day 4: a day of adventure and fun in the sun

Our last full day of the cruise brought us to Castaway Cay, a Disney owned island. As you can imagine, Disney goes all out, but still keeps the Disney-ness from going overboard. There are a couple of beaches to play at, bikes to rent, cabanas to rent for the day, places to eat, little beachy shops to get some last minute essential beach-related items, etc.

Despite not being on the boat, we still had the ever-present feeling of fabulous service. I kid you not, even though we were at the beach, when I went into the restroom to change into my swimsuit, I didn't see a spec of sand. It was seriously one of the cleanest public restrooms I think I've ever been in.

We climbed up a little outlook post during our bike ride to catch a view of the island. I imagined this island to be a little on the small side and figured we'd be going around and around in circles for our entire bike ride and not really getting away from other people. I was wrong. :)

Sweet P's first bike ride! She loved it for the most part. Towards the end of the hour, she got a little tired of it and wanted to go swimming and some milk.

Totally love this picture of the kiddo above.

Playing with her shadow.

Happy kiddo...finally getting to go swimming! This was also her first experience of going to the beach with her daddy (yeah, I know we live near the beach...what can I say? He was deployed the first summer and last summer he was gone all.the.time.)

This was also the first time she wanted to get into the water at the beach. But this makes sense too considering we were in a cove so the waves weren't crashing...and the water was warmer.

Need I remind you that this was early early February? How awesome is it that we could go swimming and were comfortable!?!?

Playing in the sand with daddy.

I absolutely love this picture of Sweet P playing in the water with the sand on her bum. Too cute.

So again we were totally surprised by how great the food was. They were serving a big BBQ with ribs, chicken, mahi mahi, corn-on-the-cob, coleslaw, and so many other wonderful things I can't remember. One thing that really sticks out though was the chocolate chip cookies. The munchkin eagerly grabbed one of those and then started trying to pick the chocolate chips out. She loved that cookie as was evidenced by the chocolate smears all over the towel and her bathing suit.

Deep concentration displayed while enjoying that cookie.

We had a great time on the island but had to head back to the boat for a very much needed nap for the kiddo. She was exhausted. So much so that she practically fell asleep within 30 seconds of putting her in her bed and slept for several hours, causing us to rework our afternoon/evening plans (which I mentioned earlier).

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In our room we had a couple of postcards. We decided to send them to the kiddo's grandparents as a fun little surprise. When we first set foot on Castaway Cay, we headed to the post office, bought postage, and sent our postcards on their way to the 'States. Amazingly, it took nearly a month for them to reach their destinations. None-the-less, mission accomplished.