35th Anniversary Cruise

Ballyhoo

Me looking like a lure and ballyhoo.

Some kind of parrot fish, trying to get away from the Old Guy :)

Can't find my fish book, but whatever this is, it was off St. Kitt's.

Spiny Urchins also off St. Kitts.

More fish I cannot ID right now because I do not know where I put my fish book!

The Old Guy and I took a Southern Caribbean Cruise for our 35th anniversary.  This was back the last of Oct, first of Nov 2011.  I did not sit down and blog it at the time, and it was a wonderful adventure so I need to record it!  We visited 6 islands and snorkeled off 5 of them.  We surely should have bought more underwater disposable cameras.  It was a fabulous, fun trip that I dearly hope we can repeat!  I do not believe we have been alone for this amount of time (9 days!) since Kelly was born (34 years ago!)  And Oh. My. Gosh.  We really enjoyed the snorkeling!  We saw rays near St Thomas (Christmas beach I think?)  Ballyhoo (so cool!) near St John; we found beautiful paper thin sand dollars off St. Kitts, did a mud bath thing and braved HIGH seas (7-8ft swells) off St Maarten, saw a volcano area (much like Yellowstone) and some beautiful deep blue/black fish with yellow spots (still no fish book and did not take pictures at our first snorkel spot, so...) on St. Lucia.  We could NOT find a good place for saucy red beans and rice on Puerto Rico (anyone we asked said, "My mamma's place!"), but we did enjoy a long walk and a nice lunch in Old San Juan.

On Barbados it took so long to debark that we missed our "snorkel with the turtles" trip, and the snorkeling was not too good at the hotel beach where we stayed.  Still, we got these beautiful conch shells to give the kids from an old guy who was missing teeth and really needed a bath (!!)  Worked out perfectly to get everyone a shell on the last day.  I did not spend any time hunting for presents, since I hate shopping and so do not usually buy souveniers even for the kids (I know, rude... but my minimalist self does not want to bring home useless stuff, and my cheap self does not want to spend money on stuff to bring home that will only get lost or tossed.) These shells will look great on my someday to be finished whirlpool tub edge :)

 St Lucia.

 Towel Creations every evening in our stateroom.

St Kitts, Atlantic Ocean on the left, Caribbean on the right.

 St. Maarten mud bath.

St Lucia

 St Lucia remote beach resort.

Shipwreck Beach Bar and Grill... We had the place pretty much to ourselves for the better part of the day!

 Captain Kimmie of St Thomas (John and I were the only two people on this snorkel trip!)

Mongoose at the Shipwreck Beach Bar on St. Kitts.