So we decided to take the month "off" and be "home" for the month of December. Although we have not been working in the hospital we have been on the go and not really at our house in Durham. After getting home from Connecticut on Thursday December 3rd we unpacked the car and repacked our bags to head to Asheboro, NC for the weekend for Brian and Jen's wedding! They had a beautiful wedding and we had a blast hanging out with friends and family! So after getting settled in from the wonderful wedding weekend we unpacked those bags and repacked our bags with shorts and sandals and headed to Ft. Lauderdale for a 10 day cruise to the southern Caribbean. Our 10 day cruise had 6 ports of call. First port was at Half Moon Cay, Bahamas. This was Holland America Cruise Line's (the cruise line we were on) private island. So the only people on the island consisted of the people from our cruise boat. We had fun here horseback riding on land and in the ocean! This was an experience for me since I had never been on a horse before. I survived! After the horseback ride, we relaxed on the beach and went swimming! Our second port of call was Tortola in the British Virgin Islands. We were supposed to go kayaking but it was cancelled so we did an island sailaway. This consisted of sailing on a catamaran to Norman Island and went snorkeling in the caves and then we sailed to a private beach and then we sailed back to the port. This was a WONDERFUL day! 3rd port of call was Martinique. We didn't do an excursion at this port we just shopped around and hung out on the beach and did some more swimming! 4th port was Barbados...MY FAVORITE place that we went to!!!! Even though I didn't get to go swimming with the sea turtles (it got cancelled b/c of a swell the night before) I loved it here. You will never see prettier beaches or clearer water!!! So instead of swimming with the sea turtles we snorkeled around a couple of sunken ships. After snorkeling we went to the beach and I did the banana boat and water tubed. It was an awesome adventure, but I do wish I would have gotten the chance to swim with the turtles :( Our 5th port of call was St Lucia. At this port we did a zip line through the rain forest. This was an awesome adventure! There were 10 different stations set up throughout the rain forest and we zipped to each station. Our final port of call was in St. Marten. This was my second favorite port. At this port we were supposed to go deep sea (bottom) fishing at noon and our boat got there at 10 so we thought it would be a good idea to go to the beach at the airport to watch the planes land about 50 feet overhead but what we didn't know was that there is a lot of traffic in St. Marten so we pretty much drove out to the beach (in a taxi) and had to turn around and go right back to port b/c it was time for our fishing trip. We got back just in time for our fishing trip which by the way we both caught 3 fish but mine were bigger! This was another fun port that I would like to go back to as well as Barbados! We had fun at our ports of call and we relaxed on our sea days. Overall it was the BEST vacation I have ever been on!
Sadly enough all goods things must come to an end...we came back to NC to 14 inches of snow on the ground...BOOOO. Yet again we got home from the cruise to unpack and repack to leave for the NC mountains for the holidays. We are spending 5 days in the mountains with Patrick's parents and 5 days at my parents in good ol Bladen County.
Today is the 25th (or at least it was when I started typing this) it was a wonderful day and a very sad day. My parents dog Roxy passed. She was a WONDERFUL dog and will be greatly missed. She was loved and lived a happy life of an (un)typical farm dog. I couldn't think of a better life for a dog than riding in the back of the truck, hunting and taking walks around the farm with her mom. Roxy fought and won several battles...she was struck by lightening and hit by a bullet but I guess there are some things a super-dog just can't beat :( We love you and miss you Roxy!
