Hopetown Lighthouse!

Okay, last post about the Bahamas; sorry I've been so behind. The last couple days of our trip were excellent. We spent one of the days going out on a boat to Hopetown, which you can only get to by boat. Cool, right? Anyway, there is this really great (supposedly famous) lighthouse there that looks like a candy cane. But, before I get to that, I must share the story of the golf cart that must be remembered (like we could ever forget it ha). So, we were leaving the house to go into town, where we were going to catch the boat (the resort only allowed golf carts to be driven inside, so cars had to be left at the front). One cart was leaving to go up, while the other was going to be along in another half hour. So, it was Gary driving, with my mom and Katie in the front, Betsy and Jamie in the middle and I was in the back, with the backwards-facing seat. Gary being the crazy driver he is, goes off tearing down the driveway at top speed. Just then another golf cart, also going full speed, turns around the blind corner at the driveway entrance, which was not wide enough for two carts. We all braced ourselves for impact, as we crashed almost head on. Exciting, no? The poor guy in the other cart (who was part of maintenance at the resort) felt so bad and kept apologizing. No one was severely hurt, which was the important thing, so we all tried to tell him that it was okay. It was as much Gary's fault as it was his. Katie did bump her lip, Gary banged his arm, Jamie her knee and I, both a leg and an arm. It was a good thing I had been looking forward an braced myself, or I would have been out of the cart. So great, having to go back inside and tell the rest of our family we had, had a golf cart accident. Maybe someday we will actually manage to no damage any property of these vacation places...probably not. haha
Anyway, here are some pics of our trip to Hopetown, which was really neat, since it is basically a little town built on the water. on the boat...yeah i make weird faces Katie and my Aunt Julie...such a cute picturethe lighthouse! isn't it awesome!?family picture, trying to get the lighthouse in the background.going on up......and looking downBets, Jus and I at the top. After, the boat took us out to this great snorkeling spot, where you could dive and swim through the breaks in the reef. Emphasis on the word "could"; I'm not sure we were supposed to. Our little heads in the distance. We saw an awesome lobster! It was purpleAfter snorkeling, the Jib Room was recommended for dinner, so we all had just brought a change of clothes with us and used some random public showers at the boat docks and went. The dinner was great and it was right in the harbor. Jamie and I at dinner.
After dinner the Jib Room was having Limbo and Dance competitions. My mom and Gary took Katie back with their car and the rest of us stayed. Limboing was so fun! I haven't done that in forever. The guy that was running it was amazing as well. He set the bar at about 3.5 ft off the ground and then looked at my Aunt, gesturing for her to come over to where he was. She immediately grabs my arm and pushes me towards him. He then picked me up and limbo-ed under the bar... haha crazy. Justin and Jenna ended up tying for the winning spot. After, the Cha cha slide came on and somehow I got tricked into leading it for the entire restaurant. During the next song, which was the eclectic slide, everyone left the dance floor except Jamie, Betsy and I, which was really embarrassing, but totally fun. It was a pretty awesome last night in the Bahamas.
When we returned to the house, Jamie, Betsy, Justin and I sat up in the observation room (it had glass walls) talking for a bit. Lots of good conversations in that room. Another night Justin, Betsy and I stayed up until 3am just talking about everything from school to relationship advice and crushes...pretty different topics haha. Anyway, Justin and I had heard about this thing on youtube where a guy was making a movie from all these different people's lives on the date of July 24th. So, on that day, people were just supposed to film whatever it was they were doing and then upload it to youtube, answering the questions "What do you love? What do you fear? What's in your pockets? What makes you laugh?". It was a bummer we hadn't heard about it earlier, but we decided it would be cool to make a video telling what we had done, even if it was just for us. We talked a bit about our day and then decided to go down to the beach, since we had wanted to go every night that week. Jamie and Betsy weren't interested and stayed behind. It was a full moon when we walked down there, so everything was so bright. After we captured that on film, I walked down to the water and stood there in the water, moonlight and soft warm breeze, wishing I could simply capture that moment and how extremely peaceful, yet empowered I felt. It was totally one of those moments that leaves a lasting impact simply because of the amazing picture that is painted around you. Eventually we started our walk back up to the house, making it into a dance rather by turning some music on from Justin's computer. Have I mentioned how much I love the randomness of my family? It works so well for us all haha. Here's getting ready to leave...can't wait to see them again! Skiing this winter probably

Hooray for one room airports! :)

So blessed to have been able to travel so much this summer!

hurricane watch? i wish

again, the beach was spectacular!

justin and betsy buried me and made me a mermaid... :)

the house was very open and spacious and, like last year, we had a play some rounds of sardines. we got everyone to play this time and managed to sustain only minor injuries. we played in the pitch dark, which made things super hard and super scary. justin kept following me around, saying my name in what was one of the creepiest voices i've ever witnessed, hence naming it his "creepy munchkin voice". seriously, it is terrifying he can even make this voice. anyway, it wasn't me that got injured this time. betsy, jamie, justin and i had gone in my aunt and uncle's room to search and justin thought it would be hilarious to get in the closet and jump out at us as we walked out. he jumped out and betsy, who was in front, grabbed the door as a reaction and tried to slam it closed, hitting justin's head...pretty great backfire. jamie and i just screamed, laughed and then ran into my aunt, coming to see what had happened. i told her that justin had come out of the closet. her response was "Oh finally." haha poor justy...not like he doesn't deserve it.

at another point in the game, we were all smashed under the couch cushions in the couch and were there for about a good minute and a half before we realized we were all there and no one was left looking. another round jamie was hiding in the service closet, which was in the main room. just as i was opening the door to look, justin comes out of nowhere and shoves me in, causing me to fall into jenna, who fell into a bucket and then as he is scrambling to close the door quickly, he falls on top of both of us.

through this game we also discovered that eight fully grown adults can fit into a single shower stall...the resort should put that on their brochures. kidding.

i love my family!

jamer and i

we went down to the clubhouse for karaoke one afternoon. the man in front started dancing with me...he was the sweaty-est person i've ever seen. i was cringing as he grabbed my arm, while jamie cheered and laughed. hahafamily picture...i think i had just played tennis. the bay with the trampoline and sail boat! dinner on the ocean was amazing, although while we were there, we were watching on the tv a tropical storm warning for tropical storm bonnie. we all started discussing what would happen if it became hurricane status and hit Abaco. we let our imaginations run a little wild, saying it could be made into a movie: a family on vacation, a storm hits and leaves one alive. somehow i was the one who would live because the title "the last little blond girl" was such a terrific title according to aunt julie. then we began talking about who would survive in a horror film.

bonnie did hit, but it was just with lots of lightning, thunder and rain...nothing too major. fun though