things that must go: cruise ship edition

well, I’m back, and that means things that must go Friday is back. While the cruise was sheer magic, there were plenty of things–even in paradise–that made the list this week, so rather than go the traditional TTMG route, I thought I’d throw in a little twist: a travel log laced with some things that must go.

I warn you, this may get a little long. If you’d like, just browse through the pictures. Or just move on to the next blog on your blog roll. Whatever works.

1.   People that dress up for embarkation day

Unfortunately, I don’t have any pictures of this incident, but on the first day of our cruise, we rode in a shuttle with a very large and very boisterous (euphemism alert) family that thought it was a really funny idea to dress up as the whole Gilligan’s Island crew. Yep. All of ‘em. Wigs and all. They even sang the song for us in the shuttle after we had flown for 10 hours straight through the middle of the night.

Luckily, once we get on the boat, we parted ways with the Gilligan monstrosity and made our way to our humble cabin where Mitch surprised me with some awesome first anniversary decorations.

and he gave me this killer locket. it’s almost as killer as arthur killer kane. if you don’t know who that is, look it up.

We sailed out of Miami, which is a pretty cool city. It IS where Dexter lives. I looked for Michael Hall everywhere but couldn’t find him. darn.

2. Elegant Evenings

Not cool. I’m on vacation for a reason. To wear sweatpants. Lots of them. And sleep. The last thing we all want to do on a cruise is dress up. Turns out, though, that elegant night is pretty much every old lady’s dream come true, and everyone gets REALLY into it. We’re talking opalescent taffeta, rhinestones, and matching clutches. Serious biz.

whatev. we did it anyway, but that doesn’t mean I liked it.

3. Humidity

This is the first time I’ve ever experienced 100% humidity. This is the first time I’ve ever felt so strongly about a thing that must go. Move it to the tip top of the list.

Our first port was in Cozumel where he headed over the mainland to see the ancient Mayan ruins at Telum. Easily the coolest thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life. Yes, it was 100 degrees with 100% humidity, and yes, I sweat 4x my body weight in salty mexi sweat, but it was still, hands down, the coolest day of my life.

why, yes, this picture with the Mayans DID cost $5. we <3 tourist traps.

4. large people that steal my seat on boats

Our second port was Grand Cayman–one of our favs. We did a tour that took us to Hell, a sea turtle farm, and swimming with sting rays.

Unfortunately, on the boat ride to swim with the rays, I had the pleasure of scooting over to make room for a very large and in charge chump, which quickly just turned into me losing my seat and leaving a half a cheek on the tiny bench. The best part was that he and his family just sat on the boat and watched while we all swam with the stingrays. Crazies.

this is hell. a really weird spot of random lava rock formations. it kinda does look like hell, but it’s definitely a tourist trap.

hangin’ with satan in cayman.

sorry the stingray ones are small. we took them with a really crappy underwater film camera, so these are scanned, and I don’t feel like cropping each one of them and then uploading them.

the stingrays were incredible. we took a 45 minuteish boat ride out to this sandbar in the middle of the caribbean sea. it was pretty much a picture straight out of a postcard. or movie. it was insanely gorgeous. most beaches that we went to on this trip were like that. incredible.

I also had some really cool videos to post, but this blog is really awesome and doesn’t let me post them because they’re “too big” along with all of my photos. just so you know, crappy wordpress installation, i’m pretty sure everyone that uses you doesn’t have to batch their photos to make them smaller and insert them all one at a time. thanks.

The videos are posted on facebook if you’re interested.

5. people that diss Jamaica

Our third and final port was Ocho Rios, Jamaica, my personal favorite of the trip. Unfortunately, a lot of the snooty cruise folk hated Jamaica because it was “too poor.” In fact, a lot of them just stayed on the boat all day instead of experiencing Jamaica. Epic, epic fail. Jamaica was amazing, and while it did smell like weed and weird fish, it was still the most beautiful place I’ve ever been.

We took a local tour for this one with this really funny local Jamaican. He knew pretty much everyone in the city and gave us a grand, cultural tour of the city.

this is dunns rivers falls–a crazy waterfall that is the premier attraction in Ocho Rios. People got in their bikinis and water shoes and actually hiked this thing. madness if you ask me.

Ocho Rios in all its glory.

lightin up. they say ganja is illegal here but….that’s far, far from the truth.

the coolest part of the tour was when our guide took us to hang out with his friends in this crazy fishing village. everything you’ve heard about jamaicans is true: they worship bob marley, they say “ya mon” regularly, and they’re all incredibly nice and laid back.

our funny tour guide holding a fish. it smelled gnarly kinda like the rasta dreads.

There you have it. Our trip in a things that must go nutshell. I apologize for the kinda crappy pics. Like I said, this blog makes it extremely difficult to upload, so see facebook for more, probably better photos.

this week’s WIN! is brought to you by this Halloween costume:

in honor of the most bizarre and random story ever. I woke up from my cabin nap one day on the ship to this breaking story. i at first felt shocked, then a little confused, and then just downright silly inside. most.random.story.ever.

if you made it to the end of this epic post, then thanks for reading. I appreciate you. And hey, if you have a thing that must go, comment and let me know so I can add it to the list next week.