A Gaither Homecoming Trip

An uneventful, yet event-full trip is always a good one

Back home safely and back to the old routine now after the past 9 days of travel and the good times are now quickly becoming sweet, fading memories. 

Can you say Ahhhhhh?

About 28 years ago I won a cruise to the Bahamas for a short and sweet four day weekend trip - the flights to and from took up two of those days. 

This was then

This is now.

This time we cruised for a longer period of time on a much bigger and nicer ship and, even better, it was a Gaither Homecoming cruise! Whoopee, it was fantastic! 

Holland America

Ms. Westerdam

What a happy time we had making new friends, eating great food, enjoying the Caribbean sunshine, and best of all, seeing and listening to some of our favorites perform both old and new southern gospel music. Everything about it was inspirational, worshipful, and filled with joyful laughter. Bill and Gloria are an amazing couple. I could go on and on about them and the way all of the performers just mesh together. There don't seem to be any big egos there. They simply enjoy singing for the Lord. 

Below are a few highlights from our trip. No matter where we sat in a concert, I never was able to get a really good photo of the performers because of the lighting and, although they did have special times of autographs and getting a photo with some of them, that just really isn't my thing. We went for the singing and they did not disappoint! So much energy from this group. They had us all on our feet every day clapping our hands, stomping our feet, (some of us may have been dancing)!

Joy in my heart, 

Joy in my mind, 

Joy since that happy day.

Joy in my hands,

Joy in my feet,

Joy in every way.

He took those worries aside 

He gave me heavenly fire,

and now I've got a brand new goal.

All since I met this man called Jesus Christ 

I've got this joy, joy, joy in my soul. 

Our first stop was Nassau in the Bahamas. We took the city tour and saw the Ardastra Zoo. It was somewhat of a strange zoo with unusual critters.

The world's largest rodent!

Strange. He wouldn't turn around for me.

photo credit

The famous marching flamingos were fun to watch.

They love applause.

Most solemn dude

This guy was running loose!

Well, maybe not running, but he was not caged. Eeek!

 

A gorgeous view of San Juan from the top of the tower pictured below.

We visited the El Yunque Rain Forest.

 A waterfall

Bougainvillea

Welcome to St. Thomas

St. Thomas was our next stop where we toured the city and got to spend a couple of hours on this beautiful beach - Megan's Beach. Loved it.

The view from where I lay.

Our suite was always nice to come back to take a break from the tours.

Somebody had a few naps on this sofa with the balcony doors wide open so he could listen to the sounds of the ocean and feel the breezes!

I loved the days at sea.

This was my favorite beach and the pics I got don't do it justice.

Quiet, uncrowded, the softest sand and the bluest, clearest water.

I could have stayed here all week.

DH never took off his shoes to feel that wonderful sand.

I walked up and down the beach barefoot. 

Each evening after dinner we could walk off a couple of calories down this very long hall.

Hey!!

There was nobody tapping on my door this morning bearing a tray of hot coffee with real cream and orange juice to get my day started off right.