Cruise Departure Day

Sunday 3/2/08

Our final vacation day. Our flight home wasn't until 5pm... and I thought we might sleep in a little and be some of the last people off of the ship. Instead... we signed up for one last excursion. A visit to the Everglades. So instead we had to meet our group to get off the ship at 7:30. That meant we were up at 6am to finish getting packed and ready and get breakfast before getting off the ship.

Everything went pretty smoothly. Well... actually... our breakfast took FOREVER. (I'm not quite sure why it took longer than every other morning.) Oh and I better not forget how we got off the ship and waited for our luggage to meet us in the ship terminal... and it took about an hour and a half. Getting up at 6am... and we almost missed the excursion. But, we made it.

One last view off of our balcony. Miami at 6am.

We made it to the tour bus and our (slightly annoying) tour guide gave us a little bit of Miami history on our way to the Everglades tourist location. Once there we took an airboat ride through a section of the Everglades.





We also saw a short presentation about alligators.


This man tried his hardest to convince us that alligators are lovely creatures. We only believe they are monsters out to get us because that's what sells on tv. It was impressive to watch him feed them and scratch their heads and rub their backs... but you're still not going to convince me that if they saw me walking by they wouldn't try to eat me.


After a quick lunch we were back on the tour bus and headed to the airport. Our plane left Florida about on time... and arrived back in New Jersey about on time. Once again... we had a really lovely vacation, but were happy to be home again. (Especially Zoe... she had spent 3 days telling us "We need to go home now" every time she got tired or upset.)

So that should be it for the vacation posting for, well, for as far ahead as we can plan. We may take a day trip or two... but otherwise our summer vacation will involve my giving birth. After that, I guess the vacation planning will involve discovering the temperament of this little girl we haven't met yet... maybe she'll be an early traveler. Or maybe Zoe will continue to be insistent on "going to Grammy and PopPop's house now!" It's all I've heard for the last week. Anybody know of any flight sales?