Beaches

The first stop on the cruise was Port Canaveral, Florida. It was overcast and a tad bit chilly for a beach day, but definitely warmer than our San Diego trip earlier in the year. 

Lounging at Jetty Beach 

Tears and cuddles happened

Per tradition, a very large hole was dug and associated wall/drizzle castle constructed as the tide came up to destroy it

Elliot being instructed in the craft of drizzle castle making

Also the ancient art of the sand ball 

It started to drizzle so we headed back. A sleepy Elliot was serenaded with Joanna Newsom songs sung by his uncles and aunts who somehow all know all the words to her crazy long weird songs. 

 The next day we woke up at Coco Cay, Bahamas. It is a small island leased by Royal Caribbean. Nobody lives on the island, but it is all set up for cruise ships to come by and dump people on it for a day. 

You have to get to the island via a tender boat

 We had to book it to make it to the volleyball tournament. We ended up taking third place. Don't be impressed- there were only three teams. It was a pitiful showing on our part. 

Us with our archrivals, the Pococks

On the first day of the Cruise, we noticed a large family (30ish people) all wearing matching shirts that said "Pocock Family" on the back. They were everywhere, and naturally we decided that they were our bitter rivals. One of them won the "Sexiest man on the boat" competition. By day 3 we saw some of them wearing BYU shirts and realized that they were LDS too. They ended up creaming us in the Volleyball tournament. While we were playing, Mom talked to some of the Pocock clan that was watching, and they realized that they are in the stake next to my parents and that we have some mutual friends. They ended up inviting us to the Sacrament meeting they held on the boat on Sunday. Basically, we were demolished in rivalry that they didn't even know they were participating in. The Grandpa of the clan hung out with us at our spot in the Solarium one day and said to Blake, "Do you know what BYU really stands for?" Then whispered into his ear "Boy, you're ugly" and walked away. We all thought it was hilarious, especially since Aaron hadn't heard the "Do you know what BYU stands for" part and thought that Grandpa Pocock had called Blake ugly completely out of the blue.  

After our volleyball defeat, we ate lunch and handed rock after rock to Elliot for him to throw into the ocean.