It's cruising time!

  

 Well, on Sept. 25th, we checked in and boarded the ship for the next 18 nights - our new home away from home.  Interior cabin, deck 2.  This post will detail our time "on" the Royal Caribbean Rhapsody of the Seas, repositioning cruise from Honolulu to Sydney.

So, these are the boys bunk beds that our cabin steward folded down from the roof each night and put away each morning!  There were ladders, a safety rail and nowhere to fall except directly on top of mom or dad.  Luckily, only a pillow met that fate, but gave Dave quite a fright none the less in the middle of the night!

The upper deck gave great views and lounge chairs for reading (or Nintendo DS for the boys) and many hours were spent here.

 

The upper deck also had the infamous 30-ft rock climbing wall (which Jackson is looking at in this family photo, contemplating his next challenge LOL!!)

Jackson climbed as much as he could and succeed in getting to the top 2 or 3 times each session before he got too tired.  Kids had to be 6 years old to climb . . . so Xavier was completely left out of this activity.  We usually made up for it by getting him a soft serve ice cream to eat while he was watching Jack. 

So, ironically enough, we did spend a couple of hours each day lounging around and in the pool, which the boys loved because of the waves created from the rocking of the boat, but I have no photos.  When I find a photo I'll post it . . . but it's possible that we never took the camera to the pool as the scenery also included lots of older people in bikinis and speedos baking in the sun.  I'll spare you the details.


When we weren't relaxing, reading or swimming, we were definitely eating!  The food was amazing and the company equally so!  We were seated with 3 great Aussie couples and shared a lot of yummy dinners and incredible desserts.

Yes, we ditched our children every evening to enjoy a nice adult dinner.  Thank you Adventure Ocean Kids Club!!  Does it look like they enjoyed themselves??  

 A collection of Xavier's crafts from his time on the ship.  The kids program ran from 9-12, 2-5 and 7-10 each day (FREE) and extra hours were available at extra cost for late night partying!

 So, the kids ate here at the buffet every day.  Bacon, Froot Loops and yoghurt for breakfast, pizza for lunch and usually chicken, fries, cheese and veggies for dinner.  Topped off with a sugar free chocolate chip cookie or jello.  And if they were lucky, they joined us at our dinner table for a chocolate ice cream nightcap at 10pm (one night there was even chocolate birthday cake!) 

 


Right, so there were also shows every evening, matinee movies, musical performances around the pool and in the theatre and the Centrum, art auctions, belly dancing classes, cooking demonstrations, trivia, game shows . . .  better than traveling by airplane??  No brainer.

Did we get seasick??  Yes, but only me and only on the last day at sea, because I tried to watch the movie in the theatre . . . we had rough seas for about 36 hours before arriving in Australia.  Staff place sick bags at every stairwell if it gets rough.  And yes, I had my sea bands on for those 2 days.  The first 16 days were pretty "smooth sailing".   So dramatic was the difference, that on day 17, Xavier was trying to use the toilet and exclaimed "Mommy, the floor is moving!"  Seriously, blonde child, we've been on a moving ship for more than 2 weeks and you've just noticed?? 







 
 










Of course, there was a bit of down time everyday, when the kids had to do some school work in the cabin and we had to deal with wet swimsuits, water shoes and life jackets, along with our laundry piles after getting rained on during our shore excursion, but life goes on quite happily when you don't have to cook, clean or get up with an alarm clock.  
 

But then you get the beautiful sunsets - it's a good trade-off!   The next few blogs will take you through our ports of call and our time off of the ship.  If you're ready to book a cruise here's your link at  Royal Caribbean

Hawai'i

Day 1: Waikiki Beach with Diamond Head in the background.  Actually not much width to the beach in this area, we were down closer to the Hilton Hawaiian village lagoon on this first day.  Boys loved the surf and each took a turn on a paddleboard thanks to some ladies who had rented one nearby.  We shared some shaved ice and soaked in the sunshine! 

Day 2:  Walked down to a church service complete with the worship team in barefeet, hawaiian shirts and playing ukeleles  (no photo - sorry!), all visitors were given shell leis to wear.   Then back to the beach for a late afternoon swim and sunset!  The boys used some of their American birthday money (thanks Rick & Linda) to buy these inflatable rings for the beach - great idea since they've been used on numerous other beaches now and made it to NZ with us!   

Jackson & Xavier actually love playing games like "run away from the wave" . . .

and "sit in the sand and get smashed by the surf" . . .

After the sunset, we headed to the international food market for dinner.  The boys (of course) chose pizza  . . .

 

But by the time we got our seafood plates, they had crashed!  We looked like horrible parents, keeping our children out too late etc etc - but it was only 7:30pm!!  And we had chosen a hotel about 3 blocks from the beach so we had to walk / carry them home.    We did have a balcony however, so the adults could stay up a little later and relax! 

Day 3:  We went snorkling at Hanauma Bay and Dave says he took great shots on the underwater camera . . . we just don't have the film developed yet!  Overall description:  Jackson loved snorking and swimming around in flippers.  Xavier freaked out about seeing the coral beneath him and knowing that he couldn't touch it or step on it and started screaming hysterically and in dragging him back to the beach, his mask and snorkel fell off and went to the bottom of the sea without Daddy noticing it was gone . . . it was a rental.

We had lots of big plans for our 4 days in Ohau, like climbing Diamond Head (extinct volcano) and visiting Pearl Harbour and apparently the shopping is pretty good too!   In reality, the kids liked the beach best and just begged us to go there everyday.  Who can complain about lying on a beach?  (And we had NO room for any shopping! LOL)

    

Back online . . . from down under!

I had a good chuckle this morning when I logged into the blog and realized that I'd left you all behind in Canada!  I had completely lost track. Here's our adventures with Grandma & Grandpa in Vancouver:  We had a great time at the Aquarium with fish, jellies, frogs, snakes, a sloth moving from tree to tree and eating grapes (we stood for quite awhile to watch the process!) and exploring Stanley Park. 

Beautiful views of the harbour, mountains, bridges and totem poles.  We had finally made it across the country to the pacific ocean!  The boys checked the water and it was cold!  

Reality Check:  Needing to do washing at the hotel and pack only our 4 bags which need to be under 50 pounds each!  Thanks Mom & Dad for having a "sleepover" for the boys - we stayed up until midnight packing, weighing and repacking!

 

Good bye CANADA!  

You ask how the boys managed on their first plane ride????  Thanks to the miracle of technology, they were pretty much silent the whole time!  Then we turned out the lights and they fell asleep!