Tyler and Kara: RPM CRUISE 2009

Welcome home, US!!! Well, we're back and we had a great time! It was a fun and incredible experience that we got to share with each other and all of our friends! The boat was amazing! We've never seen anything that big before! It was two and a half football Fields long! There were restaurants, theaters, jazz lounges, a library, and so much more!

Saturday night, the first night on the boat, we went to a really nice Japanese restaurant. The cooks were awesome. They would throw and catch their knives, toss food into the air and catch it in their hats, and they made us catch food in our mouths! It was so fun....not to mention the best steak we've ever had!!!

Sunday we convinced everybody to go to the Cha Cha lessons with us! It was so fun....hilarious to watch, but fun to participate in. People were getting stepped on left and right, but we were all laughing so hard that we didn't even notice!

That night was formal night. So we all got really dressed up and went to dinner. Everybody looked really good. Its nice to dress up sometimes.

After a wonderful dinner the entire group came together for the best part of the trip. [You see, the only reason we were able to go on the cruise was because God made it possible, so why wouldn't we keep Him the center of the trip? Well, we planned ahead! Our group booked a room on the ship so that we could have a few night meetings. Our College age pastors spoke each night, and we lead worship with James, who played acoustic guitar with us. We heard some powerful messages that really challenged us as individuals and as a team.]

After our first service, the whole group participated in the most extreme game of charades you've ever seen: GUYS vs GIRLS. It got so intense that we had to move it into one of the movie theaters, which wasn't being used at the time. There was yelling, and arguing, and cards being thrown...*sigh*...good times. We're a very....VERY competitive group of young people, and yet we all still love each other.

And by the way, the girls won. "What was that?" Well, I'll tell you again....

the GIRLS WON!

Monday, we pulled into Cabo san Lucas. There were some beautiful rocks on the edges of the cove. It was a little cloudy, but that didn't stop any of us! We all got on land and rented a taxi boat over to a nice beach. There, the boys rented jet skis. Riding a jet ski on the ocean was one of Tyler's dreams. They all had a blast! Oh, and Tyler almost got tackled by a sea lion! Seriously!

Tuesday, we arrived in Mazatlan. There, we rented a big van and went to a nice beach lined with many resorts. We found a quaint little resort with a nice pool and plenty of sun, so we hung out there for a while and played in the pool. After a while we got bored so we walked around all the shops. And after we were bored with that, we packed five of us in a tiny little golf cart and headed back to the boat for free food! Good times.

Wednesday, was our favorite! We stopped in Puerto Vierta...one word: gorgeous! Once again, we all piled into a van into the middle of the jungle where they filmed PREDATOR, where we came upon a beautiful little getaway. Here we went zip-lining! It was so amazing! Some of the zip lines were 400 feet off the ground and 1600 feet long! oh snap! We got moving pretty fast! It was the funnest thing we've ever done. Well...that I'VE ever done (kara)!

Thursday, and Friday we were at sea, but we kept ourselves entertained with movies, food...and more food. It seemed like that's all we did was eat! But boy i tell you what....GOOD FOOD! Tyler was definitely loving it!

Friday night we planned on having one last meeting, but canceled due to much of our group getting sick. However, a few of us stayed behind. We started playing around with a couple of old songs, and soon found ourselves lost in worship for over an hour. There was no better way to end our trip.

Saturday, we got all packed up and waited for our group to be called so we could exit. We got off the boat in record time, only to have our bus brake down an hour out of L.A! We broke down on the grape vine, which for those of you who don't know where that is, its in the middle of no where!! So we were shuttled in groups of five in Pastor Mark's durango to the nearest McDonald's, where we waited and waited. We were informed that we were going to have to wait for another bus from our church (seven hours away from where we were) to come get us.

Finally we couldn't take it anymore, so a few of us walked over to a scary looking hotel and begged the owner to let us sit in his lobby and watch the football game on his big screen...all thirty of us. Much to our joyous surprise, he said yes! The scene was comical. Thirty college students parading down the street, and one boy with Brandon on his back, who hurt his ankle playing basketball on the ship. it was comedy all trying to quietly file into the hotel lobby.

Eight hours later, the second bus arrived, and this time we prayed over the trip and laid hands on the bus!