Disney Dream Day 3: Nassau & Pirate Night

Picking up where I left off on our most recent Disney Dream cruise is our day at Nassau which also included Pirate Night. We were not used to a "backwards" itinerary of Castaway Cay as the first stop, so this day felt a little off to us. Nonetheless, we still had a great one!

If you missed any posts from our recent cruise on the Disney Dream, check out these links below:

Disney Travel Day: Wine and Dine Expo & Animal Kingdom
Disney Day 2: Wine and Dine 10K & Kids Races & Hollywood Studios/Epcot
Disney Day 3: Wine and Dine Half Marathon & Magic Kingdom
Disney Day 4: Boarding the Disney Dream
Disney Day 5: Castaway Cay
Disney Day 6: Nassau
Disney Day 7: At Sea Day
Disney Day 8: Disney Springs and Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party

Initially, we didn't plan any excursions for Nassau and we weren't even sure we would get off of the ship. A couple of our travel buddies told us they had never been to Nassau, so instead of staying on the ship all day, we decided to disembark and walk around the port area to explore the town a little bit.

For starters, we began the day with breakfast...which included Mickey waffles, of course!

We literally had zero plans for Nassau, so we disembarked the ship and began to wander. The straw market that I remember encountering directly off the ship was under construction, so I'm interested to see what that looks like once we return next time!

We shopped around a bit and I found a some "authentic" cadbury chocolate to take back home with me. (It's so much better than the stuff made in the states.) I also purchased an Alex and Ani bracelet with the Bahamas logo on it.

We really didn't spend much time in Nassau (maybe a couple of hours), and our final stop was at a Starubucks!

We couldn't pass a Starbucks and not stop!

I've never had a chance to "wander" around Nassau and although we didn't go very far, we still enjoyed seeing a little more of the island!

Right outside of the parliament area was a few park benches where we sat and enjoyed the gorgeous day!

Of course, we had to take a few pictures on our way back to the ship.

A HUGE plus for us with cruising Disney is the hospitality when returning to the ship. We were met with ice cold towels as well as fruit infused water and juice!

This was so refreshing on such a warm day!

That afternoon, we enjoyed lunch, took a couple of rides on the aqua duck, swam in the pool, and had a nap! It really was a productive vacation day in my books!

For Pirate Night that evening, we all dressed in (somewhat) matching shirts and Brayden was our little pirate!

I love how our shirts turned out!

The Pirate Night meal on Disney Cruise Line is one of my favorite menus and offers so many delicious choices. I've said it before and I'll say it again - I'm sad for the loss of the pot-stickers (dumplings) off this menu, but there are so many other delicious choices to choose from!

After dinner, we walked up to deck 12 to catch the fireworks. There was a huge crowd and we were quite late, but we still managed to snag a decent spot to see the show!

My sunglasses were the star of the show for the towel animal display that evening!

See those gold coins? I have a funny story to tell about them in the next cruise blog post - we still laugh about it when we talk about it today!

I love the Disney cruise ships all the time, but especially at night! It all just feels so magical!

Oh yes, and one other funny story that happened that day - so as I was walking around passing out fish extender gifts, I happened across this cabin where he was asking for funny jokes. Jason helped me think of one, so I sent it and this was my response....

Isn't that too funny? I wonder if he received any other jokes the rest of the cruise? :)

Stay tuned for our final day on board the Disney Dream - our at sea day with brunch at Palo!! :)

2015 Contraband Days 5 Miler

This past weekend, I ran the Contraband Days 5 Miler which is part 2 of our area’s Triple Crown series. It’s been a few years since I’ve run this race – first my IT Band issues popped up, then I was out of town last year. I was excited to run again because this race draws a lot of our area’s “elites”. It also happens to follow one of my favorite running routes!

What’s Contraband Days, you might ask? Well, our area holds a festival each year, to celebrate the legend of the pirate Jean Lafitte. It’s rumored that him and his “crew” hid out on the waters of the nearby Contraband Bayou and buried treasure in it’s many small islands. Therefore, we hold a festival to celebrate all things pirates! Sound like fun? Yeah, well…I don’t really go to the festival, I just run this race. :)

What does one wear to a pirate themed race when the humidity is at 100%? Normal running clothes. Arrrghhhh!

Since I haven’t run this race since 2011, I was excited to do so again. I knew that the addition of a medal for the triple crown series would draw a larger crowd this year, but I don’t think anyone was prepared for said crowd.

This line was for packets and bibs pickup and I thought it would never end. I definitely didn’t think the race would start on time! I don’t know how they did it, but they got the line down super fast and the race only started about 5 minutes late!

Packet pickup wasn’t offered before this race because there was a mishap with the bibs (they didn’t arrive in time). I can’t even image how the race directors felt (I tried to put myself in their shoes)…I heard they were scrambling to make bibs happen for this race. As it was, my handmade bib was on HP photo paper! Hah!

Ah well…most of the bibs worked! I say “most” because the ones on cardstock didn’t stay at all with the heat and humidity. I’m sure it’s a lesson learned for everyone (myself included)!

Kenzie, Melissa, and I!

Ready to run this thing but first, let’s take a group selfie!

Even Madame and Mr. Jean Lafitte himself came out to kick off the race!

What’s a pirate without a cap gun? :) Off we go!

My goal was to PR in this race – my previous time from several years ago was 46 minutes. I knew I could do it, I just had to keep around a 9 minute pace. The humidity was pretty thick, but the clouds overhead kept the sun away (thank goodness)!

My one complaint about this race is the lack of water stations. With a 5 miler in May in Southwest Louisiana, you have to stay hydrated. The first and only water/gatorade stop wasn’t until mile 2.8. It wasn’t a stop we hit twice on the course, either…it was one and only one stop.

As I approached the stop, I heard a guy yelling “Gatorade”. Well, I didn’t want gatorade, I wanted water – so I kept going to the next girl who I heard yell “water”. I said “water” as I approached her and she shuffled the cups around in her hands and I just grabbed a cup from her. As took a sip and began running again, I noticed that I didn’t have water, but I had gatorade. What the heck? That’s when I realized that water was in clear cups and gatorade was in red cups. OK that makes sense to me now, but what the heck?! I also then realized that she was holding both water and gatorade in her hands. I can’t think logically like that when I’m running – my brain is mush when I’m running and I’m only focused on finishing with a certain time. Oh well…again, lesson learned for me. Always pay closer attention. Thankfully it was only a 5 mile race and water was about 2 miles away. This is where my hydration belt would have come into play, but I despise wearing that thing. Sad but true.

Also, pretty much none of the people I was running around stopped for anything at the water stop. I mean, I can do that for 5K’s but nothing longer! I was in awe!

Anyway, the race was great despite the lack of water stops and I was able to keep a decent time.

This guy juggles during the entire race EVERY year! Now that’s talent!

There I am! The KT Pro tape didn’t start to come up until right at 4.6 miles (I know cause I checked). That’s progress, y’all!!

My goal for this race was to finish in the 42 minute time range. Even though my watch says 43:18, the official time released yesterday afternoon was 42:43 (not sure how that happened). Still a PR either way, I’ll take it!

I was also #31 out of 175 to finish this race and I came in 4th in my AG! Pretty proud of myself!

My awesome BRF Heather came out to cheer me on! So excited to have her there!! :)

After the race, we grabbed breakfast at our local favorite diner which was delicious as always.

We had a great time despite the few mishaps. I know how difficult it is to put on a race and I’m thankful for a group like Lake Area Runners who puts on so many for our area!

Can’t wait for the third part of the Triple Crown series – 4 miles on the 4th of July!

How was your weekend?
Do you carry water with you during a race?