Cute Martinos

McKenna wanted me to take a picture with her one Sunday. Then she wanted to take one of her mommy and brother. I have to say, she's quite the photographer!

My missionary visited!

The missionary that baptized me, Glenn Nielson was in Texas on business the last weekend of January and got to visit us and go to Sunday dinner with the family. I was so excited to see him. It had been 5 years since I was baptized and I hadn't seen him since I went to Utah to visit in 2006. He got to meet Joseph and Jonathan for the first time and he came with us to Joseph's parents to meet my new family. It was great catching up and hearing about his wife and baby on the way. Love you Nielson!

Barbados

Barbados was cool, but honestly it was hard to top Dominica. Our tour guide took us all over the island. We went to a Flower Forest, a Wildlife Reserve and we snorkeled with turtles.

The Barbados coastline in the background

Beautiful!

The flower forest was nice. It was cool to see all the different kinds of flowers and vegetation growing on the island. I finally learned how to use the macro lens on my camera so here are a few of my favorite flower pictures from the forest.

I loved this tree's roots.

One of my favorite parts was getting to feed a green-tailed monkey. Not a caged one, but a real-life wild monkey. The reserve was open air, meaning any of the monkeys hanging out there (no pun intended) could leave when they wanted. They would sleep there overnight and then leave in the morning to do their thing. They'd come back late afternoon to eat and then they'd leave again until night fall. We walked through the reserve when zero monkeys were there and I was thoroughly disappointed. I really wanted an interaction with them. I heart monkeys. We got to see a lot of other animals though - deer, peacocks, HUGE turtles and iguanas. There was a snake section and a ton of birds, but no monkeys. Then, just when we were about to leave, we were led to another end of the reserve and there were about 6-8 monkeys being fed sunflower seeds by one of the employees. We all just watched them but then I asked if I could feed one and he gave me some seeds and told me to squat down, open my hand and be really still. A brave male monkey approached me and took the seeds right out of my hand! So amazing! They were all so cute!

Old man monkey

See look! I'm doing it!

His little hand was so cute. So those suckers are quick!

Our last stop was snorkeling with turtles. Our guide took us a little way's from shore and showed us some sights on the beach, the most interesting being where Tiger Woods got married (this was before his drama, so we all cared more than we would have had it been after) and Simon Cowell's GINORMOUS mansion right on the water! Oh my gosh this thing was huge!

Swimming with the turtles was really neat. I dove down deeper to touch a baby one and was really proud of myself. No pictures from this as we didn't want our camera to get wet. Oh well. Mikey got some good ones. Maybe I'll post them later once I get them from him.

Dominica

Unfortunately, I have zero pictures from Dominica which totally stinks because this was, by far, my favorite place. Mike took a ton with his camera and I haven't gotten them from him, but just know, if you ever need a cool place to go, Dominica is it!

We went whale watching first thing in the morning. We saw some sperm whales which were...let's just say there are no words to describe these majestic creatures. They were absolutely beautiful!

After being out on the ocean for a few hours, we made our way to shore and on the way in, we were surrounded by hundreds of dolphins! They were swimming so fast around our boat using the wake to jump and do tricks and the ones at the front of the boat where we were were like bullets. They would swim for a while and then they'd dive really deep until you couldn't see them anymore but a whole new crop would come to the top. This was a once in a lifetime opportunity and Joseph and I were in awe at everything we saw.

Then, we went back to the ship for a quick lunch and made our way back to the tour guide's office to meet our next guy, Elvis. He was awesome! He took us on a bus trip around the island, showing us different vegetation and telling us what each is used for. Sometimes, he would stop the bus, reach out his window and grab a handful of plants. He'd pass them back to us and tell us, "this is lemongrass" or "this is used in making the perfume Chanel No. 5". So crazy! It turned out he studied botany and was very knowledgeable. We all loved him. He drove us to a place called Titou Gorge, which is a (super) cold underground river where Pirates of the Caribbean 2: Curse of the Black Pearl was filmed and we got to swim through it. Amazing. We also went to a volcanic spring and soaked for a few minutes - just me, Shannon and Kristie. It was HA-AWT! But so great. And then we went to Trafalgar Falls which are two waterfalls, Mama & Papa.

Dominica was by far my/our favorite place. I could go back in a heart beat!

St. Croix

St. Croix was a really neat place to visit. We went on an historic tour of a sugar plantation and the Laweatz family homestead. The Laweatz family settled St. Croix and made their living off the land. There are still family members alive and prominent in St. Croix, from a judge to a doctor. The house was really neat to see, and the pictures on the walls were so incredible - very old and fun to see the styles way back when.

After the plantation and Laweatz family home, we visited a small beach and I found a beautiful and huge conch shell washed up on the beach. Actually, my brother-in-law, Travis saw it first but he graciously told me I could have it. I was thrilled. I've always wanted to find a big, perfect shell from a beach far away and I finally did! Thanks Travis! It proudly sits on the bookshelf in our living room.

Sugarcane plantation ruins

After we loaded back on the bus, our driver stepped outside to a tree right by us and started picking fruit. Kristie, being the brave soul she is, walked out to him and asked him what it was and if she could have some. It tasted mildly sweet but also fuzzy. It was more of a seed that you just scraped the fruit off of in your mouth. There it is in between my teeth.

The Laweatz Family museum. Such a beautiful house.

Me and Althea, our tour guide. She was awesome. Don't mind the wet stain on my shirt. I found an "orange" in the yard and she said I could eat it. It looked like an orange but tasted like the cross between an orange and a lime, very tart but I thought it was great. As you can see from the remnants on my shirt. Keepin' it classy!

Hanging out at a beach on our way back to the ship.

We also went parasailing later in the day. I had never done this before and was super excited. It was a lot smoother and much more relaxing than I thought it would be, but awesome nonetheless. You wouldn't believe the color of the water from way up there. You could see the different color blues where the depths changed and the island was so beautiful.

On our way to the cruise ship after parasailing, we decided to jump off the pier. Our tour guide from parasailing, Dylan (he was from Colorado) told us it was okay to do, so we did. It was about a 15-20 foot drop into the water. I did a couple of back flips off the pier and everyone else jumped off and we'd climb the ladder nearby and do it all over again. Next thing we know, an officer approached us. I looked at Mike and said, "Do you think he's coming over here to stop us?" and he says, "Well, we might as well get one last jump out of it!" and we, along with Shannon, quickly jumped in again! The officer said, "You all trying to get me to do a lot of paper work?" We were a little confused what he meant by that until he said, "Well, there are too many of you to arrest...looks like you all just slipped..."! That was our run-in with the law, Caribbean-style.

St. Kitts

Our next stop was St. Kitts. We had zero plans once we docked so we decided to find a nice beach to relax on and go from there. Our taxi driver was so nice and showed us some great views on the way to Cockleshell Bay. I mean really, couldn't you just spend the rest of your life here? I could!

Our driver showed us this amazing view - the Atlantic is on the left and the Caribbean is on the right. So pretty!

We rented a bed on the beach. I'd always wanted to do this. That's Nevis in the background, along with a naked baby. I didn't even want to think about the sand getting in crevices of that poor child.

We're on a deserted beach called Banana Bay right next to Cockleshell. It was separated by a small peninsula you walked around but this was not a good place to relax. There was just this small piece of beach you see here so your stuff would get soaked each time the surf came up. Still beautiful and nice to be alone.

Once we got out of our taxi, this guy walked over to me and placed his monkey on my shoulder. I could really make that dirty, but I won't. This is a family blog.

Church in St. Thomas

Our first stop on the cruise of a lifetime was St. Thomas. That was a Sunday, so Dad found a branch about 20 minutes from the dock and we rode a taxi into town. It was really cool to go to church in a new place. Everyone was so nice! Two of the most amazing ladies gave talks - Sister Krout, the newest sister missionary in that area and Sister Guilene Finch. Obviously, I knew neither one of them, but after listening to their talks, I felt as though I truly knew their hearts. They were such amazing ladies and very steadfast in the gospel. It was a joy listening to them.

One older woman, from the looks of her around 70 or so, took one look at Dad and said, "You need some sun! That's just not natural!". It was pretty hilarious. She was so concerned for him because Dad isn't the tannest of men, and her bluntness just took us by surprise! We all laughed pretty hard. It definitely went in the quote book Kristie was keeping.

In the open air taxi, about to leave the dock

The driver drove like a maniac! It was like a rollercoaster.

The fam outside the church building

After church, we came back to the ship and changed. We went to a place called Coral World which was a really cool interactive aquarium. We got to see a shark & stingray feeding, pet a shark and watch a sea lion production. Then, we all got to feed stingrays ourselves. That was really cool. I've never been near stingrays and have always wanted to swim with them, or have some kind of interaction. They were really funny because as soon as the Coral World trainer brought us to their aquarium, they seemed to get so excited like they knew what time it was. We were able to sit on the side and stick our hands in and pet them while she told us how they lived and what their temperment was like. They were really gentle and seemed to really like being pet. Then she showed us how to feed them. One stingray in particular would come up and want to be fed, and when you lifted his "nose" to drop the fish in his mouth, he would squirt water at you out of excitement! Needless to say, they nicknamed him Squirt. I thoroughly enjoyed this part of the day.

A baby nurse shark we got to pet. She felt like sandpaper.

Petting the baby nurse shark

Learning how to feed stingrays. This was one of the coolest things. The stingrays felt like giant portobello mushrooms!

This guy was way excited!

After Coral World, we walked over to a famous beach called Magen's Bay. It was beautiful and the weather was amazing. We couldn't have asked for a better first day.

Me & Kristie with our new favorite smoothie guy. I forgot his name but he made the BEST pina coladas (virgin of course) known to man! He used all natural ingredients and no sugar added. He even filtered the water used to make his ice. Now that's legit!