Sunday, September 23, 2012

5 Year Trip - Part 1

If you know us or have read this blog for a while, then you know we love to travel.  Pretty much anywhere too.  We also love surprises and we like to celebrate special occasions.

We traveled a lot our first couple years of marriage.  One of those trips being a ski trip for our 1st anniversary.  On that trip, we came up with this idea.  We decided we wanted to take a big trip every 5 years of marriage.  We could do something smaller scale on the other years, but if possible, try to take several days to getaway and go to a place we have never been on the bigger years.  We also alternate who plans our anniversary celebration each year.  That way we can each take turns planning and surprising the other.  So, John plans the even years and I plan the odd years.      
Well,  last February was our 5 year anniversary.  My year to plan our first big trip!


We decided to do our trip in the summer because Annie was only two months old in February. 
So, a few weeks ago we spent 6 days in paradise at CoCo Bay.  CoCo Bay is in Antigua and it was exactly what we wanted for this trip.  We like small places that are not huge touristy resorts with tons of people.  There were probably only 45 or so people at CoCo Bay and mostly European.  
We love to travel with people from all over.  



It was a little harder to take this trip than I expected.  I know you are thinking, "how hard can it be to go vacation on an island for 6 days?"  Logistically, it was crazy preparing to leave the country and have everything taken care of for the girls for a week.  We leave our girls fairly often for weddings and others events, but this was different.  It was the longest trip and farthest and we didn't talk to them once except a few picture texts every couple days.   

Even though we missed the girls like crazy, it was so good.  
Good for me, for John, our kids, and most importantly, our marriage.  

No tv, no internet, no phones.  We each read 2 books, spent long days at the beach and poolside watching the sunset with absolutely no agenda and no idea what was happening anywhere in the world.   


The weather was great which is always a bonus when you risk traveling at the end of hurricane season.  I didn't prepare or clean up one meal for a week.  We were spoiled on homemade omelets and fresh fish everyday.     

I celebrated my 28th birthday while we were there as well.  And besides not seeing my girls, there was really nothing more I could have asked for that day.  

Since we were there  5 nights, each night at dinner we reminisced a year of our marriage starting with 2007.  A bit cheesy, yes, but it was something we really enjoyed.  It always brings us to a great place of perspective.  Showing us more gratefulness and blessings than we could imagine.  A look back at hard times where we didn't understand the Lord's purpose or plan in the moment, but now we can looking back.  

We stayed at CoCo Bay everyday, but one.  A few pics from that day to come in the next post.  

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