St. Maarten and the Floating Tiki Hut of Magic

Are we at the end already? Unfortunately, yes. Time for the last post about my Eastern Caribbean cruise vacation. Insert sad face here.

You might have noticed that I skipped a few stops, basically because when it comes to two of the islands I decided to just not to do anything and stay on the ship. I sat by the pool, read a lot, and just in general hung out and enjoyed my vacation. But the last full day of our cruise we had our final, and favorite, shore excursion. Ladies and gentleman, I give you: the floating tiki hut of St. Maarten.

Tucked in a little cove on St. Marrten in the Caribbean Sea, the floating tiki hut is just what it sounds like. A tiki hut (with bar and grill) that floats on the water. There are deck chairs, as you can see, and full snorkel gear. So basically, you can snorkel, then relax in the sun in a deck chair, grab a burger and a rum punch, and then just jump off the side and swim in the warm, clear water.

Nice, huh?

There was a boat that traveled back and forth from our cruise ship so people were free to stay at the tiki hut as long as they wanted. Which for me, Chris, and Patrick meant that we stayed there all day. They packed up around us, closed up the hut, and we took the last boat back with the staff. Because when you have that sweet a set-up, you don't leave. Unless you're Kent, in which case you head back after about 2 hours. But, bless him. It's his way.

By the end of the afternoon, when we were the only guests left at the tiki hut, the bar staff was just giving the rum punch to us for free to help get rid of it. Chris and Patrick got a bit, shall we say, toasted, but I figured one of us should stay sober-ish. So we kicked back, drank, and enjoyed the tunes piped in from the staff's iPod playlist.

Snorkeling in the cove was even more fun than our first stop since there was lots more to see. We hunted around for cannons that had blown off Fort Amsterdam in a hurricane, and looked at a sunken yacht, super colorful fish, lobsters, urchins, and the occasional scuba-diver. All in all, it was the perfect day.

And they let me drive the boat back! (not really)

So I bet you're wandering, "wow, this all looks great, but what did you guys do when you were on the boat?" And even if you weren't wondering that, I'm going to tell you. We did a lot of roh roh-ro-oh-oh-ing from Lady Gaga's Bad Romance (and Patrick and I performed an epic dance number to it in the dance club one night), we also did a lot of mocking of the Southern people we spent the day with on Dominica ("oh my word!"), and we did a lot of karaoke. A LOT of karaoke. Almost every night. And we might have done some choreographing of our karaoke routines, just to make sure we were up to snuff. But our perseverance was rewarded, as we received several medals for our karaoke performances. The karaoke lady was also very impressed with Patrick's acting resume...in fact, they showed the remake of Fame (which he appeared in) our first night on the ship. Coincidence, but a happy one.

So that about wraps up the vacation recap. We came, we saw, we conquered, and I avoided getting a sunburn. Think of it: pasty ol' me in the Caribbean and I managed to avoid any sunburn, thanks to my trusty SPF 75. I hope to definitely go back some day, but maybe next time pick a lighter itinerary. An island a day was very ambitious. And as you can see, it takes a lot of energy to sit around and relax all the time.

Did I mention that I got a coconut monkey drink? And you know that coconut came home.