Day 1:
Woke up at 5:45 AM to do some last minute prepping and to pack the car. At about 7:00 AM we drove our cars to my parents house (we have alternate side parking by us, yay NYC). I parked my car then my father and I hopped into my wife's car and we were off to JFK. Traveling with a baby is a bit more challenging than traveling as a couple, so DW insists on doing curbside check in. After checking in, we went to the even more space line because we were sitting in the front row of the plane. Security was about 10 minutes. After we went through security we went to the airspace lounge. The lounge is small, but it's definitely better than sitting by the noisy gate. The baby was getting cranky and disturbing people in the airspace lounge, so we decided to just leave the lounge and walk around the terminal. Before we knew it it was time for boarding. (Side note for traveling with children-My wife decided to buy a stroller called a baby zen yoyo; when it is folded up, no one would know that it's a stroller, it folds smaller than a carry on bag. The flight attendants made everybody check in their strollers but did not say a word to us. Much better than taking a bugaboo). We sat in the first row and nobody else was sitting in our row with us, awesome! There was a lot of space in the first row, so we were able to set up a spacious napping zone for the baby on the floor. The flight was supposed to be 3 hours and 45 minutes, but it ended up being three hours. It was a good flight and the baby was well behaved.
We landed in GC and walked onto the Tarmac; very common in that part of the world. We were the second people to deplane, so we went through customs in no time. We got our luggage and then we needed to get past the second customs agent. An airport worker let us cut the line because we had a baby. The customs agents there are so much nicer than in America.
We walked to the rental car area. We walked into payless; the agent was upset that the baby got upset for a second, I thought that everybody in GC was supposed to be very nice...She asked if I prefer a car with a steering wheel on the left side or right side of the car, I chose the left. Though they drive on the other side of the road, I would be less discombobulated if I drive on the side of the car that I am used to. When we went to T&C I drove on the wrong side of the road and the wrong side of the car, and that took some getting used to. After I told her that I want a left sided steering wheel, she pointed to a Chevy Aveo and said, "that's your car." Me-"But I reserved a midsize..." Agent-"that's considered midsize in GC." After some back and forth I finally said fine, I will speak to the credit card company and your corporate offices when I get back to America (that was all in my head). Agent-"would you like insurance." I thought to myself that my platinum card covers me for renters insurance so I said "No thank you." Agent-" Okay, that will be $1,900." Me- "Excuse me?!?!?!" Agent-"It's GC law, if you don't take the insurance then we need to put a $1,900 hold on your credit card." Me-"Why?" Agent-"When Americans come to vacation here and they drive on the wrong side of the road they are very reckless and get into accidents." Me-"Okay, well I already have insurance, so don't worry." Agent-"You need our insurance." I thought to myself that I will just call the credit card company after the trip and explain what happened, in the meantime I will pay for insurance. "How much?" Agent-"$30.99 a day, covers you for everything." Me-"Anything cheaper?" Agent-"You can get the basic one for $18 a day." Me-"I'll take that one." After all was said and done, she gave us a map of the island to try to get around.
After about 20 minutes of driving we got to the Holiday Inn Resort. Our room was ready, but they wanted to take care of a small mechanical issue in the room, so they told us to just wait a few minutes. They gave me a room temperature water bottle for being an IHG member. We decided to just give them our bags to put in the room for when it's ready and go out to buy some fruits and vegetables. We went to a nice supermarket. All of the shoppers were Americans that live and work in GC now. The place happened to be expensive, but we were only getting a few things. The cashier there was so nice, she told me to start dancing to the song that was playing on the loud speaker. She was telling us how when she went to NY for the first time she went onto the subway and the train started moving and everyone just started sipping their coffee, she thought that New Yorkers were aliens. Oh, island life.
We went back to the hotel and checked out our room, we were very satisfied. The only con to the hotel is that it isn't on seven mile beach and though the ocean by the hotel is nice, the beach itself is not so nice. We went to the pool for a little. Ate dinner, and called it a night. We had to wake up early for Stingray City.
