Our Cruise According to Harper

This absolute preciousness may go down as my favorite ever travel souvenir.  I can't even stand the sweetness on these colored up pages.

I grabbed a pack of three blank books out of the Dollar Spot at Target, not really having a plan for them. (Sam says I'm a craft hoarder. Which is probably actually true.). But, as I had every inch of our clothing lying on the dining room table waiting to be packed, it occurred to me that those may make cute little cruise books for the girls and serve the double purpose of distracting them while we waited for dinner. So, at what I'm sure was probably 11:15 on a "school night," I sat down and penned the bones of a little book for each girl to tell their own vacation story.

In all fairness, Willa apparently spent her travel time fighting the color red because that's her book in a nutshell. Lots of scribbling. Lots. So, that is why hers isn't represented here. I thought you may be able to imagine that on your own.

But, here's the Cliff's Notes of Harper's cruise. Some evenings she would need some prompting-- "what did we do again?"-- (I wasn't kidding when I said there were a few of the girls ' naps that resembled unconsciousness.), but for the most part, these were her own highlights of the day.  You can likely tell from the pictures (wink, wink), but I'll go ahead and translate just in case.

Day One: Boarding the Ship in Tampa

Highlight: The Pool

Day Two:  Day at Sea

Highlight:  Lunch Date with Dad. (Sweetest thing ever. I totally thought the pool was winning again.)

Day Three:  Roatan, Honduras

Highlight:  Monkeys at Little French Key

Day Four:  Belize City, Belize

Highlight:  The Slide

Day Five:  Costa Maya, Mexico

Highlight:  Buying a handmade coin purse with her own money

Day Six:  Cozumel Mexico

Highlight:  The Dolphins

Day Seven:  Day at Sea

Highlight:  the Circus

Headed Home {Family Caribbean Day 10}

How is it already time to go home?  These precious moments with my family have gone by too quickly. It's been ten days full of belly laughs and bonding, snuggles and all the "sparkly" eyes, shining with excitement and love.  And now it's time to pack up the fun and take it back to Virginia. With the same fervor that I hate how fast this week has flown by, I hope the trip home moves at supersonic speed. Like blink-your-eyes, I-dream-of-genie fast. 

When we disembarked from our Adriatic Cruise, we chose to just carry our luggage off because we only had the two bags and we liked the idea of not having to try to find them in the terminal.  But, with all three suitcases, a stroller, and two borderline maniacs, we decided to just grab some luggage tags for the last possible time slot and enjoy our last few hours on the ship while NCL took care of our luggage.  So, we leisurely ate breakfast, and when they finally called "lime," we were ready to roll.

Harper and Fiora

We made our way through the terminal and customs without incident.  It was super chilly (like upper 40s), which didn't make it very comfortable to stand outside.  But, we still decided to wait for a few minutes for an UberXL versus hopping in one of the cabs there.  (Seriously, if you haven't signed up for Uber yet, you should.  That $60 cab ride to St. Petersburg was only $32.  It's usually about half as much as a cab would be.)  It definitely felt sad seeing our last bit of the ocean for a while, especially since we knew we were coming home to snow.

While we were waiting in the St. Pete airport, I was trying to round up someone to clear on hill so that we would be able to get up our driveway and not have to climb the hill of snow with two little girls and lots of luggage.  I found a guy who said he do it, and we called and talked to Dave, and he said he'd pick us up at the airport in his truck to take us home.  All set!

Except when we got to our house, no one had touched the driveway.  So, we pulled up our neighbor's cleared driveway and then walked across the snow.  I grabbed the girls' boots from the closet and came back to the car so that they wouldn't be walking in their Keen sandals. 

They thought it was absolutely perfect that we got to come home to snow.  Within ten minutes of being home, they were dressed in snow clothes and out the door to catch the last bit of daylight.  It was nice having them out from under me while I emptied suitcases and scrounged up some dinner.  They're really going to miss their gourmet meals now that they're back at Casa de Fertitta. 

 

And just like that, our whirlwind, belated-Christmas-gift trip is over.  It's finished, and now all that's left is this goodness waiting to sink in.  And that's maybe what I love most about travel.  The memories always get better with time.  The sweet moments will become even more precious.  We'll smile with warmth at just the thought of them.  Even the blips in travel, the times that are borderline disastrous, shift from horrible to hilarious through the lens of time.  And that's what we are gifting these girls, this time around for Christmas and I hope throughout their childhood.  That our time together, our adventuresome spirits, our commitment to do life and fun and carefree, our resilience when stuff doesn't go quite right-- that's the gift.  Even more for us than these two precious girls.  I almost can't wait for all the fun stories that we'll look back on and tell about our first big family of four trip. 

   
             

Florida Bound

I don't know if I've ever been this unprepared for a trip. (I know, I know, I say that every time, but really.) Adding the girls to the mix really ups the stress level. It's one thing if Sam and I just want to wing it with last minute travel plans, or go to multiple countries without the slightest game plan. But, my goodness, throw in two little humans who depend on us, and even a direct flight and a straightforward Caribbean cruise feel like a massive undertaking.

To get our party of four ready for this trip, I basically just had to highjack the dining room table to lay everything out. The girls' things were packed first, with each outfit, undergarment, and coordinating hairbow packaged together neatly in individual ziplock bags. By the time I finally got to packing my things, it was 1:30 a.m., and I was totally over it. So, stay tuned to me wearing the same outfit every day because I only managed to pack half a suitcase for 10 days. Oh well. At least my kids will be cute.

Sam and I had both planned to work on the day of our departure since we weren't flying out until early evening, but we hadn't necessarily planned for him to get called in to work at 3 a.m. So, he had already worked 10 hours by the time he came home in the afternoon to get changed to leave.

Kasey was super sweet to help us get the girls changed while we loaded the Yukon, and then she drove us over to the airport to drop us off. It felt kind of weird having the girls unload with us this time. 

 I had printed off everything online (since cheapo Allegiant charges you $5 per boarding pass to print them at the airport), so we checked in quickly, but then got reminded (again) why our flights only cost us $332 when they quickly told us our checked bag was overweight. Now, I have a pretty good sense at this point what 50 lbs feels like in our suitcase, and I had felt pretty confident that ours wasn't over 50 lbs. And it wasn't. It was 48 lbs. But, ol' Allegiant sets their weight limit at 40 lbs, so it was 8 lbs over. Gah. They offered for us to move some things around, so we were stuffing Sam's heavy jeans into about any bag we could. We were still 4 lbs over, so we asked if we could just pay for the overage. She happily said, "sure, for an additional $50 each way," to which Sam laughed and said, "I'll throw the jeans away before I'll pay that." haha. We somehow managed to get it down to 42, and since our other bag was only 38 lbs, she allowed the cumulative to be 80 and called it fair.

The girls played in the terminal until our plane arrived. Allegiant's 737 is actually the largest plane to fly out of Roanoke, and it looked huge compared to the AA's turbo prop plane at the next gate. The girls enjoyed learning about the difference between jets and propellers, and one of the sweet American Airlines gate attendants talked with Harper about different plane protocols.

Allegiant says the can fly so inexpensively in part because of their efficiency, and I will say that boarding was pretty quick. It could also be because they charge $30 for any carry on placed in the overhead compartment, so only a fraction of the customers have them, which cuts down on all those folks standing the aisle trying to find a place for their bag.

It was so cute watching their reaction to take off. Here's a little glimpse (and by "glimpse" I mean a six minute long video that only grandparents will want to watch, though it is cute!):

Harper literally talked the E N T I R E hour and thirty-nine minutes of that flight. So, despite the fact that I desperately wanted her to be quiet for just. five minutes. it was pretty entertaining to hear some of her comments and insights. As we were ascending, I told her we were starting to clear the clouds. A few minutes later, she randomly says, "Are we going to meet Jesus?" Ummm. That's not exactly what this not-in-love-with-flying person wants to hear. Hahaha. But, I said, "no, I don't think so. Why?" And she responded with, "Oh. Well, just that He lives in Heaven and that's up above the clouds where we are." She is so literal, that sweet girl. She thought we'd be crashing into pearly gates any minute after we passed those few clouds.

After the pilot announced our "initial descent" into the St. Petersburg area, Wills got so excited and was yelling, "we're landing! we're landing!" I am so thankful for the patient ladies that were seated together with our family. The lady beside Willa interacted with her, asked her questions, helped her do things. And the lady beside me ended up being our friend Megan's mom! Small world.

We were able to find our luggage easily and then waited for the rental car shuttle. Within about an hour, we were off in our Kia Optima, and headed to our hotel. It was only an hour, but it must've been an hour in dog years. Because with two tired, hungry kiddos, it felt like it took foooorrrrrreeeevvvvveeeerrrr. By about 9:30, we had managed to grab some to-go Chick-fil-A and get settled into our hotel room. Shew. I think we were more tired than the girls.

Altogether, our first big travel together went pretty smoothly. It was taxing, definitely, with the constant policing and correcting of the kids. But, it really wasn't terrible. Now it's time to rest up to be able to enjoy Tampa tomorrow!

Well. Unless you're Willa. 

You're Doing What? {Costa Rica Day 1}

"You're doing what?!"

If I had a dollar for every time I've heard that over the last twenty four hours, I could pay for a checked bag.  Instead I'll just roll this stuffed carry-on down the jet bridge.  But, we'll say it again, "We're going to Costa Rica tomorrow!"

There are many days where I think I may be losing my mind, but booking an international trip 26 hours beforehand may make me certifiably crazy.

 So, here's how it happened. Remember how I said we spent our ninth anniversary at Chuck E. Cheese?  Well, all day as I was driving around in beautiful, sunny fall weather, I couldn't help but miss driving up to DC with Sam last year on our anniversary. We took our big trip to Europe in June as our annual celebration, so we didn't plan anything, even dinner out, for our anniversary. Big mistake. We know going forward to at least plan something, so we don't end up on a last minute flight to Central America. :)

Sam and I chatted while he was at work, and although we had Alston's birthday party and Dad's visit the upcoming weekend, the following weekend we had free. So, Sam gave me the go ahead to look for a little weekend trip. Maybe to DC, maybe to Charlotte. And this is where the "If You Give a Pig a Pancake"-ing really begins. Well, if we are going to do DC, why don't we just mix it up and go to NYC for the weekend?  I start looking at hotels and airline award mileage charts. There's a quick flight out of Roanoke, but not with American, so we can't use my accrued miles. And my gracious, even two nights in New York is outrageous, before even factoring in food or entertainment. So, I start thinking, well, if we are going to spend that much, we might as well go somewhere warm. So, I start looking at deals for Florida. Hmmm, we could do Miami or Tampa. But, why redeem miles for those when we have such affordable flights out of ROA via Allegiant Air?

That's when I see a little blurb at the bottom about fall mileage specials to Central America.  Just out of curiosity, I decided to click on it, y'know, just to see.  Well, it turns out we could go to Costa Rica (which has been on our travel bucket list for the last five years) for HALF as many miles as it would take for us to fly to NYC.  Come again?  Then, of course, it just made sense to do a little peek on Hotwire to check out hotel prices.  And... we could stay at a 4* all-inclusive for the same price a night as a hotel in DC, and about $150 less per night than New York.  Sam was all for the "little weekend trip" to somewhere driveable, but I had a sneaking suspicion that adding another "big trip" to 2015 may not be something he'd go for.  So, like any wife that's been married nine years, I sent him a halfway kidding message to test the water.  :)  I was fully expecting his response of "you've lost your mind."  What I wasn't expecting was his next line.  "But, if we can make it work, let's do it."

What are we, crazy people?  We have jobs, kids, dogs, a house... we can't just up and go to another country.

And then we did.

We checked with Rachel to see if she could stay with the girls the few school nights, and she could.  We asked the Fertittas if the girls could stay with them for the weekend, and they said sure.  We verified with Kasey that she would be willing to work with Rachel's work schedule and help with anything Harper would need for school.  Yes, yes, and yes.  Then, on Monday morning, we checked with our respective bosses to ask off for Wednesday-Friday.  Another green light.  I asked my work partner if she could take two appointments I had with customers, and she was happy to.  Everything was falling in to place! Just to go ahead and start daydreaming, I pulled up the weather in Guanacaste, Costa Rica to send to Sam, and that's when I saw it.  Highs in the upper 80s, low 90s and... 100% chance of rain and thunderstorms every. single. day. for the next ten days.  What?!  No wonder it was all so cheap, it's the rainy season!  I pulled up TripAdvisor and quickly messaged the first ten tour groups listed to 1) ask if the weather was really as bad as it looked and 2) find out if they could even accommodate us for an excursion on this short of notice.  And maybe they were just being salespeople, but each and every one of them messaged me back nearly immediately and relayed that yes, it is the rainy season, but it usually only rains for a bit in the afternoon.  And of course they could schedule us.  They'd be happy to take our money.  :)

So.... on Monday evening at 5:55 p.m., before running out to the girls' friend Bryce's fourth birthday party, we booked the flights with my American Airlines award miles.  And then, I pulled up my eBates app, routed to Hotwire, and booked three hotels--our resort in Guanacaste, Costa Rica and hotels in each of our layover airports of Miami and Charlotte.  On Tuesday, we worked full days, came home and threw some clothes in our suitcases, grabbed our passports, and met Rachel and Mimi at the airport at 6:45 p.m. to check in for our 7:50 flight.  What. a. whirlwind.

This time around, the girls were quick to give hugs and "have a good time"s, whined about getting to go next time, and then happily hopped back in the car.  The novelty of Rachel's new car and Syd riding along with Mimi was plenty to keep them happy.

The airport was absolutely dead, but it still took us a little while to check in.  Apparently, the merger between American Airlines and US Airways was finalizing on Saturday, and we were returning to the States on Sunday.  Since it wasn't showing the return flight under their current system, it kept asking if we had visas to stay in Costa Rica indefinitely.  Eventually a manager figured out what was going on and overrode the request.  And that was our one and only snag of the entire trip.

While sitting at the terminal, I sent my TripIt (one of my must have free travel apps.  You need it for your next trip!) itinerary to my mom and dad so they'd know where we were each leg of the trip.  We had six flights with three hotels, so it was a lot to type out in an email.  It was so nice to just add them as "viewers" to our trip.  About three minutes later, I start laughing as I see an incoming call from Dad.

"Kid.  What on earth are you doing?!  Why are you going to Liberia??!"  The airport serving the Guanacaste region of Costa Rica is called the Liberia airport.  But, poor dad thought I was headed to Liberia, Africa.  Ha!  The nice thing about that misconception is when I said, "oh no, Dad, we're just going to Costa Rica," it didn't so quite so ridiculous, especially since this wasn't planned when he was just at our house two days before.

This flight timeline is the complete opposite of our Europe flight strategy.  We had plenty of time in between flights (sorry, guys, no running through the airport stories this go round!), and actually had an overnight layover in Miami before our flight into Liberia the next morning.  My only required amenity for our hotwire search here was an airport shuttle, so we got a 3.5 star hotel near the airport for $68, and it ended up being Element by Sheraton.  The shuttle was a bit slow (it was about 1 a.m. by this point), but we were so pleased with the accommodations.  Super spacious, comfy beds, and a really nice continental breakfast.  

Our one larger bag was checked all the way through to Costa Rica, so it took no time to pack back up our carryon and catch the shuttle back to the airport.  Wayyyyy better than crashing on the floor of the Miami airport for nine hours.  We are rested up and ready for you, Costa Rica!

Is That My Wife? {Costa Rica Days 2 & 3}

Helloooooooo, Costa Rica!

One of my favorite parts from any trip is the final descent into our destination airport, especially if it's in daylight.  I love having my face smashed against the window glass to catch a first peek at our newest adventure.  (By the way, I'm not a window hog.  It's just that Sam always needs to aisle to stretch out his granddaddy long legs.)

Our flight into Liberia International was easy as pie, and after standing in line at customs for an hour, we were so happy to see Julio waiting for us with a sign for Issys Tours.  When I frantically emailed around for tour recommendations and real weather conditions, I came across Issys on TripAdvisor.  They had great reviews and their prices for transfers seemed reasonable, so we set up our transportation and a tour with them.  So within minutes, we had our luggage and were in an air conditioned vehicle with cold bottled water on our way to the Occidental Grand Papagayo Resort. 

I'm a little bit of a (calculated) risk taker when it comes to vacation, and this one wasn't any different.  I actually booked our hotel through Hotwire, so all I knew about it prior to handing over our payment info was that we were staying in a four star all inclusive beachfront resort.  That's really all you need to know, right?  We aren't loyal to any one brand when it comes to accommodations, so it was fun to roll the dice and see where we would be staying.

This getaway was planned more for relaxation and adventure than for traditional touristy sightseeing, so we didn't mind a bit that the Grand Papagayo is a secluded resort.  And as much as it felt like blasphemy to our two sweet girlies at home, we loooooooved that it was adults only.  Sorry, babes!  We kept saying how much the girls would love it and we'd love to take them to Costa Rica sometime.  It just won't be here. 

As thrilled as we were to see this amazing view, we were most excited about the fact that it was 85 degrees.  And not a rain cloud in sight.  Yay for horrible meteorologists! 

After resting up and getting settled after our first full day in Costa Rica, we were up early on Thursday morning for our private "Adventure Multi-Tour" with Issys.  Julio was at our resort bright and early to pick us up for a day of fun.  In our minds, Costa Rica and ziplining have always been synonymous, so as soon as we pulled the trigger on this last minute trip, I made sure we'd have to opportunity to try it out.  

The adventure park was about an hour from our hotel, and we enjoyed seeing the small towns as we worked our way out of the more tourist-saturated areas.  It was easy to tell when we were outside the scope of local transit because the roads became bumpier and bumpier.  As Julio said, we were getting the "Costa Rica back massage."  :)  Small price to pay for all the fun that lay ahead.

We checked in with a few other folks, and got to meet some of the guides.  One asked if we spoke Spanish, and Sam said, "pequeno."  Those that speak Spanish just started laughing, because instead of saying "poco" meaning "a little," he literally just said "small."  It was even funnier when the guide said, "no, you're not small."  I can understand a bit of Spanish, but I wasn't admitting that for fear that they would only give safety instructions and precautions in Spanish.  I didn't want my life to depend on my meager high school Spanish skills.  After they fussed about us coming to Costa Rica and not speaking Spanish (noted.  Fair point.), I think they were somewhat excited that they could totally make fun of us and we would be none the wiser.  

 

First up, horseback riding!  Somehow I ended up with the biggest, feistiest horse (I'm trying not to take that as an insult.), and Sam's....was not.  He said he felt like an elephant riding an ant. Ha!  Sam grew up riding horses (his parents still have one), and I took horseback riding lessons as a child, so it was fun to ride again.  Even if it did sound like Sam was slowly murdering his poor, much too small horse.  Still, it made for an enjoyable way to get up the mountain, and the twenty minute ride was much easier than a walk would've been.

And now for the main event... the ziplining canopy tour.  We were handed some leather gloves and some brief instruction on how to hold our hands and brake ourselves.  Yes, we were fully in charge of stopping ourselves from slamming into a tree.  At first that had me a bit panicked, but it was really quite simple.  We'd have the next hour to work our way through ten platforms with ziplines up to a half mile long, traveling at speeds up to 50 mph

Though there were five other people ziplining with us, Sam was the first down the line for the majority of the rides.  I think so that he wouldn't tip the line if he went after someone since he was by far the biggest of the group.  Because of that, there were a few rides that I was a couple people behind him, and he'd wait for me on the next platform.  After a few times, I felt like I was getting the hang of it.  Sam had already taken off on one of the longer lines when one of the guides asked the other gentleman in our group if he'd like to go upside down.  He quickly answered, "Absolutely not."  And then for some ridiculous reason, I volunteered to try it.  In shock, they let me do it.  And one of the guides quickly hopped on the line ahead of me so that he could hear Sam's reaction when he saw me flying in upside down.

Sam said he was just waiting at the next platform for everyone else when he looked and thought, "Holy cow, someone's upside down.  Who had on the blue shirt?  Wait a minute.  Is that my wife?"  Bahahahaha.  He couldn't believe I did it, much less to be the first one.  I'm still kind of shocked, too.  Let me just say that I did momentarily think I was going to die.  Soaring through a canyon with the weight of your body resting on the harness around your hips is a bit terrifying, but it was nothing short of a once-in-a-lifetime experience.  Of course, not to be outdone, Sam did it on the next line.  :)

 

We hated for our ziplining time to come to an end because it was just that fun.  I would do it again in a heartbeat, and would easily say it's a must-do if you're visiting CR.  (Update:  It was actually so fun that we bought a Groupon to zipline in North Carolina and do a horseback trail ride this Spring.  Why not be tourists here, too?)  

The water slide was next, and it was fun, but more painful than the ziplining.  Cement water slides aren't for the faint of heart, as you can hear.  

To warm up after the freezing cold water slide, we went to the hot springs for a mud bath.  I can smell the sulfur again just typing that.  Our guide told us all about the healing and anti-aging benefits of this particular mud, but I kept wondering if they are secretly laughing that we are there smearing the bottom of a river all over ourselves.  Either way, we rinsed off and laid in the crystal clear hot springs for thirty minutes, just relaxing and enjoying the scenery.

 

Lunch under the lanai

I'm not sure that I would've picked to do our big excursion on the first full day we were in Costa Rica, but it was fun to start the trip off on such a high, and we could not have had any better weather.  It was sunny and beautiful the entire time we were on the mountain, and as soon as we left, we saw an afternoon storm roll in, but we never felt a drop.  Plus, we were left with three days to recover.   :)

A day packed full of fun, and still back to the resort in time for dinner.  High five.