We left from Fort Lauderdale this time. Ft Lauderdale is actually where we saw some cruise ships for the first time a few years ago and decided we wanted to take a cruise. That was when we went to Disney World the first time and then drove down to Miami to meet a couple of cyber friends.. more about them in an upcoming post. Our first cruise left from Miami, but as I already said… Ft Lauderdale is where we first decided we’d like to try a cruise.. so, it seemed fitting that our 2nd cruise left from Port Everglades in FLL. Here is the skyline as we left on Feb 26th.

The boys wer efascinated with watching the goings-on about the ship as we were escorted out of the port. Here are some of our “escorts.” We didn’t see any divers, but I understand that there are also scuba divers on the look out below.

These aren’t the best pictures, but I liked them because they have the Ft Lauderdale skyline in the background.

I also wanted to try centering the kids in a stationery frame…
this is weird.. the same spot… minutes after each other and yet one is so much darker than the other… I’m sure our photographer friend has better pictures than I, but I haven’t seen them yet so I’ll just have to go with the ones I have.
Here Tim and Amanda are having some sort of father daughter discussion as we leave the mainland and head out to sea. It’s hard to beleive Amanda will be graduating this year. We HOPE this isn’t our last family vacation with all of our kids, but with graduating and entering the FT work force and/or college life.. it’s just hard to know if her schedule will allow her to go with us next winter.. assuming we even go anywhere next winter… ok.. I’m not going to borrow any sadness before the time even arrives! On with THIS vacation!