Blissfully Jansen: Panthers

After 2+ years of begging/pleading/bribing/schmoozing we were invited to go on the Panthers Fan Cruise at the beginning of March! Apparently long snappers are not high on the list of requested guest appearances...boo. But, whatever, we got to go! Did I mention it was all paid for by AAA of the Carolinas? Oh yea...free vacation. For those of you who know, I like to travel and I like saving money. And when you can combine the two?!?! Mind glowingly fun. If its free...its for me (us).

We were on Royal Caribbean's Oasis of the Seas, the biggest cruise ship in the world we are told. It was huuuuge. Loved it. The port cities were pretty average in my humble (and apparently snobbish) opinion, the main focus is the ship. It makes sense, it was unreal. We went to the private Royal Caribbean port of Labadee, Haiti, Jamaica and Cozumel. Cozumel was my favorite, we snorkeled and then took a cab to the other side of the island for lunch at Coconuts. The food and the views were so worth the trip. In Haiti we did a yoga class on the beach and then spent so time in the water. Jamaica we stayed near the port shopping center and kept it pretty low key. We went to Jamaica for our honeymoon and did most of the touristy things then, and we are going back in July for a wedding so we weren't too stressed about exploring.

There were 4 other current players and one former player who was the emcee. It was fun to get to know everyone because I hadn't really met any of them before! The fans were GREAT, only a handful of awkwardness in the whole group ;). We really had a good time chatting with everyone and getting to hear their reactions to things and the questions they had. The whole point of the cruise is to give the fans an up close and personal experience with the players and I think they got just that.

Here are a few fun pictures from the trip!!