Beautiful Belize and St. Patty's Day!
We awoke bright and early on a cloudy 17th of March....aka St. Patty's Day! Pilar and I quickly suited up, ate our breakfast (room service actually arrived on this day) and headed down to the nightclub to meet up with the boys and with the rest of the people who were going on the snorkeling excursion. Once we had all arrived, we made our way down to the bottom of the ship and boarded the double decker boat that would taxi us to our snorkeling site. As I mentioned, it was a little cloudy and chilly since it was around 8:30am, and there were intermittent rain showers. These factors did not do anything to help my nerves. It may sound silly, but I get really nervous about the smallest things, and this was one of them. I was nervous the water would be cold, nervous I would inhale the water, nervous I would panic, nervous I would get seasick as my brother had when he snorkeled (and we share the same motion sickness issues). Needless to say, I was a little nervous.
Our tour guides on the boat were awesome Belize natives with very thick Jamaican-like accents. They were pretty funny, too. They distributed our snorkles, flippers, and life jackets as we approached our destination. Once we arrived, they gave us the go ahead to jump on in to the water. I followed Pilar out and eased my way on in...and the water was perfect! I fumbled around a little bit, trying to figure out how to breathe and how to make my mask comfortable, and once I got it, I was off. I stayed with Pilar and the guys for a little while, but I soon found myself so completely amazed by all of the life under the water that I ventured way off by myself. I can't explain how awesome it was being out there under the water and seeing the different types of exotic fish and vegetation. I found myself praying a lot while a swam around. This was such an incredible example of just how small we are and how vast God is, that there is an entire world under the ocean that we rarely experience. It was funny, because I would be peaceful and prayerful, and then I would see a cool fish or some colorful coral and would think, "That's fu***** awesome!" I don't generally use a lot of profanity, but this would pop right into my head, and I think that will suffice to say how beautiful it was under those turquoise blue waters.
I think I snorkeled for about an hour and a half or so and then happened upon Pilar on my way back to the boat. We both got back on and ran into Chris who had ended his snorkeling early due to motion sickness issues. There is so much irony in the fact that I NEVER got seasick at any point on the cruise but Chris and Travis both had issues with it. Poor little guys. Anyway, we turned our gear back in and headed to the second deck of the boat for some sun and some rum punch. The sun had come out by this point and our tour guides had graciously made some delicious rum punch for all of us. This was one of my favorite parts of the cruise...sitting atop this boat, gliding over gleaming turquoise-colored waters with the wind flying through my hair, sipping on rum punch, and listening to 90's music. I was sitting next to a really nice older couple from Canada (Pilar and I found that we only ended up meeting older people...not really sure what this says about us,) but this couple was really cool.
By the time we made it back to the ship, we were all in a pretty good mood and I especially was ready to start celebrating St. Patty's day with a Long Island in the hot tub. We did precisely this, and had full access to the hot tubs since everyone on the ship had left to explore Belize. We had decided that the snorkeling would be our only exploration in Belize, espeically since the boys had been there the year before and had said that there really wasn't much to see on land. I believe we made a great decision by staying on the ship because we had pretty much the whole thing to ourselves. We just lounged and enjoyed the incredible water and relaxing day for the rest of the afternoon. Chris worked out and then passed out in the cutest little bear cub position...
After our lovely day in the sun, we returned to our rooms, showered, and napped. We joined the boys for dinner...lovely as always, and then headed back up to our room to prepare for our St. Patty's day festivities. I had come prepared with a lime green flashing necktie that I loaned to Chris and I was already wearing a green dress, so Chris and I were safe. Travis decided to safety pin a green apple onto his shirt and fasten some green shot glasses to his head that he would later use to borrow drinks from strangers. Pilar decided to take part of our green luggage tag and pin that onto her dress. We definitely looked ready to party.
Next stop: Cozumel!
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