Articles by Ann Taylor

After two days at sea of not doing very much at all, I decided to be a little more active today. Following breakfast, our first stop was the cruise ship fitness center. Working out on vacation is not my idea of relaxation, but with all the food we’ve been eating, it’s a good idea to hit the gym occasionally. If my clothes don’t fit when we return, I want it to be because of pregnancy, not because I just ate too much.

Apparently the morning is the busy time at the gym, because it was pretty packed. Dan and I were able to do what we needed to do, and I worked on my balance skills – using an elliptical machine on a moving ship takes some serious concentration. After we got showered and cleaned up, it was time for morning trivia. Dan and I made a new friend today, Steve, who was very anxious to join a trivia team. He’s from Portland and was checking out trivia while his wife was involved in a very intense Scrabble match against some kind of Scrabble champion. (Yes, these are the types of people we are cruising with.) Steve was hilarious, and while he didn’t add much to our trivia answers, he was fun to partner with.

We ate a light lunch in the buffet, because our afternoon plan was to catch a movie in our stateroom with all kinds of snacks. Before the cruise, I had envisioned day after day of camping out in a lounge chair by the pool.  Then, one look at the leathered faces of our fellow passengers told me that I did not want to follow their lead and bask in the sun all day every day, so we planned an afternoon in today. I’ve been wanting to watch Million Dollar Arm, and we arranged for room service: chips and guacamole, chocolate covered strawberries, and cheese and crackers. It was a great, relaxing afternoon, although we did miss Captain Dale’s talk on business jets and whether or not they make business sense. Oh well – I’ll take a true-story sports movie any day.

Dinner with Mimi and Robert was more of the usual, but after dinner we were able to go to a martini demonstration, where we learned how to make a few of the ship’s 52 martini cocktails. Unfortunately, I didn’t get to sample any, but those who did said that they were delicious. I savored my mocktail of the day instead, a “Tropical Blend” that was basically an orange-banana smoothie. We participated in 70s Music Trivia this evening, which was hilarious. I wanted to go just to see if we would know any of the answers. My mom is a big fan of music from the 70s, so I thought I had a shot at getting a question or two right. It turns out, we did a lot better than some of the other groups, despite not even being alive in the 1970s! True, I knew the ABBA answers because of the musical Mamma Mia, but that’s beside the point. The point is, we weren’t totally dumb! Coming up later in the cruise is 50s Music Trivia, so we’ll have to see if our luck continues.

Dan’s karaoke escapade has become the talk of the ship, and I am not even kidding you. I had a lady come up to me at the lunch buffet today to say that I was incredibly lucky, because life with my husband would never be boring. (She doesn’t even know the half of it.) She said it was exactly like something her husband would have done. Then, as we were leaving the dining room after dinner, a man shouted out, “Hey, Pina Colada!” as we walked by, so we chatted with him for a minute. It’s been really funny. Dan is already looking forward to the next karaoke night, and planning his next tune, so I’m sure you’ll hear more about that later.

OK, that’s it from me for this trip. Dan takes over all blogging duties tomorrow, so you’ll be getting lots more detail and history from him. Catch you back in NYC!

 

I’ll start today off by mentioning that we completely missed karaoke last night. I laid down on the bed for a few minutes just to “rest” before the karaoke started, and next thing I knew, we had missed the whole thing. Oops. I asked Dan why he didn’t wake me up in time, but he didn’t feel that it was in his best interest to wake a sleeping pregnant lady. In hindsight, he was probably right, but I still felt bad about making him miss karaoke. If you know Dan, you know he LOVES karaoke.

This morning, we went to hear a speaker talk about our first two ports of call in New Zealand, Bay of Islands and Auckland. Normally when we travel, I’ll get a guidebook beforehand and read up on the area that we’ll be visiting, but on this trip there were so many different stops that I didn’t do that. The little presentation was pretty interesting, talking about some of the history of the area and some of the popular activities to do there. Apparently, New Zealand is the capital of the world for extreme sports, but don’t worry – bungee jumping is not in my future.

Next, it was time for our morning round of trivia. We are really getting into this, as the competitiveness of some of the other teams is contagious. At first, our goal was to just get one question right, but now our goal is to get more than half the questions right. This morning wasn’t one of our best outings at 10/20, but I figure any baseball player would be thrilled to bat .500, right?

Lunch today had an Italian theme, and I definitely ate more than one helping of the tomato and mozzarella Caprese salad. After our daily presentation from Captain Dale on his experiences flying private business jets, it was time for Dan to hit the gym while I opted for an afternoon nap. (Who’s surprised?) Next it was back for afternoon trivia. I tell you, one of these days we are going to win! You can have a team of up to six people, but Dan and I like to be on a team by ourselves so that we don’t get over-ruled by those who “know better.” To grade the answer sheets, you just trade with a team near you. We were being so nice, giving credit for misspelled answers and “Romaninoff” (correct answer: Romanov), but the other team didn’t give us credit for “multiple” instead of “many.” (Question: What does the prefix poly- mean?) I’m sorry, but multiple and many are essentially the same thing. We awarded ourselves a point back for that one.

After trivia, it was time to clean up for dinner with Robert and Mimi. They started off the cruise telling such charming stories, but last night ended up in a diatribe about terrorism that we’d probably all be better off without hearing. Thankfully, the ship was hosting another karaoke session right after dinner, so we had an excuse to bail quickly. Dan ended up singing the Pina Colada song (Escape), and despite not being a professional singer, ended up being somewhat of a sensation. We followed that up with the real professionals, the Ocean Princess Singers and Dancers, for a full-production show featuring the music of Cole Porter. Everyone did a great job, and I really enjoyed the show.

As we were leaving the theater, a lady and her husband stopped me and asked if Dan and I were having a good time, since we were so young. I guess she thought we wouldn’t have enjoyed the show because the music was older, but I grew up with old Broadway and Hollywood musicals, so I thought it all was great. It turns out, we were chatting with Captain Dale and his wife Laurel. They were SO nice, and Dan was even able to help out the captain with an iPhone problem. (Dan has been incredibly popular with the older crowd when they have technology questions.) Dale showed us underwater footage from his GoPro camera from when he went snorkeling in Bora Bora, and there was a creepy-looking moray eel in a cave that looked sort of like a Muppet. Also, it turns out that he lived in Mobile for a few years when he was a child, when his dad was temporarily stationed at Brookley Air Force Base. Such a small world! He said he’s never met anyone from Mobile since then, but since he lives in Canada, I figure that’s not surprising.

Tomorrow we have one more day at sea, and we’ll be crossing the International Date Line then. Friday, March 6^th, will not exist for us, which is so weird to think about. Of course, when we fly back from Sydney, Sunday, March 15 will seem like it never ends, so we’ll be getting the time back then. I think I’d rather have a day of flying that doesn’t exist and an extra-long day of vacation in the middle of the trip!

Today we arrived in Pago Pago, American Samoa for our third island port day. As we pulled into port this morning, we could see the McDonald’s out the window, so we knew we were headed for familiar territory.

The past two island ports were pretty busy days for us, with the Francky-Franck tour of Moorea and the snorkeling lagoon tour of Bora Bora, so the plan for today was pretty simple: sit on a beach and relax. We made our way to a little resort that was about 10 minutes away from the ship called Sadie’s By The Sea, where for $5 per person we had use of their pool, beach, showers, and most importantly, wi-fi. Apparently there are only two resorts/hotels on the island, and this one had a pretty nice set-up:

It was another beautiful day, and we thoroughly enjoyed relaxing by the pool, swimming, and catching a few rays. We ate lunch at the restaurant on site, Goat Island Café, and both of us enjoyed some delicious wahoo fish wraps with French fries and fresh fruit. I even made a new friend in this sweet orange kitty:

A few other people from our boat made their way over, but all in all it was pretty secluded and quiet. Well, quiet except for the CD of American oldies that kept playing over and over again. But that was ok, because it was like a little taste of home. In the gift shop at Sadie’s, you could buy Lay’s potato chips, Tostitos chips and cheese dip, and other American “specialties.” We got a good chuckle out of that.

Dinner was good once again, although Mimi is a bit under the weather, so we didn’t get quite as many good stories out of her tonight. Hopefully she’ll be back in action soon. Soon we are going to head down to karaoke, which Dan is really excited about. Stories about that to come tomorrow!

Today we were determined to accomplish a little more than we did yesterday. (Well, I guess that goes mainly for me, since I’m the one who slept yesterday afternoon away!) We planned to hit up the next session of the Dale Erhart lecture series and a trivia competition this morning, then catch some sun and hit the gym in the afternoon. Goal accomplished!

This morning’s lecture (title: Top Gun – Was it Real?) gave a little history on the creation of the “top gun” academies across different countries, why they were needed, and what their future might look like going forward. I mostly just like to go for the anecdotes that Captain Dale tells about his former students, colleagues, and experiences. The audience today seemed bigger than yesterday, so I think word got out. There’s no lecture tomorrow because we’ll be docked in Pago Pago, but I think we are both looking forward to coming back to these on our later sea days.

Next up was trivia. Now, we’ve been hearing about these cutthroat trivia competitions since we boarded the ship. The “experienced” cruisers have their teams all organized and trade bragging rights over who won what or who got what prizes. It’s a little extreme. Dan and I decided that we needed to check it out today, but my only condition was that I didn’t want to join another team – we had to hang out in the back and hope we got at least one question right. Well, it turns out that we’re not too shabby. We got more than half of the questions right! We weren’t the top team, but we also weren’t the worst, and I think we got a little bit of respect from some of the older players when I knew which famous dancer was killed when her scarf got caught under the wheels of her car. If all my years in the ballet studio taught me anything, it’s that I know my famous dancers! (P.S. It’s Isadora Duncan.)

There was a themed option for lunch today, so we dined on English pub fare and Dan enjoyed a Boddington’s beer. We both had fish and chips, and then I went out to lay by the pool for a bit while Dan hit the gym. Let me say, now I know why Mimi and Robert go sit by the pool at 8am. It was H-O-T at 1:30pm and I was only able to sit there for about 30 minutes. I’m pretty tolerant of heat, and I love being toasty warm, but something about being pregnant in the hot sun just didn’t sit right today. I called it quits and hung out in our air-conditioned stateroom for a bit before I went up to visit the gym as well.

Post-gym, it was time for my daily afternoon nap while Dan read on our balcony for a bit. Then we went to dinner, where we got to hear more tales from Mimi and Robert. (Mostly from Mimi – Robert doesn’t talk as much as she does.) Dan asked how they got into traveling, and we heard all kinds of things. We heard about Mimi’s first airplane flight, which she took to Venezuela and got so tipsy that she didn’t get concerned when her plane was struck by lightning. We heard about her trip to Cuba where it rained so much that all she could do was go to the beach bar. (My favorite quote: “It cost $13, but I tried all of the rums.”) We heard about her return trip from Cuba, where she forgot that she was bringing back a whole box of contraband cigars and thankfully was able to talk the customs agent out of searching her bag. She has had such an interesting life. We had originally requested a table for two for all of our dinners, but I’m glad that they weren’t able to accommodate that request. It has been such a hoot to talk to Mimi and Robert, and I look forward to seeing what else they have to say in the coming weeks.

Tonight’s after-dinner show was an Australian comedian, who I am sorry to say was terribly unfunny. He actually cut his set short, since his jokes were flopping so badly. We felt so bad for him at the end, but what can you do? On the way out of the theater, we stopped to chat with a couple of the cruise dancers/entertainers who were incredibly nice and friendly. They mentioned that we must be the youngest people on the cruise, and I didn’t have the heart to point out that they were probably younger than we are. They were from the UK originally, and like everyone else who works on the ship, they got really excited to hear that we were from New York. I think a lot of times we really take for granted that we live in one of the most amazing cities in the world, that other people dream of visiting, and it’s nice to step back and remember that from time to time.

Tomorrow we’ll be in port in Pago Pago, American Samoa. I’m excited for a beach day, and Dan is excited to be spending that beach day at a resort with free wi-fi. J A little something for everyone!

After a whirlwind start to our cruise with two port days, today we had our first day at sea. We did a whole lot of nothing, so this post isn’t going to be as long as the previous posts. We enjoyed sleeping in this morning, and I realized it was the first day of the whole trip that we stayed in bed past 7am. Now, if you had told me that I’d be getting up before 7am on the first three days of my vacation, I would have laughed at you. But sure enough, it was hard to get off of New York time, and we’d pop out of bed bright and early. (The flip side of that is that I was going to sleep around 8:30pm, but that’s beside the point.)

We enjoyed a leisurely breakfast where we ran into our dinner companion, Mimi, who wanted to know which side of the pool our chairs were on. Um, we just rolled out of bed…who has time to get up early and go reserve pool chairs? After breakfast, we had a Meet and Greet get-together with about 20 other people who frequent the Cruise Critic online message boards. Dan had good luck with those boards in learning about different excursions and such, so we wanted to meet some of the people in person. Everyone was really sweet and interesting, and it was nice to catch up a bit with some of the people from our Moorea tour.

For their sea days, Princess Cruises offers an enrichment lecture series, which sounds like the last thing you want on vacation, but for this cruise they had Captain Dale Erhart of the Canadian Air Force in to talk about F-18 fighter planes and his career in the Air Force. It was really fascinating to hear about the Canadian Air Force’s transition from using the CF-101 Voodoo planes to the F-18s and to listen to stories about his time as a training instructor for the newer pilots. Let’s just say, he’s had plenty of close calls. After his career in the Canadian Air Force, he flew for Air Canada and spent some time as a private jet pilot for a very wealthy client.  He’ll be back to discuss different topics on all the sea days this week, and Dan and I are looking forward to attending each session.

After a lunch at the pool-side burger grill, we headed back to the room for a bit, where I promptly fell asleep. Dan’s afternoon was a little more productive, with catching up on some emails and a trip to the gym, but I was conked out. Couldn’t tell you why, since we’ve been getting so much sleep each night, but there you have it.

It was the first of three formal nights for dinner this evening, and it was kind of fun to get all dressed up and see other passengers in their formalwear as well. One of our fellow Moorea tour participants, Mike, is from Florida, and we found out that he LOVES the formal night on cruises. This struck us as funny, since all we had seen him in up to this point was tank tops, shorts, and flip flops, but he said that since that’s all he ever wears at home, he loves the chance to get all dressed up. He did look quite dapper with his wife Nancy this evening. Getting to know some of the other people on the ship has really been one of the highlights for me.

After dinner, we caught the evening show, which was a musical performance by an Australian actress/singer named Belinda Marks. She was a great singer, and it was an enjoyable way to spend an evening with my “No-jito” mocktail. Grapefruit juice instead of rum…I may never go back to alcoholic cocktails again. Yum!

Today we stopped in Bora Bora, and Dan and I went on a snorkeling expedition. Dan found this excursion through Trip Advisor, and it was one of the most highly rated activities in Bora Bora, so we were really looking forward to it. The day involved taking a boat to three different snorkel sites (with different types of fish at each one) and a traditional Polynesian lunch feast on a private little motu (a tiny island that was created when a spot of coral died). There was a group of 12 of us on the excursion and, like yesterday, it was fun to meet others from the ship.

Bora Bora and other Polynesian islands are surrounded by coral reefs that serve to protect the islands from storms, typhoons, etc., but to get to the really deep water, you have to go out beyond the reef. That was our first stop of the day, to swim with sharks.

Dan was really excited about this part, but I was less so. I figured I’d just stay in the boat and watch. Maybe take a few pictures. Our guide, Patrick, assured us all that the sharks in that area (black-tipped reef sharks and lemon sharks) were scavengers and that as long as we didn’t die in the water, we had nothing to fear from them. Well, I couldn’t pass up this opportunity, so I hopped into the water too. Even though it was about 30-35 feet deep, you could see all the way to the bottom. There were big lemon sharks swimming along the bottom, maybe about 7-8 feet long, and smaller black-tipped sharks swimming closer to the top. After spending so much time watching Jaws and Shark Week, it was really disorienting to be right there in the water with actual sharks, but it was such a cool experience too. I’m so glad I did it!

The second stop was to a much shallower spot, maybe about 3-4 feet deep, where we could snorkel with stingrays. As we were getting there, Patrick pulled out his ukulele and played us some traditional Polynesian songs while driving the boat with his legs.

The sun was out, we were cruising around Bora Bora, and it was just a surreal experience. The stingrays were a lot of fun. There were a ton of them, and they were probably between 3-5 feet wide. Patrick had little sardines that we could feed them. For someone who really only ever saw stingrays at SeaWorld, this was a lot of fun. The black-tipped sharks showed up again and swam around us before it was time to head over to stop #3.

The third and final snorkeling stop was to a lovely coral area where we could really see the wildlife underwater. There were all kinds of fish, in all different colors, and it was really peaceful underwater with just the sound of your breathing and the sight of all the fish. Until Dan tried to get my attention by touching my foot and I thought I’d brushed up against some kind of giant fish and started to frantically swim away. That was less peaceful! Patrick let us snorkel for as long as we wanted to, and it was nice to not feel rushed in any way.

After that, we climbed back into the boat to head to lunch. We took the scenic route, past all the ritzy hotels with their overwater bungalows (some of which looked more like mansions than bungalows) and got to enjoy the beautiful day some more. There was a minor mishap when the engine stopped, but we figured out that it needed more gasoline, so once that was fixed, we were on our way.

At Patrick’s family’s private little mini-island, or motu, we enjoyed a traditional Polynesian feast of roast pork, breadfruit, plantains, chicken with spinach, and assorted root vegetables, all steamed in a traditional Polynesian fire pit, along with grilled mahi mahi and tuna. Everything was completely delicious. I had to forgo the champagne, beer and wine that they served, but I did snag a Coca Cola Light, which was a treat.

After lunch, we had time to relax and make new friends with some hermit crabs before it was time to head back to the ship. One of Patrick’s cousins came along this time to play the ukulele for us while Patrick drove the boat. All in all, a perfect day in Bora Bora.

Back on the boat, it was time to clean up and get ready for dinner. After my abrupt departure from the dining room the previous night, we were looking forward to seeing Mimi and Robert again and actually having a conversation with them. They are such a nice couple, and it was entertaining to hear about their lives in Canada. After dinner, we caught a comedy show. The bulk of the audience thought it was hilarious, but I think we need to wait about 30 more years before we find it as funny as they did. Our day of sun and swimming wore us out, so it’s time for bed now. Tomorrow is our first full day at sea, so we are looking forward to exploring the ship some more and doing some relaxing!

Day Three of our trip started out right – upon opening our stateroom door in the morning, we were greeted by the sight of my suitcase! Yay!! What a welcome sight. I’m so glad it arrived, and many thanks to my father-in-law who spent hours on the phone with various baggage reps trying to track it down and get it to me. Skip, we owe you big-time – how about if we get you a grandchild?  🙂

On our first port day of the cruise, we stopped at the island of Moorea. Like Tahiti and Bora Bora (tomorrow’s stop), Moorea is part of French Polynesia, and it was truly a tropical paradise. We have very different days planned at each of our island stops, and for the Moorea day, we were doing an inland tour with a gentleman named Francky-Franck and three other couples from the cruise.

We started things off with a quick intro to Francky and the island of Moorea. Francky was born in France and when it came time to do his mandatory military service, he said he was given a choice – one year of service in France or Germany or two years of service in Polynesia. There was really no contest there, and after spending his military service here, he eventually moved back to Moorea, fell in love, and recently became a father.   He only used the latest technology in explaining the geography of the island – a child’s Magic Erase board. We learned all about the fish that inhabit the Moorean lagoons, the island’s two bays (including Cook’s Bay, which is ironically NOT where Captain James Cook arrived), and the island’s culture.

Second stop on the tour was a juice factory, Jus de Fruits de Moorea, that also happens to make specialty fruit liquors. There was a particularly good-looking pineapple sparkling wine, but sadly that is off limits now. As we were leaving, I happened to brush my hand along the top of a wooden tiki statue, and Francky-Franck immediately started carrying on about how now I would have a baby since that was a fertility statue – I just pointed at my stomach and said “Yep!” and he was so caught off-guard. Then he proceeded to guess exactly how far along I was (he was right) and the baby’s gender. His baby daughter is five months old, so he’s just been on this side of things pretty recently.

Knowing that I was pregnant, he let me ride up front in his truck (instead of on padded benches in the back) for the bumpy, steep ride up Magic Mountain for some fantastic views of the sea and the shoreline. It was amazing. The interior of the island is so lush and green, and the water surrounding it was so pristinely turquoise. I’ve never seen anything quite like it – definitely a whole other world.

One of the most interesting parts of the tour was our stop at a botanical garden that also grows vanilla beans. We got a lesson in how the beans made their way from Mexico to Tahiti (the conquistadors), how the plants are fertilized without the bees that take care of that job in Mexico (by hand), and how the pods are then dried into the vanilla beans we see in stores (very slowly, with each bean getting individually massaged along the way). We tasted some delicious marmalades made with local fruits and vanilla, and had the chance to purchase true Tahitian vanilla beans ourselves. Can’t wait to get baking with that!

The tour wrapped up with a visit to an ancient Polynesian temple and a pineapple farm, and then it was time to head back to the ship. Shortly before dinner, the ship set out for the next port, and I started to feel a little queasy. For the duration of the cruise, we are sharing a dinner table with a lovely couple from Canada, Mimi and Robert. Bless their hearts, there is no telling what they thought of me, because immediately after we sat down and ordered our drinks, I was hit with a wave of sea sickness and dashed out of the dining room to get to a bathroom just in time. The rest of the evening was spent with Dramamine, half a sandwich from room service, and an early bedtime.

I look forward to getting to know Mimi and Robert better throughout the rest of the trip, but it was just not happening tonight. Hopefully it will just take a day or two to get my sea legs, and then the rest of the trip will be a breeze. Tomorrow, we’ll be snorkeling in Bora Bora, which is the part of the trip that I have been most excited about. Swimming with sharks, here we come!

Today definitely started off on the right note – my suitcase has been found! Our Air Tahiti flight from LAX to Papeete continued on to Auckland, New Zealand, and apparently my suitcase went with it. Air New Zealand is flying it back to Papeete tonight, and it will hopefully arrive before our ship actually departs at 4am. If not, they will send it to tomorrow’s destination, the island of Moorea, and we’ll be able to pick it up there. Whew. Crisis averted!

But back to today – first of all, it is unbelievably peaceful to sleep in an overwater bungalow. (Or maybe it was just because we’d been up for nearly 48 hours. No, I’m going to go with the bungalow.) We had an incredibly relaxing day in Tahiti before heading to the cruise terminal to catch our ship. Dan wants it noted that he sat quietly and read a book in a beach chair for two days in a row – that’s probably all the relaxing I’ll get him to do this whole trip.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After a leisurely morning of swimming and sunning, we had lunch by the pool and then it was time to bid au revoir to Le Meridien and head to our home-away-from-home for the next 15 days, the Ocean Princess cruise ship. The check-in and boarding process was really quick, and then we had time to venture back out to the Papeete market place to pick up a few necessities. It’s great knowing that my suitcase is on it’s way, but in the meantime I’m still wearing the same knit dress I wore on the plane and rocking the no-mascara look. (Ladies, take note – always pack ALL of your makeup essentials in your carry-on bag. Concealer and lipstick can take you a long way, but mascara definitely helps.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After our shopping excursion, we had time to orient ourselves to the ship before cleaning up for dinner. Dinner was yummy, but being in the full dining room reinforced that we are among the youngest guests on the cruise. Plenty of more seasoned travelers were trading stories of being in Giza, cruising from Capetown to Rome, and other great trips. One lady wants to “cover the earth before the earth covers her” – an adventurous spirit if ever there was one!

After dinner, we met up with three other couples that will be going on tomorrow’s island tour of Moorea with us, and based on the people we met, I’m sure tomorrow’s blog entry will have lots of funny stories and quotes. They are all, shall we say, experienced cruisers. Two are pretty outspoken New Jersey natives. It promises to be very interesting. We have a 7:45am meeting time in the morning, so I’ll have to wrap this up and get some sleep. Next stop, Moorea!

Last night, Dan and I left New York to spend 18 days in the South Pacific. We planned this trip last Fall, knowing that we’d want to get away from the freezing February temperatures we always seem to get, and – fortuitously – it so happened that this would turn into our “babymoon” getaway as well. The plan was to fly to Papeete, Tahiti, spend a couple of days there, embark on a 15-day cruise from Tahiti to Australia, and then fly back from Sydney to NYC. We’ll be writing these blog posts as the trip progresses, but due to spotty internet access in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, we won’t be able to post them online until we get back. So…as you read this, we are back in NYC, hoping that the freezing temps are gone for good. I’ll be blogging the first half of the trip, which includes my favorite part (island-hopping) and Dan will blog the second half, which includes his favorite part (the Lord of the Rings Hobbiton set tour).

Our trip begins with lots of airplane time. We flew Qantas Airlines from JFK to Los Angeles, and then Air Tahiti from Los Angeles to Papeete. Both flights were good, but I have reconfirmed that I will never be someone who can sleep on a plane. The Qantas flight was particularly nice, since the crew was super-friendly and had the best Australian accents.

We landed in Papeete, breezed through Customs, and caught a cab to Le Meridien Hotel, where we’ll be staying the night before boarding our cruise ship tomorrow afternoon. Unbeknownst to me, Dan got us an over-water bungalow, which is completely awesome. Check it out below. He may have a hard time getting me to leave here tomorrow.

After a much-needed morning nap, we grabbed a bite to eat at the poolside bar and then claimed our spot in the sun for an afternoon of swimming and relaxation. Relaxation was definitely called for after our morning mishap. Oh, I forgot to mention that? Well, my suitcase didn’t make it to Tahiti. Dan’s bag came off the plane pretty quickly, but we stood in that tiny tropical baggage claim for a long time as each suitcase slowly made its way down the conveyor belt – and none of them were mine. Eek. I wasn’t too worried, since I figured it would just make the next flight (tomorrow), and I’d get my bag in time to board the ship. Minor inconvenience to not have my bag until then, but I’d packed a bathing suit and flip flops in my carry-on bag, and what else do you really need in Tahiti, right?

Later in the day, we found out that they don’t really seem to know where my bag is. Thankfully, my fearless father-in-law is on the case, and if anyone can track down that bag, he can. The first several stops on our cruise are all in French Polynesia, so once the bag gets to Papeete, they should be able to get it to me pretty quickly after that. Stay tuned for the next installment of Where in the World is Ann Taylor’s Suitcase? Mystery, intrigue, suspense – this trip will have it all!