I searched for trips out of Florida as this was the closest location to us with cruises departing in November.  Due to the "snowbirds" relocating to Florida at this time of year cruises were ridiculously high.  I then extended my search to the western states.  I found that you could cruise out of California for around $300 per person for 5 days - that is a steal considering it includes your lodging, food and entertainment.  Of course before the final choice could be made I had to check flights - that could be the clincher.  Skybus had recently opened a hub in Columbus and was flying to Los Angeles.  By being somewhat flexible on the dates I was able to get $10 seats!!!  wooohoooo - the trip was a no brainer.

Once I knew what I wanted to do I opened the invitation to dear friends of ours Missy and Matt.  I have worked with Missy for 16 years and we have become quite close and luckily they have also become hooked on cruises after their first in February 2007.   Missy's yearly anniversary of her 29th birthday  is on December 4th so this trip would also be a celebration for her. 

I contacted Mark's boss to get approval for Mark to have a week of vacation.  His boss was not able to approve the vacation as a surprise because of Mark's duties.  He needed to be able to plan with Mark in advance of what would need to be covered during Mark's absence.  OK, a snag, I can deal with it.  I just happened to be talking to my Mom who lives in Florida and she mentioned that my Aunt Katie could possibly be having surgery in November!  AHA!  An idea comes to mind.  I then told Mark that I wanted to go to Florida for my aunts surgery and the supportive husband that he is I knew he would go with me if I asked.  Of course he said yes and I played it off that I was not sure of the dates but they were approximately November 25 til December 1st.  I notified Mark's boss that this was the plan and to just go along with it and that Mark and he could discuss til all was settled.

The end of August Missy and I officially booked the cruise and the flights.  We then started the planning and getting everything straight as far as car rental, hotel reservations, etc.

Missy and I were planning and conniving for the next 2 months without Mark knowing anything.  We got one week out before leaving and Mark found out!  All was not lost though.  He was still shocked and absolutely surprised!  To me it was a huge load off of my shoulders.  We had started packing and Mark was looking at the weather in Englewood Florida and of course it was in the 80's.  Mark was going to pack shorts and warm weather clothes and it was only going to be in the high 60's, low 70's in California! 

We would fly to Burbank California out of Columbus on Sunday, November 25th at 6am.  With the time difference we would arrive in California at 8:30am.  We had an entire day to tour LA, Beverly Hills and Hollywood.  In my opinion this was enough time for these locations.  It would have been nice to tour some of the studios which Mark would have loved, being as he is a huge movie buff but the studios are not open on Sundays.

Our first sighting of the Pacific Ocean...

Beverly Hills........

Shopping on Rodeo Drive......

We were all pretty tired from getting up at 3am to fly to California and with the Guests of Honor now dubbed the "Old Ones" approaching yet another year older, we decided to call it a day and head to our hotel after the shopping trip on Rodeo Drive.  We had dinner at Olive Garden and then turned in for the night about 10 which was 1am our time.