Tom Grundy's YogaSlackers Cruise Page

Yes, you read that right - cruise. A group more known (at least to me) for suffering without enough food, insulation, or space (5 people in a 3 person tent with 2 sleeping bags camped at over 13,000 ft on Rainier springs to mind) actually went on a cruise. Yes, a cruise, on a cruise ship, to the Bahamas. How did this miracle happen you may ask? There was a lot of interest in having a get together and after a bunch of research it was determined that a cruise actually was a pretty good way of having a scalable get together. That means that if 10 people came it would work, and if 50 people came that would work too. It also had the advantage of none of us getting stuck with shopping, cooking, or cleaning up.

I left Boston in early January just before their mega winter really started (lucky timing on my part). By the time I got to Florida there was snow in Boston and things were steamy warm in Miami. I met up with a bunch of Miami acro/slack people as well as a few of the people going on the cruise. Sam and Raquel had just been down in the Keys and Jason and Chelsey just finished teaching acro in Miami. Others trickled in that evening and the next morning. The cruise company parking was expensive but I wasn't sure where else I could park. Thanks to Victor I found some on-street parking and was able to stay in his place that evening as well as stash some valuables and food safely away from prying eyes and the heat of the Florida sun. The next morning I loaded up and rode my bicycle to the cruise terminal.

moon over Miami (actually I think it is over South Beach)

Once onboard I joined some of the others at lunch. People kept trickling in throughout the afternoon. We were 19 including a few relatives who often joined us for meals but less often the random acts of acrobatics and other foolishness. It was fun to catch up with some of the YogaSlackers I hadn't seen in a while - some since teacher training in 2013 as well as some I had seen more recently. It was also nice to finally meet some of the Slackers who I had only heard about or seen in facebook posts. Of course there were lots of others that it would have been awesome to have along too, but for various reasons they weren't there. Then we had a long and hot lifeboat drill - well, at least my room went and stood in the sun where we would muster if we had to load the lifeboats. Someone who had been on a previous cruise warned us that we would just stand there, so at least we didn't go early. Then the ship cast off and we were on our way. We went up to the deck in the front of the ship to do some acro and take pics. Some of the other passengers were pretty amused, others ignored us.

and we're off - Chelsey stands on Jason's head to point the way

The next series of pics were taken by Eric R. Ward. More of his work can be seen @a4gpa #EricWardPhotography on instagram or Eric R. Ward Photography on Facebook, he can be contacted at eric@ericwardphotography.com . It was fun to be able to photogeek with him a bit, and it is nice to get some pics with me in them for a change. He did a better job of getting up early for sunrise pics and timelapse cruise ship movies.

hand to elbow and hand to hand and I'm even pointing my toes, Tom on Jason, Dan on Kyle- Eric R. Ward Photo

two high, Jason on Kyle, Dan on Tom - Eric R. Ward Photo

Lining up on the handrail, Chelsey, Kathy, Jason, Tom, Kyle, Scott - Eric R. Ward Photo

again on the handrail - Eric R. Ward Photo

more acro foolery, Chelsey on Tom and Scott - Eric R. Ward Photo

I brace my camera on the handrail while we head out to sea - Eric R. Ward Photo

I'll put a word here about cruise life. We were on the "Norwegian Sky" - probably a mid-sized ship 848 feet long with double occupancy capacity of 2004 and 934 crew. For starters our rooms (at least the ones I saw) were small - like an RV. 4 of us packed into one interior room in steerage for maximum savings. I am sure the balcony rooms were much nicer, and also much more expensive. I am a little curious about the economics of the cruise line industry. I know there are a lot of economies of scale, but they couldn't have made a whole lot of money off of me. I think they break even on steerage and make their money on alcohol, gambling, nicer rooms, and various extras like island tours. The food was pretty good if you went for the sit down meals - actually the buffets were decent too, but the sit down meals had even better food. Some items were on the menu every meal, others just one night. Once we realized that you could just order anything, and the portions were small, many of us went with 2 appetizers, a main course, and then 2 deserts. Often followed up with a stop at the buffet a little later. Nobody went hungry unless they wanted too. If you had dietary restrictions that weren't met by the regular offerings you could ask and they would plan ahead for the next day. It was pretty dark in the dining rooms, but I still managed to get a few pics of some of the food - I knew my dad would want to see them even if nobody else does...

our home away from home - the Norwegian Sky (at Great Stirrup Cay)

the menu one night - hopefully legible

group at dinner

Mediterranean Seafood Orzo (most excellent)

Baked Goat Cheese Tart (not so great)

Thai Coconut Shrimp (most excellent)

Beetroot Chocolate Cake (ok)

Chocolate Nutella Pot De Creme (most excellent but very dense and sweet)

That night we went to a circus camp. It was mostly for kids but we got to play with juggling and plate spinning and so on. I can't remember which night it was, but we went to a comedy show one evening too.

Day 2 - Great Stirrup Cay

The next morning we pulled up next to Great Stirrup Cay - an island entirely owned by the cruise line. They are slowly increasing the docking, beaches, and coves by sculpting the limestone bedrock and probably importing or dredging up sand. We were ferried to the island and a group set about looking for a good place to set up a slackline over the water. The one place we had scoped via aerial photos was closed off, so they hiked a bit to where there were some small islands about the right distance apart. Meanwhile I went snorkeling - it wasn't spectacular, but I saw a bunch of fish and some coral and conchs among other things.

rainbow over the island - this was the gap we originally planned to slackline

magnificent frigatebird

selfie snorkeling - with fish photobomb

school of fish

blue fish

After I got out it took a while to find everyone as they had moved down the shore a good bit (to the slackline area). We did some acro and slacking on land while they were setting up. Every once in a while a jet ski would zip out with a lifeguard to see what they were doing, but miraculously they seemed ok with the slackline as long as we weren't on the rocks. Some people were shuttled out there on the SUP or packraft and others just swam out - with my snorkel gear in my case. The line was high and long enough that it was intimidating and hard (at least for me). Especially as the tide went down. I was able to stand up a few times, but only managed a few steps before falling on my best go. Beyond these rocks the water was deeper and clearer.

Sam on the waterline with others below

Sam on the waterline - Eric R. Ward photo

John starting on the line

staging off the Hala Atcha SUP by the slackline (shark's eye view)

Chelsey on the packraft - our cruise ship in the background

Jason makes a water exposure turn on the slackline...

... and then goes to visit Neptune

Sam and Eric support Kimberly - Eric R. Ward photo (well, at least his camera)

They started herding everyone back a long time before we actually were scheduled to leave. We had to wait a while to get on one of the last shuttles because there was something wrong with one of them. This day I managed to do a pretty good job of keeping myself slathered in sunscreen and/or under shade, hat, and clothes. Some of the others didn't do as well blocking the harsh near tropical sun from our winter whitened skin. That night after dinner we were entertained by a Vegas retrospective show.

Day 3 - Nassau

This morning we pulled into Nassau. Once we left the ship we rented scooters and set off like the scooter gang we were. The first stop was a beach NE of town. There we played in the very blue water and on the beach before continuing on to circumnavigate the island. Next stop - the east end of the island for more posing. Then on to a beach on the south side with waterline potential. There we set up a "space line" over a stream outfall (a space line is where there are more than 2 anchors so the lines end in "space"). I wasn't inspired by what was under the line, so stayed off (AKA chickened out).

more acro with Chelsey, Mark, Corinne, John, Kyle, Leah, Raquel, Scott, Dan, Kimberly, Eric, Kathy

low to high bird Kimberly on Kyle, Corinne on Mark, Scott on Kathy - mouseover for photoshop fun

Chelsey, Sam, and Jason on the line

chatting with a local while Eric walks the line - scooters behind

On the way towards the west end of the island one of the scooters stopped running. We couldn't get it started. Luckily we were near a mini-mart, so we called the rental place, left it there, and continued on with a little more crowding. This delay slowed us down enough that we skipped the west end of the island and cut up to a beach on the north side. There we did more acro and photography on and near the beach.

North side beach

setting up acro shadows off the seawall, Leah and Jason in front

Eric taking acro pics

Leah flies Chelsey in foot to hand

When we went to leave this beach, another scooter wouldn't start. So we left that one there and headed back to the terminal with a stop to get some tasty but dangerously hot conch fritters. Back at the terminal we attempted to get some refund from the scooter rental place (there were a bunch of different operators that all rented out of the same area, both duds were from the same company). They were not very motivated to give us a refund, and we were on a tight time frame, so they basically stonewalled us. The end result was that Kyle got an expensive souvenir moped key along with a story. We played around a bit more on the way back onto the ship - including walking on the hawsers mooring it (which was not appreciated by the crew).

Kyle and his moped key

Kyle walking on a mooring hawser

Day 4 - Freeport

Rather than deal with the moped mess, we rented a van and went to Xanadu beach - so named for a closed resort there. Consequently it was fairly empty - perfect. We played with our toys - packraft, SUP, snorkel gear (relatively lame with so-so visibility and not much to see), and each other. The weather was threatening, but we only got a few sprinkles. I managed to surf remarkably small waves with the SUP. Raquel and I did some SUP acro, but the wind was blowing offshore, so I was scared we'd both fall off and the SUP would blow away. Even so we drifted pretty far offshore while playing around.

surfing on at least triple over ankle waves - Eric R. Ward Photo

Raquel and I doing SUP acro and drifting out to sea - Eric R. Ward Photo

Raquel and I glad to make it back to shore - Eric R. Ward Photo

I annoy Leah working on a crossword (I had a run of answers I knew) - Eric R. Ward Photo

top, Leah, Eamon, John, Kimberly, Chelsey, Corinne, Raquel, Kathy
bottom, Eric, Kyle, Dan, Jason, Sam, Mark, Tom, Scott - Eric R. Ward Photo

That night entertainment included a nice sunset, an amusing couples game show (which Sam and Raquel and Kathy and Scott got into), and a musical/dance production that wasn't so great (from my view). We also plotted setting up a highline across an atrium but that fell through. I missed out on the late night slackline set up across the deck (evidently quite hard to walk with the rocking of the ship).

sunset from the bow of the ship on the way back to Miami

what the YogaSlackers really do - board games
probably a very heated discussion here about if Chelsey is "evil" or not

Sam and Raquel compete in a couples game show
here passing an icy lemon up one pant leg and down the other

The last morning we enjoyed the sunrise as we came back into port, then a last breakfast. I was glad to see my bicycle was still locked to a parking garage sign. We sat around talking until it was time to go. I debarked in a leisurely manner as I thought I had to wait 'til that evening to get my stuff. The guy manning the x-ray took pity on me and let me keep my bag of dates although we weren't supposed to bring anything into the country. They were probably loaded onto the ship in Miami anyway.

It was quite nice to be on the cruise and visit various places in the Bahamas but the thing that made the trip was all of the people on it. I think we could have had almost as much fun in a warehouse or field somewhere. It is hard to include all the interactions with this great group of people in a trip report, but that was one of the most important part of the trip. I would like to especially thank Raquel and Sam for their effort in putting this together especially in light of how hard it must be to herd a bunch of slackers.

After the cruise a number of people came down with a sore throat, possibly from Kyle - who had a sore throat and lost his voice on the cruise. I was among this "lucky" group with a frustratingly unproductive hacking cough for almost a week. Fortunately (to one way of thinking) I was mostly alone during this time - at least I didn't lose my voice.

photogeeking with Eric - reflections of us in multiple windows

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