A Christmas Cruise

Normally we spend Christmas with family in Canada, or family comes from Canada to our house.

This year we decided to celebrate Christmas in a more traditional way... by taking a cruise to the Bahamas.

Ya know, as our ancestors didn't do.

So after class on the last day of school for the kids we piled into the Minivan of Destiny, and drove to Jacksonville, and got on a ship for 5 days of fun and sun.

These are some pictures, starting with the one on the upper left, of Abigail on our ship, the Carnival Elation.

This is the ship at night.

 And this is the ship in the morning.

 On Christmas Eve we went to a private island in the Bahamas and played with some sting rays, as was foretold by prophesy.

 On Christmas Day we hung out on a beach on another private island, as one traditionally does during the holidays.

 While us adults swam, then sat on chairs and watched the world go by, the kids started digging a hole.  Pretty soon they made friends with some local teenagers and they all dug an impressively large hole in the beach.  Good times were had by all.

 This was a seriously big hole.  Both kids could sit inside it, with a good 6" of clearance above them to the top of the hole.

We did a bunch of other things, but I completely suck at taking travel photos lately.  We saw shows, played in pools, drank pina coladas, spelunked for rubber duckies, and ate a lot of food.  However I'll leave you with this dramatic shot of life at sea.

Have a Happy New Years, all!

CRAM: A Sunset Cruise

A few months ago as my wife and I walked around the Vancouver waterfront, we decided that walking beside the water is nice.. but we'd rather be on the water.

So we decided to take a cruise around the bay.

Although, you have to ask yourself, especially when you are sans-kids, and armed with cameras, what is better than a cruise around the bay?

A sunset dinner cruise around the bay!

So thats what we did.

True story.

So we put on our pirate hats and hatched a plan to stow away on the good ship Constitution, currently docked in port on the north shore of Vancouver. Our plan (purchasing tickets from a ticket agent - crazy right?) worked like a charm.  The captain never suspected anything was amiss....

... and we soon departed on a journey around around Stanley Park into English bay, and thru False Creek (which is really a fairly wide water way that cuts thru the city, but dead ends (which I presume is the false part).

It was a 3 hour tour, and you all know how well those go... right Gilligan?

(really it was 2 hours, but 3 has a more theme song feel to it, ya know what I mean?)

All the while we dined on roast beef and pacific salmon, and got great views of the city during golden hour.

Along the way we saw some of the funkier aspects of the city.

As you can see from these photos, the sky was overcast and there was not a lot of sunset to be had.  A tad disappointing, but we made due by focusing on the skyline, and some of the other epic views.

Lions Gate Bridge being one of the most striking.

Interesting story... as we were passing under Lions Gate bridge, we saw police lights on one spot on the bridge, and police boats racing towards the bridge.  Us boat-folk theorized that there was a jumper.  However after 10-15 minutes all the cops skedaddled, so if it was a jumper, he didn't.

So we continued on, and were soon treated to the sight of Canada Place lit up at night. It looks a lot like this:

She's a beauty, eh?

Shortly afterwards we docked, and headed to the hotel.

Tomorrow should be interesting - we're heading straight out of town and heading to the Gates of Hell (if I read the map right.)  Should be interesting.

Lenoir Cruise

During the warmer months, Lenoir NC holds a classic car cruise on the first Saturday of every month.  Many of the downtown streets are closed and lined with hundreds of classic cars.

This evening we checked out the action.  My parents are in town, and they came with.  Dad was starting to re-live his youth.  It was... disturbingly nostalgic.

These are some pics I took of the cars.  I'm still working on figuring out how to master my camera.

Punch Bug!

Not all the cars are fully restored...

Dad beside a car that is one year off from his fathers very first automobile.

Zeke looking for Papa with his "binoculars"