ABC’s of a perfect day…

Avalon



We woke up this morning to a beautiful view of Catalina Island and the town of Avalon, California. Avalon is a whopping 1 mile square. After a lovely breakfast on the Lido deck we headed down to catch the tender to shore. We walked around a bit and then decided to take a bus tour to learn more about the island and the town and some of the history of the area.

We leaned that Avalon has several oddities like having a third street when there is no first, second or fourth streets. Eucalyptus Street is the only street in the town that does not have a Eucalyptus tree on it, there is a casino, but no gambling and the town is proud of the giant bird aviary that has not birds in it!

We saw the apartment that Norma Jean Baker lived in with her first husband and several homes owned now and in the past by the Wrigley family. In fact the Wrigley family purchased the island and founded the town of Avalon. While Avalon is now part of Los Angeles County, the rest of the island is still owned by the Wrigley family…that’s a lot of chewing gum!!

We saw one bedroom condo’s that sell for one million dollars and lovely villas overlooking the town and the ocean that sell for who knows how much!

After touring the small town and some shopping we headed back to the ship for our daily afternoon reading/sun tanning/napping session.


Beauty Treatments

We came on the ship fully planning to take advantage of the SPA facilities. We were soon discouraged by the prices of the spa treatments and decided to forgo spa time for shopping. But last night we saw that for today only there was a special package price on a full body massage, scalp massage and facial. We decided to go ahead with our splurge plans and booked the package for each of us.

We both felt like butter that had melted into the massage table by the end of our treatments. I was more relaxed than I can remember being in a long time! Our faces were glowing from contentment and the facial!! We felt completely spoiled, and at peace after our day in the sun and spa!

Cruising

I am finding cruising in general to be an amazing vacation experience. As my family well knows being on the water is one of my favorite places to be, cruising has proved to be no exception to the water bringing me much joy!

Yesterday in particular was a great day of cruising. After our incredibly relaxing spa experience we headed back to our cabin to dress for our formal dinner night. Of course we looked amazing!!

Dinner was a sumptuous affair of shrimp and lobster (I think I have had shrimp in one form or another every day Travis!) with a fun conversation with our table mates. Melissa and Diane from the Ozark’s (no, really!), they are sisters-in-law, married to brothers and Sat and Michael from LA (two single guys) and Nancy and Kiev also from SO. Cal. (two single girls).

After our dinner we headed to the main stage area for an amazing tribute to Hollywood show. While we are convinced the mail singer wouldn’t make it past round one of American Idol, the women are good and the dancers are great.

We topped off this perfect day with a walk on the deck under the stars, which are quite amazing in the middle of the vast and very dark ocean. We headed to the very back of the ship and tried not to conjure up images of titanic but just to take in the beauty of it all! We could not help but wonder how anyone can look at something so far reaching and so beautiful and not believe in God! His beauty and glory are every present around us as we are surrounded by so much beauty, blessed by our time together and ever so thankful for the break from reality!!

Love and miss you all!!

Renee and Leila