the band sing beach tunes, and soaked up the sun. Misty told me before I went that I was going to fall in love with this place and I definitely did. It was a very simple island (with no civilization except for the people who care for the island) and just a very beautiful place!
The days we were at sea I spent a lot of time with this view....
I read 3 books while I was on ship, met people from all over the world (I was definitely one of the youngest passengers as the majority of the guests were in their 60s!), and just enjoyed being outside surrounded by water. We actually went through several bodies of water including the Atlantic, the Caribbean, and the Pacific.
In the evenings we would go to dinner and then Misty had performances several of the nights. It was really fun to get dressed up and enjoy the night life the cruise.
I've always known Misty is talented, but it was so fun to get to see her perform and to see her doing what I know she loves to do so much!
On Super bowl Sunday the ship hosted a super bowl party.
The only sad part was that because we were streaming the game in we couldn't watch any of the commercials (which in my opinion is the best part of the whole game).
In addition to hanging out with Misty it was fun to hang out with her casts and friends on the ship. It was also fun watching Katy Perry perform in the half time show with a bunch of professional singers and dancers:-)
Our Second stop on the ship was to Cartagena Columbia. This port was also amazing. Cartagena is a quaint town that is super colorful and has a very European feel. We took a cab from the ship to the downtown area and spent our time there just walking around enjoying the scenery, eating at a great restaurant, and taking pictures.
I was finally able to get my Coca Cola Light which I had been very excited about!
After hitting up Columbia we sailed through the Panama Canal on our way to Costa Rica.
This was actually really fascinating to me. It's not very attractive, but so interesting how the Panama Canal works and how boats go through.
We went under this really cool bridge while sailing through the canal.
On the night of sailing through the Canal Misty and I went to dinner with the cruise director, Mark and another ship friend, Brendan. While eating a delicious dinner we sailed under the Bridge of the Americas (connects North and South America) and sailed past Panama City, Panama. It was definitely a cool experience!
The ship had a few different restaurants but below is a picture of the main dining room. Although this isn't a great picture I thought it was a beautiful dining room.
Because I was with Misty and because the girl loves to dance (and always bring out the dancing in me) we definitely danced several nights! The below picture is from a sock hop one night.
Misty and I hadn't seen each other since August and now that we live in different places it was really fun to get so much one on one time with her. We had a great time with a mixture of good conversations and lots of laughter and fun!
One night we went to the italian restaurant on board with her friend Sheryll and Josh
Her entire cast really was amazing! I normally went to both shows each night they performed and loved them!
We often hung out in the Crows Nest (a lounge on the top deck of the ship) after the shows to listen to music and dance!
My last day was in Costa Rica
We got off in Puntarenas Costa Rica which was another small coastal town.
We tried walking along the beach but the sand was so hot that we just snapped this picture and ran to shade. ha
This beach wasn't nearly as beautiful but it was a cute town. It was just really HOT. I definitely forgot that it was January while on the cruise. I can totally see why people go on tropical vacations during winter. It felt so good to be out in the sun during a month that is normally so cold and gloomy!
We camped out at this open cafe along the beach and took turns walking around and shopping. We also ate lots of food!
Costa Rica was where we had to say good-bye as I actually had to get off for good to go home and the ship kept going to finish their cruise (the rest of the passengers got off in San Diego)
I had a driver pick me up in this town and drive me the 1.5 hours to San Jose where I spent the night and flew back to Birmingham.
It was so hard to leave this amazing vacation and come back to real life, but I am so thankful for the week that I had and the amazing places I visited. It was definitely one of those trips that was carefree and just fun. Sometimes even vacations can be stressful if you are trying to navigate a place or make decisions, but I joked that the biggest decision I had to make was which deck I wanted to lie on that day or what Ice cream flavor I wanted for dessert. :-)
Thank you Misty for gifting me this week of memories and a vacation that was so incredible!
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