A Week of Cruising- Wednesday

Nassau, Bahamas

The day started out the usual way of Laura and I enjoying breakfast outside.

After lunch we watched as the ship pulled into the Port of Nassau. Another ship was already there and there were people coming in and out of the ship. We decided that our ship was without a doubt much prettier because it had colorful pictures on the sides and the other ship only had words. I should mention here that When we got off the ship we were both sweating bullets within just a few minutes because of the humidity.

We noticed once again that the water literally changed colors drastically. We could see the tour guides lining up to take us to our distinations. We even saw a pirate or two or three. (not real ones mind you. Here is an interesting tidbit of information if you ever go on a cruise. They will take pictures with dressed up people just to try to get you to buy the pictures.)

Our tour that day consisted of a city tour with stops out Fort Fincastle, Fort Charlotte, and the Queens Staircase.

It ended with a tour of the Pirate museum. A must see if you are ever there.

Our Tour guides name was Carvin. He told us that if we forgot what his name was to remember it's what you do with your turkey.... He was a big black man of about 250 to 300 pounds and he had the most awesome Bahamian Accent which he called broken English. It was very quick and many of his words ran in together.

I learned some very interesting facts about Nassau such as the fact that if you see a pink building, it is going to be a government building.

Carvin said they based the color off of their National Bird, the Flamingo. I also learned that the Baptist church is the offical State church in the Bahamas.

I also learned that the Bahamas consist of a large collection of islands and if you are rich and interested and want to retire somewhere in the Warm south, you can buy your very own island.

Nassau has many hills and everyone of them has some sort of fort on top. When you go to the top you can see for miles around.

The government will not stand for law breakers. If you break the law you will either pay with your money (and not cheaply), your time (more years in prison than we Americans could ever imagine), or your life (if you kill, you be killed. Captial punishment is awesome.)

It was rather odd riding around in the van because the drivers side was on the left hand side, they drove on the opposite side of the road then we do, and there aren't any stop signs or red lights except for something like 150 of them. Road rage does not exist there. Who ever is sitting at the cross roads first, gets to go first.

One of our interesting tour stops was the Queen's Staircase. It used to be called I believe the 64 Steps for the 64 steps that were carved out of the mountain side. We were told that it was carved by hand out of the stone face by hundreds of slaves that were forced to work long hours on it after they finished their work for their masters. They work on it for 10 years and never knew that sometime during those 10 years they were freed and could have stopped. But no one ever told them, so they continued for many more years. It is not a staircase for the weak and weary. It goes pretty much straight down.

During our time at Fort Charlotte, I helped the economy by buying two necklaces and a bathing suit wrap.

At last we ended our tour at the Pirate Museum where we entered a replica of a pirate ship and took a tour of the lives of different pirates. We even entered into a battle with Black Beard himself. Of course we were on the winning side and he was killed in the end and we survived.

After that we learned that many stores in the Bahamas close down much earlier then here in the US. Many were closed by 5 :(

We had grad plans of going into certain stores and buying them out :) But of course they ended up closing before we got there. At least I can go to the website. (Anyone interested in products that turn color in the sun go to www.delsol.com There's some really cool stuff in that store!)

We were able to stop in Diamonds International and get our free charm bracelets. And after taking a tour of down town, we stopped at a few shops that all the other tourists were visiting and bought some more stuff. That was so much fun.

We also stopped at a little plaza before heading back to the ship and bought some intereting jewlery. Did you know that you can make pins and earrings out of fish scales? Those were really cool. Laura bought one for her sister, but decided not to tell her that they were fish scales.

We got back on the ship in time for supper and I have to say that once again it was wonderful to sit down.

They had a little bit of heaven for supper that night. A chocolate mousse cake. I am convinced it is going to be in Heaven. It was SO GOOD! Of course I had to make sure it was good with a second piece.

Laura and I finished the day by watching two movies. The first one was August Rush with one of my favorite child actors, and the ever Favorite Movie of mine Enchanted. By the time the movie ended around midnight, Laura and I both were almost completely asleep.

Laura had plans of seeing the sunrise so we set our clock for early because not only were we going to see a sunrise, but Snorkeling was at 8 in the morning.