Spring Break 2023

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Welcome to Spring Break 2023!

Last year we took the kids down to the kids down to 30A. It is a very beautiful area in the Florida Panhandle and this was not our first time vacationing there. For the last 3 years we have taken the boys and their friends to the 30A area.

Well, our experience in 2022 was very different than past years. Timmy and his friends wanted to venture to the Seaside area. In the past years we had eaten in the area during the day and shopped around. Didn’t think this Spring Break would be any different. Ha, we were so wrong! We have never felt so unwelcome in an area. It was just a bad experience and we vowed we will never go back to 30A for Spring Break. It was very disappointing.

The Spring Break conversation comes up with Timmy and his friends and they want to go to 30A. Oh, I so don’t want to go back but we know this is one of the last Spring Breaks we will have with Timmy because he will graduate high school before we know it so I was reluctantly willing to give it one more try.

In July 2022 we took Timmy on his birthday cruise and a couple of other families joined us. Spring Break discussions were had, cruise option was kicked around but no plans were solidified.

In the back of my mind I’m still thinking 30A and I’m just so stupid annoyed by the idea.

Well, praise be, one of the parents mentioned cruising for Spring Break and the kids were all in!! Yeeessss!!!
We all start looking and landed on a Carnival cruise to the Western Caribbean. Next thing you know we have 11 adults and 18 children (ages 14 - 20) signing up for the Spring Break shenanigans.

To organize all the things we had a cruise meeting at one of the families houses, a GroupMe chat was formed, another planning dinner and matching shirts were decided.
I cannot believe the planning started in December and here we are today almost ready to set sail!!

I am very excited to spend a week with this crew. The parents all get along so well. The kids have known each other forever and have traveled several times together. A couple of us have been friends since KinderSchool days.

I keep laughing because there are only 5 boys out of the 18 children. I am normally surrounded by boys at all times so being around a bunch of girls is going to be fun.

A few of the families came down to Tampa the night before. One group went to the Yankees game and then a met up with others at TopGolf. We didn’t make it to those events because we were not planning on going to Tampa Saturday. We decided very last minute to mosey down.

Our hotel was in Downtown Tampa. It was very easy to navigate to the hotel. We actually ended up driving from Tallahassee to Tampa on the back roads instead of going I-75. It was a very easy drive (ride in my case) and we drove right on into downtown.

We met up with a couple of the families at Maloney’s Irish Pub (https://www.maloneyslocalirishpub.com/). I thought the food was great and it wasn’t very crowded. I had the Shepherds Pie. The boys all had burgers.

We laughed about stories from the July cruise and the kids found ice cream at a Publix by the hotel. We called it a night and will see everyone at 1pm on the Carnival Pride!!

Here’s the plan…
Sunday - set sail

Monday - Day at Sea

Tuesday - Grand Cayman - private bus tour

Wednesday - Mahogany Bay - monkey, sloths, ATV and private beach

Thursday - Belize City - cave tubing

Friday - Cozumel - all inclusive resort with water toys

Saturday - Day at sea

Sunday - back to reality

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Photos

Timmy selfie
When you ask a teenager to take a picture you typically get a couple of selfies

Vacay Jeff
Jeff did make note that these drinks were not included in the drink package

Quiet morning
Little reading, little Starbucks and little bit of blogging