jamaica, here we come mon!
on the monday morning after the wedding, oliver and i woke up at the buttcrack of dawn to get to the airport for our flight to jamaica. we were EXHAUSTED and it was literally dark outside as we were driving there, but we were so excited that it was worth getting up early. my parents took both of us and my uncle sam (he was flying back to california) to IAH for our flights, and then it was just me and the hubs on our first married trip!
when we were checking in, oliver checked the seat options to see if we were sitting together and if maybe we could move to the front of the plane. we had purchased first class seats for the way back from jamaica, but on the way there we were planning on roughing it in coach. BUT there was an option to upgrade, so we figured, what the heck?? and we ended up with first class tickets all the way. it was quite fabulous.
we had an hour or so layover in atlanta, then we were en route to the island of jamaica. we had actually been gifted our honeymoon for christmas of 2011 from oliver's brother ian, and we were super excited to get to montego bay and check into our sandals.
when we arrived, we did the customs line (which made for interesting people watching) and went to the sandals area of the airport to wait. they had drinks there for the guests waiting for the busses, so of course we had to partake.
our bus arrived and took us to the resort, where we checked in and got settled. it turned out that our butler rooms were overbooked so we got a free upgrade to the ultra luxury royal beachfront suite room. it came with an entire stocked bar, had a walkout patio that led straight to the beach, and 24 hour butler service.
after we got settled in and had some champagne on our porch, we went over to the spa for our couples massages. again, the original massage we had booked was full so we got offered a free upgrade to either beach massages or serenity garden massages. we had walked past the beach massage tables on our way to the spa and they were in the middle of everything and not private at all. since we were going to be laying on tables naked except for a thin white sheet, we opted for the garden massage. it was in a very lush garden right behind the spa and had a house with the two massage tables on it. we had to fill out an information card about ourselves and how much we bruised, sensitivity, allergies, etc. and then we were asked how hard we wanted the massage. since it was my first, i decided to go light/medium with my massuse. oliver wanted something a little more hardcore so he selected deep tissue for his intensity level.
we got undressed and put on our robes and walked out to the little garden hut. we were introduced to our massuse ladies--mine was probably 5'0'' and 120lbs soaking wet. olivers lady....was BIG. not fat or anything, just roughly the size and height of a linebacker. i was seriously worried for him at that point.
we wrapped up our massages and went to our room to relax and get ready for dinner. we met our first butler (we had two for the week) and went out for italian food that night.
we got into a regular schedule during the week:
-breakfast on our patio
-feed the cats their morning breakfast (we had semi-tame cats that came around--momma, fluffy tail, and I cant remember the third one! so sad!)
- go to the beach OR go on a scuba adventure
-lunch on the beach
-drink/nap/read
-pool
-bath/shower
-dinner
-drink
we were usually in bed by 11 each night, which is surprisingly early for me, and up around 8-8:30 every morning. oliver's favorite part of each day was breakfast on our patio. since we had the butler room, each night we would request breakfast to be set up out there. we got pretty spoiled waking up to 3 course meals each day. our kitties got spoiled too--they each had about 2 creamers in the morning and then another 2 apiece for their afternoon snacks. :)
we did a couple of excursions throughout the week also. the biggest thing that we did was take the scuba certification class and got certified! we had an AWESOME dive instructor, termi, and he took his time with us, making sure we were comfortable in the water and with the safety techniques. through the certification process, we ended up going for 3 dives, and the 2nd was our cert. dive. it was us and termi, and we had to perform all of the safety measures at about 40 feet below the surface. (lose your mask, lose your breathing apparatus, share your breathing with your partner, etc). once we were certified, we got to go on a long, relaxing dive with just us and termi. it was awesome! BUT once we got back to the surface, we realized that we were going to be late for our fishing expedition. not to worry! termi called in a private speed boat that came and brought us back to shore. we seriously felt like celebrities, because our butler, tasha, met us on the deck with our clothes and our fishing trip waiver, and she also had a piece of pizza for us to eat. then termi took all of our dive equipment back for us and cleaned it up while we hopped aboard the fishing boat!
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| termi checking our tanks |
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| our fishing boat |
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| termi making sure we made it to our fishing trip! |
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| oliver caught a fish! we got it mounted |
we also: went to climb these crazy falls (Dunns Falls), went to a dolphin adventure show, swam with stingrays, petted nurse sharks, drank WAY too much, and generally had a fabulous time. jamaica was awesome--we loved everyone at the resort, made friends with people who worked there, and really enjoyed the beautiful country. i would definitely go back!
see ya'll next time, mon!
kristin
