alright, i've sat down with my soft batch cookies and a coke, time to finally bang out my spring break recap.

before i start, i should just issue the disclaimer that i'm fairly sure i've forgotten parts of it, any week of the year it's hard to remember what you did 7 days ago, so bear with me.

[follow along with photos here]

as i mentioned last time, spring break '04 involved going on a carnival cruise to mexico with alayna & co. she & i left out of college station for san antonio friday afternoon and packed all our stuff up with her parents. saturday morning i met the other people going along with us on the cruise, and the 5-car convoy took off for galveston. after the usual paperwork and shit we got on the boat, which was about what i expected i suppose.

at first on the ship we were completely lost, never really knew where we were most of the time. we got used to the semi-cramped sleeping quarters and bathroom pretty quickly. right away on the first night we were in the dining room semi-dressed up and sharing a table with like 10 people i'd only met a few hours before. there really wasn't much to do since most of the day was already blown, so we snapped a few pics on the deck and looked through the lounges and shit.

the next day, sunday, alayna & i sat out on the lido deck, which would become mistake #1 of the cruise. you've heard this story a million times, but we should have just sat out in the sun for 20 minutes on our backs, 20 minutes on our fronts. instead, i was trying to finish off a novel and we both ended up falling asleep at certain points and we were out there for a good 2 hours. suddenly i didn't have to worry about being self-conscious about being too white anymore, now more like too fuckin red. it was pretty obvious right afterwards and at dinner that night that we (read: me mostly) were sunburned decently. i knew that wasn't gonna help us with the next couple days on beaches.

that night was our formal night, so i threw on the suit & tie and alayna in her little black dress and we took some decent photos. plus the waitstaff observed the newman's 25th wedding anniversary.

monday morning we arrived in cozumel. we immediately starting snapping pics of the crazy turqoise water and palm trees on our way to meet up with our jeep tour. we took off from puerta maya (the pier we docked at) in a convoy of multi-colored jeeps bound for passion island, about a 6 hour adventure total. the ride there was interesting, we got to see firsthand just how mexican the place was, heh. it was about how i'd imagine the city streets might be. we went through the city closer to the beaches and went through some rocky areas en route to our boat to take us to passion island. it was great once we got to the island, they served us tasty mexican food and had an open bar, plus the beach/water was by far the nicest i've ever been to. we seized the opportunity and played around on the beach and just relaxed, just the two of us. they even gathered us all up to play a waterballoon game on the beach, in which each round you got a healthy squirt of tequila sunrise for encouragement. alayna and i made it to the final round, but as she tossed the waterballoon over her head she threw it more up than out so i had to make a desperate dive for what i knew i'd never get to. but we had plenty of fun doing it at least.

what ended up being the most memorable moment of the cruise for me was just alayna and i sitting on the passion island beach, she sipping a sex on the beach and me with a corona with a lime. after that we packed up and headed back to the port, where i got to drive with the locos on ghetto boulevard, mopeds and bikes just whizzing by and getting way too close to you.

later that night we got onto a catamaran to just cruise around and watch the sun go down over the water. for whatever reason that trip wasn't very popular and it seemed like they only had about like a 1/4 of the capacity they thought they'd have. we knew it'd be open bar, but i didn't think it would be *that* open. they gave you three choices: superior beer, margaritas and pepsi. after i sucked down 2 superiors a little too quick, i took a liking to alayna's margarita (surprisingly good, we usually don't like 'em when they're just loaded with tequila) so i had a couple myself. obviously, i don't remember how many beers and drinks i had, cuz it all went to my head fairly quickly. it was fun though. got some good pics of the sunset too, and me and my trusty margarita cup.

little did i know the alcohol from earlier would come back to haunt me, haha. since we were done with our real excursions for the day, we decided to go into cozumel to go to the world-famous (well...) carlos n charlie's bar/restaurant, with the intention of maybe visiting senor frogs and fat tuesday's as well. it started off as a disaster (i think the liquor was talking for me or something, i had some fucked up logic, man) cuz alayna was saying we should maybe try to take a taxi to c n c's, and i'm all "nah man, let's just walk!" which was like... stupid. for some reason i thought it was a helluva lot closer than it was, cuz we ended up walking in the middle of fuck nowhere, which is sort of a bad idea in a foreign country when you have a pretty girl next to you and $200 in your pocket. there was like nobody around, except several stray dogs just roaming along on the streets next to us. we were definitely spooked, so i hailed a cab and we gladly paid our $5 (again, why didn't i just pay that? beats me man, like i said, the liquor...) and went into the loudest fucking bar/restaurant i've ever goddamn been to. we sat down and the table next to us had a bunch of high school babies (remember, 18 yr old drinking age) just getting bombed, with several of the waiters smacking them on the ass with a paddle or something like every 30 seconds. we definitely wanted to drink, so alayna got a daquiri (or something) and i got a sea breeze for a change. yeah we were expecting normal goddamn drinks, not that huge weird plastic cup they give you. they call it a yard, but they might as well call it a bong, cuz that's what it looked like. cost 12 fuckin bucks, and for that price we should have gotten a dimebag with the fuckin things.

they had awesome food, but i pissed all over it drinking that sea breeze just a few hours after all that earlier drinking, cuz halfway into my beef tacos i was all kinds of spacy. completely lost my appetite and now the place seemed even louder. alayna was semi-peeved about it but she seemed to get over it pretty quick and she bought a t-shirt. we toyed with going upstairs to senor frogs, but i had no interest in any more shenanigans or drinking. we taxi'ed back to the port and she bought another shirt from fat tuesday's, while i trudged along in ultimate indifference. at the duty-free shop somehow i was coherent enough to spot good buys: a $25 bottle of cointreau and $10 for some bacardi rum.

in hindsight even though it was pretty fun we should have done cozumel PM hours a little different. i should have been more sober going into it so i could have gotten drunk *at* the bigshit clubs instead of on a $39 catamaran ride with all-you-can-drinks. oh well, live in learn.

of course, i get back and pass out in our stateroom, while unknowingly to me the rest of our group partied on the lido deck. kinda funny seeing alayna and some of the rest doing a conga line on the stateroom tv the next day, and i'm all asking everybody "say man, when the fuck did *this* happen?"

the next day we arrived at calica, which is how you can get to playa del carmen. alayna and i went with a group and bussed to paamul beach and snorkeled. it was a fun experience, took a little getting used to but it was worth it, fun to see all the fish swimming right around you and seeing the delicate reefs and such. afterwards we were sorta forced to lay on the beach some more, and i say forced only cuz i was so goddamn sunburned by this point. we got back to the room a little after noon and i knew that was it for sun for the rest of the cruise.

that night was pretty vicious, i think everybody knew i was red all over but nobody really realized how uncomfortable i was. luckily i wasn't nauseous or headachy, but my skin just plain hurt everywhere and i was no fun to be around at all. i felt back for alayna cuz she just wanted to hang out and do a little bit of everything on the boat, but i was so irritable cuz it just hurt to move and all i wanted to do was lay in the room and read or sleep, but i knew that'd be kind of a party pooper.

the last day on the ship was pretty much the most mellow of them all, which is what i needed for sure. it was st patrick's day, so several of us wore the green shirts that alayna's mom got us, that was kinda fun. out on the deck i sucked down a whiskey sour (had several of those on the cruise) and tried a beck's, which was alright. at dinner that night it was kinda unique cuz the waitstaff sung "happy graduation" to brant and his buds and to alayna & i. we got a cake and a champagne toast and all.

brant & co. had sung karaoke ("take on me") the night before, so we went to go see 'em the next night. several of the girls in the group also got up and sang "we were family" too. had to have a guiness there to mark the holiday, heh. props to the guys to ball up and go sing karaoke, just that it got a little old and with the sunburn and shit i wasn't as festive as everybody prolly wanted.

thursday morning was mostly just going through customs and packing everything up, then the 4 hour drive back to san antonio. we ate mexican and watched sex & the city episodes thursday night in SA, then drove to CS on friday.

as far as my opinion of the cruise overall. for the most part, it's pretty positive. the crew was all really polite and did a great job, most of the food was pretty good (as you'd expect). 5 days is about right for me, the 3-day seems like a waste and 7 days sounds too long. there's usually pretty much to do on the ship, so you never really have to worry about getting very bored. i can't find much to complain about. as cruises are kinda famous for, everything you do you're gouged on price. every single thing that comes up, just plain costs more than it should. we paid like almost $30 each just for an unlimited soda card to use at any bar on the ship, but we realized during the cruise we should have all just bought one or something and passed it around, cuz i'm not sure i spent $30 on cokes. the alcoholic drinks luckily aren't too ridiculous, though i'd imagine when you show up in duty-free ports once a week, you can stock the whole boat with hard liquor pretty goddamn cheap. overall i'd recommend carnival cruises to people, just as long as you expect to shell out the cash.

as far as how i/we/the group spent the cruise, i'm overall pretty pleased. admittedly i drank a lot on the cruise. i knew i wanted to i guess, but in hindsight i sorta realize how much i drank during those 5 days. nothing i really regret, but wow this spring break sure was flammable. as far as alayna and i, i think we did fine. we got on each other's nerves by the last day or so and i was ready to be back on solid ground, but given the scenario (with each other 24/7) everything went well. we had a number of romantic situations and she was obviously very moved by them, and i know she geniunely loved having me along for their trip. the whole group was pretty tolerable, all pretty nice people on the whole. it was fun getting to meet everyone, knowing some of them could end up showing up at our wedding or something some day. always good to network with those in-laws, eh?

pardon the length, but i had to explain a whole week's worth of shit, hoo-ah?

i'll post more later about what i've been up to since mexican intoxication.

cheers,
justin