Cruise, day 4. HAITI!

To say I was excited for our first port day was an understatement.

 This would be my FIRST time ever to step foot onto a different country!

Yep, not even Mexico.

I know, 36 years it took.

 Haiti of all places would be it... who would of thunk!

We could disembark pretty early.

8am, I think.

Watching Haiti's shore line coming closer.

What would it be like in person?

To be honest, I was nervous to go there.

3rd world country known for its poverty and crime.

The hot, humid air hit us right in the face.

Holy cow, I've never experienced anything like it.

Our first excitement after docking.

A ghetto row boat with Haitian men rowing along the cruise ship.
Huh. Not going to lie, I was thinking HIDE YO KIDS! 

We tried talking to them, but pretty sure they didn't know a lick of English.

Then I turned around and said, LET'S GO!

We will only go to Haiti once, lets go enjoy it instead of watching the creepy row boat men.

 On the dock with Haiti in the background.

 Royal Caribbean bought this portion of the island, so it is WELL protected.

You can only enter if you are an employee, or a passenger.
It is much like Castaway Cay in the Bahamas that Disney owns.

So pretty much it is fake Haiti, which was jusssst fine with me!

Real Haiti was yards away.

An electric fence was the only thing between us.

You could see real Haitian people in real Haiti, and it did NOT look pleasant.

Talk about feeling like entitled "rich" Americans.

Yikes.

All the music and dancing hoopla as you walk of the dock

Labadee is a long strip with different beaches all over.

We were told of the beach best suited for families, so off we went.

To get to the beach it was lined with vendors that Royal Caribbean lets in.

Much like Mexico.

Cheap souvenir type stuff.

 Jake getting heckled.

We enjoyed swimming and lounging!

The water was sooo nice and warm.

I was surprised by how salty the water was.

So nice, bringing me some island punch.

Virgin, of course:)

They provided a buffet lunch.

I was thinking burgers and hot dogs.

Well they had that.

PLUS a bazillion other choices.

I could get used to this.

Early retirement, Casey?:)

In the afternoon we had our big excursion!

Labadee has the longest head first zip line over the water in the world.

Couldn't pass that up!

We were nervous because you needed to be at least 80 pounds.

No exception.

Rusty weighed 77.

We tried to fatten him up before the trip, but it wasn't working.

Luckily the scale was behind the desk on the floor where they couldn't see it.

He stepped on and Stephen put his foot on the scale while I

 tried distracting the worker with questions.

I could see the numbers fluctuating pretty quickly.

Stephen was trying his best at keeping it steady.

Finally the worker said he was good to go!

Stephen saved the day!!

We loaded into the 4 wheel jeep thing and off they took us up the mountain!

Should I be nervous about this tongue pierced, crazy man driving us?!

Rusty was the first victim.

He was demonstrating what the bullet position looked like.

 Dallin and Rusty.
Screaming, I WANT MY MOMMY,  lol!

And is that view not amazing?

Lane and Randon

While I was waiting for my turn I was busy asking the workers all about Haiti.

He said he lived in the village right next to Labadee. 

He pointed his finger to the mountain, and there it was.

I'm sure I sounded nosey, but I wanted to know what it was like living in Haiti.

Terrible, it seemed.

Those fisherman we saw go twice a week to fish for food.

You could see others fishing as well.

They were grateful that Royal Caribbean bought that land because it gave them more working opportunities.

Such a poor, poor country.

I was grateful my kids could see some of it so they can see how lucky they are.

Casey's sweat soaked shirt.
Woof, it was so hot.

The end of the zip line looking up to the start.

We stayed over at that beach.

I love this picture of the palm tree shadow.

No swimming at this beach.

Too much coral.

And unfortunately we learned the hard way, lots of sea urchins!

Dallin picked one up and got stung.

His hand turned purple.

They took him to a life guard who hopped out of her seat, grabbed Dallin and starting running!

I guess they take those stings seriously. Something about you could die.

Stephanie started panicking, I don't blame her!

He was fine and came back a few minutes later.

 I was thinking we could stay here forever!

Back on the boat you could see better that village the worker lived in.

We got cleaned up for dinner.

And had time on the boardwalk before the water show started.

It was on the very back of the boat, in a big outdoor amphitheater.

I thought it would be a cheesy performance.

NOPE!

These pictures are terrible, but it was amazing!

Lot's of dancing, swinging, and diving on a water stage.