Munday's the Arizona Roadrunners

Back in Orlando area for last time this year and just made it back in time to take very long drive over to Titusville to watch the Shuttle Discovery go up for last time to Intn'l Space Center! Guess I don't need to say it was fun and exciting but I will. The launch did not go off until 4:50pm so did get caught in traffic going over (took about 2 hours to get there) and big time traffic to get back 5 1/2 hours later! Thought I was going to be sick from car fumes on the highway. Terrible but worth it I guess. Wonderful 2 minutes! We arrived and found free parking and since we had a few hours to wait we went and enjoyed the food at this Cuban/Mexican restaurant. Very good and great service! Only thing that took us all by surprise was all phones were blocked! That's right no calls or txt messages out! Only coming in. A little disappointed when trying to phone and txt and nothing is going and we had a good signal too. There were thousands of other people with same issues so not

Back here in Wauchula along the lovely Peace River. I am enjoying our time here so much! I love this river that is dropping each day and along with the lower river is more wildlife. Haven't seen the river otters again but saw a number of turtles sunning themselves today and saw Stumpy sunning himself in water today. This sunset is one of our prettiest thus far. I see the moon is full now and can tell you it is so pretty here in Florida. The pickle ball is great and weather is perfect!

Last day of our cruise was spent at Half Moon Cay. It is a private beach that belongs to Holland America. The water was lovely and so many people took advantage of the day and went swimming, snorkeling and even swimming with the rays. It was a great day with perfect weather. So happy the weather held throughout the cruise.

While still cruising we had a day at sea before our last stop. I took advantage of the day and participated in the Susan G Koman Walk for the Cure. 9 laps on the promenade deck and I was good. Great cause and nice to participate with other folks too. Early enjoyed the deck and watching! Fortunately we had a nice weather day so no wind or rocky ship!  

One of the stops on the cruise was at St Thomas U.S.V.I. We were here back in '06 so were a little familiar with town. This time ship was docked 2 miles south of town so a good walk in; which we did of course. All sidewalks so that was good and did a bit of shopping and even visited local cemetery. ha! Back to ship early. They wanted to leave on time due to long time at sea on return. Next stop Half Moon Cay, Holland America's own island.

Our day at San Juan Puerto Rico was lovely! Picture perfect and a little warm as we walked around the wall of the old city. After stopping for refreshment we continued on thru the city. Reminded me a lot of the French quarter in New Orleans but cleaner. Had a full day here so plenty of time and a nice place. Did not go into the new section of the city which we could see but didn't entice us enough. One thing we did learn was they are being overrun with feral cats. We saw cats everywhere and even signs about them. Here is a picture of one napping.  Did ask how the people feel about being a territory of U S without representation in Congress.  They seemed to think they had more government then they really wanted to support any way. Interesting.

The first stop on our cruise was Grand Turk in the British bahamas. The water was so pretty. They had a memorial at the dock for John Glenn of all people and celebrating his orbit around earth all those years ago. I remember doing a current event on it and of course he did go back into space in his 70's. We took off on foot to see the town and boy did we see it - what there was of it anyway. ha! Not much but did nearly get trampled by some wild horses and did see the wild flamingos. They are no longer wild in the USA but still reside down here. Must have appropriate habitat which we can no longer provide I guess. Beautiful beach but otherwise not much there. Thought we might have heat stroke on our walk but we made out fine.

Getting ready to take off! After boarding ship we all took tour to get our 1st view of ship and where everything was located. Since ship was docked on intercoastal waterway in Fort Lauderdale we enjoyed watching the smaller boats passing by and even saw two manatees swimming by. Very nice start to cruise.

Leaving the Everglades we traveled north to Lake Ochechobee. Along the way we watched many sugar fields in process of being burned. Guess it's ok down here in Florida. Next day awoke to this lovely sunrise as we headed into Ft Lauderdale to pick up Alex and Katy from Seattle.