6/16: Nassau, Bahamas
I woke up this morning in Laguna Hills and headed out with my Mom and Dad to LAX at 6am. It was drizzling by the time we arrived, June gloom setting in just in time to say goodbye, and I gave Mom and Dad hugs goodbye to last 2 ½ months.
I flew through security and worked my way through a maze of temporary walls (LAX is undergoing construction, although promises to be “gorgeous” by the time it’s finished) to my gate. Once I got there, thanks to construction four gates worth of passengers and their carry-on bags were crowded into one gate’s worth of space, so I turned around, sat down in a café and had a croissant sandwich and an iced tea until it was time to board the plane. The plane was giant…so giant that it needed two aisles to accommodate passenger flow and so awesome that the first class seats were there own little cubbies with feet of leg room, foot rests and chairs that reclined completely flat. Was I jealous? Never. I made good use of my 2-inch reclining seat to begin reading the assigned reading book for the Summer at Sea students, The Triumph of the City. Admittedly, if Delta’s HBO section had included Game of Thrones like they advertized, that would not have happened.
I landed in Atlanta with my book halfway finished and stomach mostly empty, so I found myself a tuna sandwich, ate half and stowed half, and head off to the tram. If there’s one thing I love about the airport in Atlanta, it’s this tram. Whenever I take it I always hope my connection gate is as far away as possible so I can ride it longer. But alas, I was in terminal T and going to terminal A, which are right next to each other. Was riding the tram necessary? Definitely. I found my gate: a flight headed to Nassau (which incidentally is pronounced “nah saw”, not “naw sow” like I had been pronouncing it for the last year whenever I told people about this trip…what a noob). The plane was just late enough boarding to miss its departure time, so we chilled out another 20 minutes or so waiting to get a place in line for take off. This delay ended up working out for me, though, because I finished Triumph of the City with about 5 minutes of flight to spare. During that time I chatted with the women next to me who was heading back home to the Bahamas after coming to the States for her granddaughter’s graduation.
We landed around 8pm Nassau time. I love landing on islands because you get so low to the ocean before hitting the runway. Even though it was dark twilight by the time we were landing, I could still see the turquoise water (dimmed, of course) and see straight to the bottom, a few reefs breaking up the white sand. It makes me a little sad I’ll only be here for tonight and tomorrow morning, but I can always come back ☺
In baggage claim all the parent-less college age students found each other (what else would we be here for other than Summer at Sea embarkation?). I shared a cab with a few other girls, and drove on the LEFT side of the road to our hotel, which I was not expecting since the driver seat was still on the right like in US cars. I think the girls in my car felt a similar sentiment because the first turn our driver made out onto not-1-way road we all looked at each other like uhh… oh ok, it’s supposed to be that way. Once we got to our hotel, the Sheraton Nassau Beach Resort (Summer at Sea did a deal with them so pretty much all the students are staying here tonight), we ran into several groups of other parent-less college students that, surprise, were here for Summer at Sea. One of the groups, who had clearly flown into Nassau yesterday, greeted us with high fives, giant frozen rum drinks in hand, yelling “Deck 3 is the best!” Too bad I didn’t fly in yesterday. Once inside it took about ten years to check in, mainly because the woman checking in one of the lines (the one I was in, of course) mysteriously vanished in the middle of checking in the group in front of me and did not return the entire time I stood in a different line and was checked in by someone else. Needless to say, I was quite relieved to get into my room and walk out onto my balcony overlooking the waterfall pool, the ocean, and one of the most beautiful harvest moons I have ever seen.
My phone and computer are still reluctant to leave the States…at least time zone-wise. My phone still thinks its 6:15 and my computer 8:15…but the clock in my hotel room says 11:15 so I’ll go with that. I’m off to have a fun first night and get to know some of my soon-to-be shipmates…maybe one will even be my roommate! (I find out who she is tomorrow when I arrive…I hope she doesn’t snore). Tomorrow I board the MV Explorer at 11am, and I am so excited to see what it’s like. I can’t wait to get settled into my cabin, and I’m more than a little worried about how I will fit the 3 bags worth of stuff I brought into what I’m sure will be very limited space. Packing a little lighter probably would have made my unpacking job tomorrow pleasurably less exciting, but oh well, I wouldn’t want any part of this trip to be boring anyway.
Hopefully tomorrow I will get my Summer at Sea email address, which I can use as much as I want without eating into my free email time, so please use that one once I post it. In the meantime, feel free to send me messages via facebook or at ginnyscholtes@cox.net
Love from Nassau,
Ginny
No comments:
Post a Comment