Dec 7
Only 18 more shopping days till Christmas. That is the most weird foreign thing that I can imagine right now, though everyone on the ship is sort of shopping crazy. Not because it’s Christmas, they just are. It feels pretty much the opposite of Christmas here in the Caribbean. That isn’t to say that some folks here aren’t trying. I saw a Santa today, and there was a rotating Christmas tree in the window of the bar I ate at last night in San Juan, so it’s not like it doesn’t happen here. It just feels different.
Today we’re in St. Martin. Megan spearheaded a mission to go ziplining. Eric bailed out due to his having to watch the Patriots game late last night, but Megan and I hit the gangplank as soon as it opened and jumped on a taxi to Loterie Farm where there are various outdoorsy activites that include the aforementioned ziplining. So we got harnessed up and hopped on an overloaded truck and headed up the hill. The staff guys that were going to ride in the cab, hopped on the roof and offered us the inside seats which we happily accepted.
At the top we were briefed about how to hook into the lines which gave me the impression liability law is not as rigid here as in the states. Not that they weren’t thorough, they just didn’t treat us as if we were going to walk off a cliff at any moment as they generally do in the states. The zipping was pretty great. There were some long lines where the pulleys are really screaming by the time you get up to speed and there were places where the valley floor was a good hundred feet down from the lines. Probably the trickiest part (we were on what was billed, the “extreme” course) was between the zips where you were walking down cable walkways with just a few crossbeams. Mostly you could see right down to the forest floor. There was one traverse where you held on to two cables and walked on a third. I should note that there was always a safety line that you were clipped into because the danger of falling was very real. Did I mention the rain was making the footing slippery? It was. But the rain was nice and cool, so very pleasant. However, the other feature of the rain was the creation of mud generally and rust on one of the zips in specific (but only one, they didn’t know why) so as we got off one on the lines we both laughed hysterically at each other because we were completely covered in mud and rust which we believe was responsible for us being ignored at an eating establishment later on. (or maybe it was that I wasn’t wearing my wet dirty shirt. I couldn’t decide whether that would be better or worse) All in all a most excellent adventure.
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| Looking so fresh... |
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| and so clean clean. |
After zipping we caught a taxi back to Philipsburg which is on the Dutch side of St Martin (Loterie Farm is on the French side) and walking distance to the ship and did a bit of wandering through the tourist markets and ended up grabbing food and drink at an Oceanside bar that we’d been at before. Megan pointed out the Ohio State flag and OSU Buckeyes sign out front. I think that’s the real reason we ended up there. She’s sad this is her last cruise, but I think she’s a bit homesick too.
I think that’s all the news that’s fit to print. I should get this update onto the interwebs while I have a free connection and head back to the ship.
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