Recap 2014: Post Cruise

I know a couple of you are anxious for me to finish off the never-ending AJ door saga, and I'll get to it shortly.

Sadly the time had come to leave the ship but a few of my friends, Anne Marie and Chrissy, joined me in Fort Lauderdale for a couple of days to relax and rehash all the excitement before returning to reality. Queue the start of BSB withdrawal. I don't know about you gals, but for me leaving the ship is just such an overwhelming experience. A mix of happiness over everything that just happened, disbelief, sadness that it's time to go, and of course exhaustion.

After we go through customs Chrissy calls up our van service that we hired to take us to Fort Lauderdale and after she gets off the phone with us she informs Anne Marie and I that, "They're not able to send a van at this time..." Ugh, are you kidding me?! I'm so tired and all I want to do at that point (aside from trying to invent time travel to rewind 3 days) was get to this hotel and take a nap.

"...So they're going to send us a limo instead," Chrissy finished her thought. Oops- I clearly got upset a little too soon. I can't believe they're actually sending us a limo. It appears as if my good luck streak is continuing. Sure enough, not 15 minutes had passed and there was a limo pulling up beside us to take us to the hotel. It was just what we needed to help ease the sting entering back into reality.

Limo ladies

Fort Lauderdale
The rest of the day was spent lounging by the pool and napping. Really nothing too exciting so I'll fast forward ahead to the evening.

Pretty beach

One thing that every cruiser does after leaving the cruise is hit social media hard. We've been away from twitter, facebook, instagram, etc for over 3 days and have like a year's worth of pictures and stories that must get posted immediately. Thus our evening was spent in the hotel room doing just that, with the door open to feel the warm ocean breeze flowing through our room...if I closed my eyes I could still picture being back on the ship. *sigh*

Out of no where Anne Marie squeals with excitement.  Now I really thought I was back on the cruise and maybe Howie had just walked by or something (wishful thinking!) But since we were no longer on the cruise, I'm curious what all the excitement was about. Well, she posted a picture of our door on instagram and we got responses from AJ's friend 'Madonna Mark' and then later on, Rochelle commented on it too. 

"This is incredible!!! The quotes are on point! So creative! I Love this! #illbethereforyou" - Rochelle

Ummm what?! Rochelle wasn't even on the cruise how is this possible? I couldn't believe that one of AJs best friends, and now Rochelle actually saw our door. So at this point I HAVE to believe that AJ has seen it. I mean, he had to have, right? And even if I didn't have concrete proof, it meant so much to me that AJ's wife saw the door and appreciated it.

A few more hours pass. We were busy chatting, catching up, and swapping stories. And then all of a sudden I hear yet another squeal from Anne Marie. Sure enough....what we had been waiting for...

AJ himself finally commented on the door. Mission accomplished. It was such an emotional roller coaster for me. Part of me was thrilled we at least got some resolution and AJ saw all the hard work that we put in. Obviously based on his comment I can't tell to what capacity he saw the door. So if I'm being 100% honest, part of me was still disappointed he didn't get to see it in person. But alas, I felt so relieved that he FINALLY saw the damn door. Ha!


Final Thoughts
This entire trip was absolutely unforgettable. I felt so fortunate from the minute I arrived in Miami to the moment I left. I can't explain why I had so much good fortune and luck on this cruise. While on past cruises I've certainly had some unforgettable moments and run-ins, I've never had the types of interactions as I did this time around. From winning the scavenger hunt and getting to take a shot with Kevin. Playing blackjack with Howie. Being partnered up with Nick on the beach for a game. Having a nice conversation with Brian the last night at the ABC party. And of course all the excitement with AJ and our door. These sorts of things just don't happen in real life and can only happen on the cruise.

In all my years of cruising, I never could've fathomed this. Its like I had had been saving up all my Backstreet karma for the past 15 year and cashed it all in on this trip. Well worth it!

And now that it's taken me 7 months to finish my review...hopefully we won't have to wait that much longer for our next cruise announcement. See you all on the next cruise!!

The luckiest gal on the 2014 cruise