Lossie Family Adventures Takes to the High Seas 2017

Ok - it's been awhile! Life got kinda crazy for awhile. It finally feels good to be back in my happy spot and writing! The summer of 2017 had a lot of "firsts" for our family! The first summer the older Chunkies did sleep away camp (loved it!) and the first time our family set sail on the high seas for a cruise! Many of you have cruise hating hubbies like mine. I'm never going on a cruise - I don't want to be shuttled around with the masses and cattle called to see the giant ball of twine and have to sit at a table and make small talk with people I don't care about and will never see again! Ok, it wasn't my IDEAL vacation, but after visiting all the places on my "list" within a 3 hour flight of Atlanta and towing along three kids who are eating me outta the house - a cruise - wasn't sounding so bad! So in March of 2016 I booked a family aft cabin suite on Royal Caribbean's Adventure of the Seas for June 2017. Yes - a year and a half in advance. Enough time to convince the hubby - and with 5 peeps in tow - you need to book WAY in advance to get a suite. Before I knew it, my kids had finished 3rd, 1st and Pre-K and sleep away camp was conquered successfully and the cruise I had planned a year and a half in advance was happening tomorrow. First of all - I love traveling more than anything! I wish I could be that woman who visited every country on Earth, because every place I go makes me realize what an amazing planet we have and how short of time we have to explore of all its wonders. I'm very excited two out of three kiddies share my passion for travel. When I was planning the cruise - I asked the two older chunkies if they would like to go on a big boat or go on a smaller boat and explore places they have never seen. They both voted hands down to go exploring! Yes - I have some cool kids! So I booked the Adventure of the Seas which departs out of San Juan, Puerto Rico and explores the jewels of the Southern Caribbean - St. Maarten, St. Kitts, Antigua, St. Lucia and Barbados with just one day at sea. With a year and a half to plan this trip - the first thing I did was take the cruise ship excursions and chunk them! I wasn't about to pay overpriced cruise ship prices and be shuttled with the masses. Using my favorite app, Trip Advisor along with Cruise Critic and Lonely Planet I researched each island and came up with an excursion/plan on my own. Now the cruise ship will warn you against this rogue behavior - saying planning your own excursions can result in death or missing the ship! Ok, I thought about this - but took on the risk! So we flew into San Juan the day the ship set sail at 8:30pm. Arriving at noon, we had plenty of time to explore San Juan, but my kiddies were too excited and wanted to get right on the ship! It was an easy 20 minute cab ride to the port. When we arrived at 1:00pm ish - it was a long long line. One of the perks of booking a suite is VIP baby, the short line was for us and saved at least an hour with an easy check in and our room key handed to us! Booking an Aft Cabin - I knew we were on the back of the boat - and yes it's a longer walk but so worth it! We had an amazing 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom suite with a sitting area, fridge and huge balcony - big enough to hold four chases and a table for four! They dropped a bunk from the ceiling so all three kids had the "kids room" and took turns sleeping in the bunk which they thought was super cool! We spent the afternoon swimming in the pool, riding the slides and enjoying our adult alcohol package. After an early dinner we retired to our suite to enjoy the view and all of a sudden we were moving and the kids were so excited! We all fell asleep to the gentle rocking of the ship and woke up with the 5:32am sunrise to the wonders of St. Maarten. After a very insightful 30 minute cab ride about the Dutch side and French side of this island nation - we arrived on the French side at Kontiki Beach Club at the recommendation of a friend. A beautiful white sandy beach with tranquil glass blue waters and mountains in the distance made Orient Beach a beach of dreams. While is it a "naked beach" we never once saw a naked or topless person - and my kids made plenty of friends - it was mostly families. At the beach club we enjoyed champagne and an amazing sushi lunch. For my non sushi eating kids, they enjoyed burgers and chicken and were perfectly happy! Around 3:30pm we said goodbye to paradise and our cab driver picked us up and we headed back to the boat. After showers we headed to the concierges lounge (included in our suite) for apps and drinks. It was very nice and our kiddies were super happy they had Orange Fanta here! Afterwards it was on the the main dining room for dinner. Food was good, it was not great but service was amazing! My youngest did not like anything on the menu and our server asked him what he wanted and he said Chicken Teriyaki - he had it made for him and brought it to our table! We were on a small ship and there really wasn't much to do after dinner and since we had a port everyday - we would just head back to our room, let the kids watch a movie and have a glass of a wine on the balcony and enjoy our amazing view! The next day we arrived in the enchanting island of St. Kitts. I wasn't expecting much from this place since the reviews I read were very average - but I did have a fun day planned. We started the day with a quick cab ride to Dolphin Discovery. We swam with the dolphins before but never in the open ocean and this time we would get to ride a dolphin too! The cruise ship price was $199 a person and did not include pictures, when I booked directly we paid $99 a person and it included ALL of our pictures. I had an amazing time with the older kiddies (minimum age is 8). Our dolphin Angela pulled us through the ocean and pushed us at warp speed. We became dolphin trainers in minutes and she responded to our hand signals. Truly amazing time! Afterwards we head to Timothy Hill where the Atlantic meets the Caribbean and then on to a dive bar called Shipwreck. We had a beverage and looked for monkeys for didn't see any. After a 30 minute stop we headed to our next stop - Spice Hill on Cockleshell Beach which has amazing views of Nevis. The roads of St. Kitts are not for the faint hearted. They are twisty, turney roads over high mountains with shear cliffs, amazing views but super scary! Spice Hill was an amazing restaurant on a huge strip of beach with breath-taking views to the island of Nevis. We a delicious lunch of salad and fish tacos. Our kids made friends with a local kid and foudn a sea puss! Hated to say goodbye to this island, but the wild monkey sighting on the way back made it worth it! I would come back to this place for sure if I could find a reasonable flight from ATL! The next day we woke up in the beautiful island of Antigua! We took a 30 minute cab ride to Jolly Harbor where we boarded Catch the Cat - a catamaran with a delightful crew of Captain Lushi, Marigot and their grand-daughter Amara. What an amazing find on Trip Advisor! The crew was so attentive and so good with our children! We made a stop at Cade's Reef and snorkeled. Our oldest pulled up a few conch shells up but they had critters so we had to throw them back. We saw tons of yellow snappers and a baracuda! Our next stop was Cow Beach - a beautiful beach with cows roaming wild! We pulled anchor off the beach and enjoyed an amazing lunch prepared by the crew of bbq chicken, salad and fruit. Sadly our 4 hour adventure was over and it was time to head back to the boat! The next day was the biggest bummer! We were supposed to go to St. Lucia where Brian and I got married 11 years and 3 months to the day! We had a vow renewal ceremony planned and our kids were so excited to go to the island where where mommy and daddy got married! But two days before our trip - we received an email we would not be going to St. Lucia because of port dredging so instead we were going to to Martinique. God must have been crying too because it was a rainy awful day. We heard story after story of people coming back on the boat, they hated Americans, yelled at them, would not accept American money and only spoke French. We decided to make it a low key day and hung out on the boat and ordered room service in our room for breakfast and lunch. Not the best of days, but it could be a whole lot worse! Our final day was on the island of Barbados. We booked a boat with others called Cool Runnings. There were three stops, swimming with the giant sea turtles, a shipwreck and a beach. The crew was over the top fun and the kids said it was the best day ever! The boat was very reasonable - $40 for adults and free for my youngest - we had three stops, unlimited drinks and a delicious lunch of fish, chicken and salads. My oldest son said he liked Barbados the best because they didn't make him wear a vest! The crew was over the top amazing with our kids, making them flowers, talking to my surfer girl daughter about surfing in Barbados and taking the oldest out to see more fish. Super fun day which ended in a dance party heading back to the port! And yes there was Brandon, our native Barbados dude, one picture turned all my girlfriends into surfers and made Barbados tourism go through the roof. Brandon - we'll be back! We had one day at sea - we slept in and spent the rest of the day at the pools and water slides and docked the next morning in San Juan. We spent two additional days in San Juan which was good and bad. I had explored the city before and wanted Brian to see it - but the kiddies were done and baked. We stayed at the Ritz on Isle Verde which had an amazing beach and the kiddies were super happy to find starfish and seashells and play in the waves. We wandered a few blocks down and found some amazing local places for lunch and sampled local favorites like Monfungo. We hired a sitter through the hotel and had a night out in Old San Juan at Marmalade - an absolutely amazing restaurant. A 10 day trip with kiddies 9, 8 and 5 was a lot - our longest vacation EVER! We had a blast on the cruise. For us - it was all about visiting amazing destinations - I treated the ship as my floating hotel, taking me to hard to reach places and exploring some amazing islands! Overall the cruise ship was VERY GOOD. The alcohol package was totally worth it, the suite is a must do, if I could do it again I would book more speciality dining - the main dining room is very average - breakfast was good - dinner was ok to good. Room service was very good and we did do that a couple of times especially on the day at sea. My very picky hubby gave this vacation a 7 - and gave the approval to book again!!! My kids said this was the best vacation EVER! With all you can eat food, unlimited ice cream and all the soft drinks you can drink - it's a kids dream! So summer of 2018 we are headed to Italy, Montenegro, The Greek Islands and Crotia. Mommy gets to see a little slice of the world and the kiddies get lots of free ice cream. You take the wins!