After our retirement from the Marines, I was fairly confident I wanted to travel around these United States more, and was not in a hurry to leave the country for awhile.  Understand, I had just spent four years away from home.  Most of my time away was in Africa, and the last year I was only about a four hour drive away.   We visited Texas, Florida, Virginia, Tennessee, and North Carolina.  We also went through a few boats of varying sizes until we settled on our cruiser and a Jet Ski.

Good friends who were already cruise enthusiasts kept returning from one voyage or another with stories of their life of luxury at sea and eventually I agreed that we should join them.     I managed to convince another friend that he should treat his wife to the same fun we were planning.  Actually, I think we husbands just told the ladies to plan the trip and let us men know when to drive them to the port.

The first cruise was aboard the Norwegian Star, Sailing out of Tampa to Belize, Roatan Bay, Cozumel and Costa Maya.   The ship sailed on Sunday so we drove from Atlanta to Tampa on Saturday and stayed the night near the ship.  We boarded the Star on Sunday afternoon.

The first night at sea, we celebrated clearing the bridge as we hit the open water.  The ladies went to an orientation while the men  remained in the beer garden with our cigars and watched the sun set on over water, no land in sight, a strong breeze kept us cool and I don’t remember going to bed.

The first full day at sea was a lazy as a day could possibly be lazy and it was wonderful.   With the curtains and doors open, it would have been easy to spend the entire morning in bed watching the seas roll by our balcony.   A late shower and early lunch by the pool was enough to set the tone.   I found my friends at the cigar bar/beer garden overlooking the pool, the horizon and the entire ship for that matter.   This refuge at the top of the forward levels would be our gathering place for not just this cruise, but another one a year later with a larger crowd family and friends.

We spent another evening in our perch, enjoying new found friends, the best of cigars and some over prized miller lights.

The next day, we would wake up on Roatan Bay, Honduras.  A island about 50 miles from the mainland.