home where my thought's escaping, home where my music's playing

Tuesday, 09/27/16, 10:03am, 12:57pm, 3:24pm, 5:47pm, 8:05pm (gah, briefly editing during choir rehearsal while she reviewed other song parts and altos weren't singing), and finally 10:28pm, make that all the way up until Wednesday 09/28/16 12:28am (all mountain time)

Whew. Wow. Blog, I have missed you, but it's been a good break. An excellent break. A much needed break. A beautiful, loving, quality friend time, adventurous, whirlwind, heart bursting break.

Last night we got home from Bermuda. Bermuda, bermuda, bermuda. Oh how I love thee.

Our friends who got married there on Saturday actually live there. So now we are already trying to decide when we'll go back, with the kids. Need to save up some money to all go as a family! And we want to go when we can enjoy the ocean together as a family. So to a point where the boys are strong enough swimmers that we can do some boating (did I mention that those friends of ours own a boat?) and some snorkeling. We actually ended up with no beach time, other than walking on the dark beach and sticking my feet in the water at the reception (that was incredibly amazing though). The one time we were going to try and make it to the beach was the morning after we arrived and we really were in need of some sleeping in time then. Several other times we had rain, wind, storm coming in. More on that later.

We arrived last Wednesday around noon island time, after THREE flights from Denver starting at 7:40pm mountain time last Tuesday evening. It was originally supposed to be only one connection, at JFK, but the Denver to New York red-eye was canceled by Delta months ago. They first tried to re-book us through LAX, but after Nasser called them, he made it better by flying through Salt Lake City.

Oh man, we arrived a bit bleary-eyed, but super excited. 

I LOVED watching the view as we were coming in.

Nasser got tired of me taking pictures pretty quickly. Haha. I loved the little airport though and it's "cute-ness" just made me that much more excited to be there.

We took a taxi (the first of many) to our little Airbnb studio apartment.

I suppose you could call it an efficiency? It was a one bedroom, one bathroom place, one unit of several others in a house that appeared to have been converted. Our host, Josie, was super nice, attentive and was there to meet us and show us around the place. It didn't have a kitchen, but it did have the necessities- a mini fridge, microwave, coffee maker, hot pot for heating water, set of 4 plates and silverware, mugs, glasses, as well as a few little snacks to get us started. She even had books and movies, and a little balcony (which we failed to use). We could have even picked up some food and grilled it on the little charcoal grill she had provided in the closet. We went out on the balcony only to bring in the patio furniture before the storm came through; the entire island was preparing for Tropical Storm Karl before it skirted around us Saturday morning, the morning of the wedding. It hit its closest to the island at around 4am. Again, more on that later.

Our rented studio was in the same building as a couple of our friends. Their unit was just downstairs, similar provisions, although it was a different portion of that house. It appeared that our unit was the original master bedroom, with the master bathroom, so nice big shower and bathtub (although Bermuda has limited water, everyone collects rain water as there is no municipal water supply. So we were not really "permitted" to use the bathtub. Although we did wonder if there was plenty of water after the tropical storm, we never used it).

We quickly dropped off our stuff Wednesday, and met our friends outside who had a taxi to scoop us up and head to the caves. It was raining, a lot, that entire day, but we ended up having an amazing time, taking a tour through Crystal Cave (we couldn't go to Fantasy Cave because the tides were too high),

The underground lake can be accessed by scuba diving through underground tunnels, but they do tours for the normal people. They used to do boat tours through this, so I think that's how many of the stalactites were broken. Some were purposely broken to allow for tours to walk through, as well as some stolen by tourists. 

Very sad to see how damaged it looked.

The two large rock formations are what's really interesting about this picture.

The yellow fire hydrant looking one on the left is about 14 ft tall. The one in the right bottom corner is 35 ft tall.

The distortion happens due to the layers of fresh water vs salt water and the mix in the middle. Also, the depth of the water gets to be about 55 ft deep in sections. Seeing through the crystal clear water was mesmerizing. I could have sat in there and just looked at the cave and water for hours.

They'd been getting a lot of weather in Bermuda over the previous days and as a result the tides were high? 

I think. Or maybe that time of day in particular? 

Anyway, we had to duck to get under some of the rock formations as we walked on the floating bridge. 

You can see up to the original opening to the cave way up there. Two young boys discovered 

the cave in 1907, but some of the rock formations in the cave are estimated to be about 1.5 million years old. 

Back when the two boys, around age 10/11, found it, they of course only had candles to explore and 

ended up getting lost for like 3 hours trying to get back out. Or so was the story told to us by our very entertaining tour guide. Oh how I wish I could remember his name! And I should have taken pictures of more of the wonderful people we met on the trip, especially people who lived on the island- our host, our cave tour guide, some of our taxi drivers, guests at the wedding who live on the island. 

(speaking of which, I cannot wait to see the professional photos and more of the other guests' photos.)

eating lunch at the Swizzle Inn (had to try the Rum Swizzles there of course),

we got to meet the mother, aunt, cousin, sister, and brother-in-law 

of the groom at Crystal Cave and for lunch. Nasser already knew some of them and 

our other friends had arrived the previous day. a lot of the guests mingled really nicely together- friends from different parts of their lives, from childhood, high school/college, from work, from Bermuda, and family 

and adventuring through the forests and caves and swimming holes with the friends staying at the Airbnb.

I, of course, had to climb a tree; it was raining and the tree was super slippery, so I didn't climb very high up. 

By the way, we're still on Wednesday only. Keep in mind we have a second wind after seeing some cool things, we finally got a good meal in us (late in the afternoon after breakfast had been in New York early in the morning), and the rain was keeping us feeling really awake and alive.

we trekked through the forests, on a sorta trail

we tried taking shelter in the rain for a bit, but we were pretty soaked by that point

had we been explorers who needed shelter for the night, we would have been set in this cave we found.

good thing we had our cell phone flashlights, haha.

we  found another cave with its own private, more untouched underground lake. 

I was way too scared to attempt swimming in it without any real light and 

trying not to get pierced by rock formations under the water. We really considered it though!

I am pretty sure swimming in any of these caves and swimming holes is frowned upon, but I would expect some of these cave pools are accessible by scuba diving. maybe someday I'll get scuba certified. it's something I'm actually somewhat scared of, I think. but it also sounds amazing. you would think that me being a swimmer and I love snorkeling, I would be able to handle scuba diving, right?? someday, perhaps we'll do it as a family when they boys are in high school. how cool would that be?

it was pretty eerie 

but really fun

we did swim in a pool that was better lit. so so cool. 

and it totally rained the entire time. we saw three crabs on the rocks around us; 

two were fighting eachother. had my phone been truly waterproof and I wasn't scared to lose it, 

I would have gotten some pictures of that too. 

Nasser captured a couple shots for me before getting in himself.

After another taxi ride (boy we felt bad about getting the seats wet since we were soaked through by this point and dripping although the driver was super nice and thought we looked like we really needed the ride, which we really did, it was way to far to walk), we went back to our Airbnbs and took showers. We then made our first of many walks over to the Fairmont Southampton hotel, where we joined up with the others in the hotel lobby lounge for the first of many drinks. (oh I forgot about the Fireball whiskey shots we had at the Airbnbs before walking over, hah!). It was an interesting walk in the dark, a little over a mile and boy, walking up the hill to the hotel really pooped me out and made me sweat (in the crazy humidity) profusely. God, the sweating on the trip!! In many ways, I am glad to be back to the dry, Colorado weather.

So the drinking thing is another interesting part of the trip. I'm going to take a brief break from the trip synopsis to talk about alcohol. So if you're reading my blog for the first time, I should fill you in on something. I suffer from depression, and this blog chronicles my life with depression, my life with kids, my life with travel and running and triathlons and everything. But depression is the biggest theme you'll find. I write as therapy to me, I write to share a personal experience with mental illness, and I write to raise awareness to the struggles and stigma of mental illness, in particular, depression, since that's what I suffer from. If you want to read about how my disease first manifested, you can find that here. Anyway, back to alcohol. In the last, I don't know, year maybe, I've really cut down on my consumption of alcohol. It really started when Nasser and I noticed a pattern with some of my depressive breakdowns. Too much alcohol for me = I am easily triggered.

But, this week in Bermuda went really well with that. I didn't have kids to worry about, and I totally trusted them being with my parents, and we were at least accessible by text and email easily enough, and it was so fun. I remembered that I can be quite extroverted, when I'm feeling happy and stress-free, and the trip really rejuvenated me. I limited my alcohol so that I wouldn't be hungover or sick or anything like that and also to limit the possibility of getting triggered. There were a couple times in the late night partying where I felt "off", but it was mostly physical. Like the night after the welcome dinner, we stayed up late, with drinking and games in one of the suites, and I just felt a bit drunk nauseous, plus my cold was really acting up, which I discovered, seemed to be a little bit triggered by the hotel, possibly the crazy air conditioning. It seemed better at our rental and outside. Oh that stupid cold was a pain in the butt nose through the entire trip.

My depression stayed away for almost the entire trip. It only crept in a little bit late Sunday night, with just Nasser at our Airbnb. I think I was starting to feel the effects of going, going, going (or raging as we fondly referred to it), and feeling sad that the trip was ending, and I was feeling stressed about coming home, and I hadn't blogged in so long (but it was also really nice to just experience and not reflect for many days). I was so tired, and we were trying to get up early and get a sliver of beach time in Monday morning before our flights home (that didn't happen between getting to bed so late, and feeling super tired in the morning and sleeping in slightly more, and packing, and we didn't know what we would do about showers if we went to the beach before many hours of travel home). I'm trying not to regret missing out on certain things; I just want to go back that much more though.

The wedding activities were amazing and there were lots of them.

they took care of us so well, and in addition to all this, there was lots of social time/ bar time/ incredible hotel suite time in the after parties of everything. there was a fair amount of different groups of friends and family social time and everyone seemed to get along so well. they ended up with about 80 guests at the wedding and recovery cruise events, with most people visiting from "out of the country". talk about incredible.

The fabulous bride and groom have spent a lot of time traveling for work and going to interesting places in the years since they've finished college. Sometimes when I feel sad about my life, I regret not having more time between college and having kids. However, there is so much travel with kids I'm excited to do in the next several years. And I often get excited about how young I'll be when the kids start college, and when they move out for real on their own, and perhaps how young I'll be when they have children of their own one day. Anyway, I feel so grateful to have been included in this wedding and sharing the celebration over so many days with such wonderful people.

the ferry that took us to Hamilton for the welcome dinner. the groom is in the knee high socks on the right.

clearly, I am obsessed with selfies

 there were these cool, little one-person sailboats that we passed on our way into Hamilton.

drinks/appetizers before the welcome dinner. again, "groupies" 

the happy bride and groom, listening to the friends' speeches. 

I missed any video or photos of Nasser's speech because I was too busy listening and trying not to cry. 

I met the groom in high school, before I met Nasser. he and Nasser have been friends since 2nd grade.

 the party bus back to the hotel, for more drinks

dark, but I kinda love this picture. we had such a great great time.

 checking out the "hurricane bulletin board" at the hotel. 

at this point the storm was supposed to come in Saturday morning, but it was only a 

"tropical depression" at this point, 
Thursday night after the welcome dinner. later on, it got upgraded to "tropical storm"

I went for a run Friday morning, before the storm came in much. 

some wind, and a little rain towards the end of the run. 

also, these lizards were super cool to see, on that path to the hotel.

 I did around 1.8mi, a little past the hotel than up the hill and inside, 
joined a friend in the exercise room for about a mile on the treadmill, 
then we ran together back to the Airbnb another 1.2mi-ish (so about 4mi total, maybe a little less) 
and he went back on his own to the hotel. quite a group of separate runs with 
some walking through the hotel in between and loading up on water in the fitness room, 
but I'm so glad I got that run in. also, I love getting to run with friends. 
man, I regret not getting a running selfie with our friend. darn. 

(see this is why I take so many photos to document the trip. they make me so happy to look back on and remember it, and be able to share with others. by the way, sorry this post is so freaking long. jeez I have a lot to say, you guys. :) )

the storm was rolling in most of Friday, with rain throughout the day. we played card games at the hotel, many of us friends hanging out in the bride and groom's suite most of the day, watching the storm from the safety of the hotel a few floors up.

Friday night, with the impending storm, the Airbnb folks headed back to our rental homes and we got together in our room to watch "The Perfect Storm".  I had never seen it before, and maybe it was the excitement of our own upcoming storm, but I really enjoyed it. Except there were sad parts. Still enjoyed the movie and now I'm really interested in reading the book. Along with all the other books I still have not read.

The next morning, we woke up at various points through the storm, listening to the rain and wind. I never actually woke up until about 7am, after the storm was heading away from Bermuda. Around 10am, we lost power, and Nasser and I ended up outside, chatting with our host lady for a bit. The power came back on after about an hour; it affected about 800 homes, just a portion of the island, and apparently, the people at the hotel heard the backup generators turn on. All in all though, we came through just fine.

We headed to the hotel around noon, as the guys were due to hang out with the groom all afternoon, playing all the various games people brought and drinking lightly. (we brought 2 very fun games that were hits at various points during the weekend, and they fit in my bigger purse which I often brought to the hotel so we could play in the fancy suites or in the hotel lobby lounge.

The spouses/girlfriends of this core group got together for lunch Saturday afternoon, and then we went our separate ways to get ready for the wedding. We were splitting a room with our friends from the Airbnb, just for Saturday night, the night of the wedding. It was a nice 2 double beds room, with a bit fancier of a shower than the Airbnb (you would hope for how expensive that hotel was- yikes!).

me, ready for the wedding. prior to getting my hair blown about in the wind, eventually putting it up, and prior to all the sweating in the heat and humidity, especially dancing at the reception.

the train/trolley to the Reefs hotel for the wedding 

a sub-portion of the ladies, the spouses/girlfriends 

 lots of wonderful friends

 gorgeous views on the walk down to the wedding site

 the wedding site, on this deck on top of an outcrop of rocks. incredible location and gorgeous spot to get married!!

 the 2 awesome dudes, the husband of the sister of the groom, 

and the boyfriend of the sister of the bride, held up the chuppah for the ceremony.

the groom with his parents, and his sister, one of the two bridesmaids. 

the only "traditional" wedding party were the 2 awesome dudes, who were ushers, and the sister of the groom and sister of the bride, who were bridesmaids. and then there were just lots of friends. 

I missed getting a shot of the sister of the bride, simply because there were too many heads in the way after missing the perfect shot on the stairs.

the bride, and then the bride with her parents. so so pretty!

 they incorporated many Jewish traditions into the wedding ceremony. also our friend in front of us (blue kippah in the bottom left corner there) was taking video of the ceremony on that GoPro. I am so excited to see his finished product you guys. this friend has some mad skills with photography and video editing, and works in the animated movie industry. Nasser has some cool friends, no that's WE have some cool friends.

the bride and groom were so clearly elated. so so awesome to witness.

hah, these matchy matchy cutie-patooties in the full Bermuda outfit

The next 3 shots are "the guys" as part of the groom's crew. The groom convinced most of them to wear the traditional Bermuda shorts, with knee-high socks, and boat shoes.

And then the next 5 shots are the ladies, the spouses/girlfriends of those guys. We all ended up in variations of blue dresses, which we totally did not plan.

posing for the professional photographer, the groom's "crew", with the bride and groom

the after party in the amazing fancy suite

it had a bar

Nasser enjoyed bartending for a bit

the suite had a kitchen, where we made frozen pizzas after the wedding. I helped the sister of the bride for a little while, because apparently she and I both like to host, and I like to help at parties when I can. haha. it's something I truly enjoy though. I'm useful and good in the kitchen. :)

We had beautiful weather for the entire recovery cruise. You could NOT have asked for better weather. Sunny at various points, but it was behind the clouds for awhile while everyone was swimming where we anchored in the water. Oh and that water was the perfect temperature to me. I dove in and was one of the first people in, because... swimming. Yeah... one of my favorite past times. I hope some people took photos while we were in the water, I think they did, but I failed at that one. (not that I don't have enough photos, right? are you still with me, anyone? Buehler?... Buehler?...) I was in the water pretty much the entire time we were anchored.

mimosas were had because... raging. continued. on and on. you guys. 

leaving the little harbor

we swam somewhere out in the beautiful water. like I said, less direct sunlight while we were in the water. also, the boat had a bunch of pool noodles for everyone to use in the water and float. so so so fun. we were probably in the water for at least an hour, chatting with people, swimming around. I of course did a couple laps around the boat. hah.

After the recovery cruise, we walked back the Airbnb to again shower. Many of our friends met us for dinner near the Airbnb- many of them did the walk from the hotel which was so nice! We were a little uncertain about dinner, since many places were closed- Bermuda kinda shuts down early on Sundays. But this little place, Island Cousine, was open. Nasser and I shared a chicken curry roti (like an Indian burrito- amazing!!), with a side salad, some onion rings which we shared with the table, some garlic bread, and grilled plantains. So so delicious, and slightly less expensive than a lunch time meal for two at the Burger Bar inside the Fairmont Southhampton hotel. Omygosh, we ate at the Burger Bar around 5 times throughout the course of the trip, ordering various things. We so did not diet on this trip. But perhaps we will get back to that now that we're home.

We went back to the hotel one more time Sunday night after dinner (we had to catch a taxi since it was raining after we got out of dinner, luckily the group who had walked from the hotel was able to catch a taxi pretty quickly too), so that we could "rage" one last time, with some friends and the groom. The bride needed sleep by this point. We played more games, and then headed back to our hotel in the wee hours one last time.

Monday morning, like I said before, we were in a mad rush to get over to the hotel, attempt the beach maybe to walk in the sand, but the weather wasn't cooperating with that, and we ended up spending quality time with the bride and groom, and their families, and eventually a couple other friends, at the Burger Bar, the hotel lounge, and finally, we hitched a ride on the hotel shuttle to the airport, at a lower cost than a taxi. It turned out we were on the same plane to Atlanta from Bermuda as the mother, sister, and brother-in-law of the groom. And we even ran into the sister of the bride and her boyfriend in the little tiny airport.

I enjoyed my last views from the plane, sad to say goodbye, but ready for a nap, and to head back home and to reality. 

I suppose I've been spending most of the day reliving the trip by writing my blog, so it hasn't been much reality, and it turned out incredibly long. It's time for some sleep now. It is almost 12:30am mountain time.