Reboot? New Beginning?

Well its been a long time since I have written on here. Things have changed, I have grown, life has moved forward but something has still been inkling in the back of my mind. My beautiful wife said to me tonight that she was very hopeful of this blog of mine and that she thought I should stick with it.

I thought about this and realized that with everything that has changed in teh past few years that I should give it another go. I do enjoy writing these, sharing my thoughts, my ideas, and our adventures.

I am thinking going forward I will continue to talk about my travels, give travel tips, and share my experiences. I will also go more with the “nerd” side of my webpage and will do some reviews of games I am playing, share some of my photography (that is a separate post and story), and overall share some of my crazy thoughts and experiences.

So to all who have made it this far I hope you are ready for a new adventure with nerdlifeandtraveling.com and are prepared to see where this journey will take us. Make sure you send me any suggestions of anything you would like me to touch upon, things to review, or any comments you may have about the blog. Also make sure you tell your friends and family because the more we have on this journey the more fun it will be.

Day 11, Sea Day

So now on to the last sea day of the trip before we head home. I will also talk about our experience leaving the ship on this post as it does not warrant a post on its own. Also to mention I have no pictures of this day again except for food so it should be pretty short.

So looking at the daily for today and I don’t see anything that we really did this day. I know we had breakfast together, and we checked out the shops for anymore sales. I remember checking out the liquor store on board to see if there was anything I wanted to pick up but with already having bought the rum I didn’t feel the need.

While going through the stores I remember I did take one picture. Tell me if you can see what is wrong with it.

Do you see it?

I believe we had lunch at the buffet in the afternoon, my wife packed and I got kicked out the room because I was annoying her. I believe I just went for a walk around the ship. I remember we watched a movie when I got back. Had our usual afternoon cheese plate plus I believe we got some room service. Had our afternoon nap and then headed to dinner.

The Menu for the night.

Sabrina’s Caesar Salad.

I believe this was the Warm Goat Cheese Croustillant.

This was the Squash soup I believe.

The Aged Prime Rib. I guess I was late to get a picture. No one really strayed from the pack too much this night.

I actually took another dessert menu.

The Biscuit Croustillant

The Blackberry-Anise Nougat Glace. It was very delicious.

The Crème Brule. I was told it was not as good as the one in Tuscan Grille.

And of course the Chocolate Cake with vanilla Ice Cream. It was delicious.

So I will need to go back a little bit for the next pictures. About two or three days into the cruise I had spoken with our Maitre D because I wanted something special for my wife and I. When we first met her sister and her wanted to make a chocolate bomb, and for years we have joked about it and even gave her a recipe once for it. Going through the cruise critic boards I found out that Luminae actually serves something called the chocolate bomb. So I asked if it would be possible to get one. We didn’t hear anything until the last day when I saw them being served. Our Maitre D came over to tell me he was sending one to our room as he didn’t want everyone else to get jealous that we got one. So when we got to room there she was waiting for us. Of course we were stuffed from dinner but we still tried it.

This is the presentation.

We cracked her open.

Look cake inside.

And pineapple. It was very good but very rich. It was a wonderful treat to end the cruise on as I always wanted to get my wife a chocolate bomb and now I can say I have thanks to celebrity cruises.

So after this we headed for bed to get ready for our long day of travel the next day.

We got up around 7 and got ourselves all packed up and ready. We headed down to bistro on five because my mother and grandmother were in their wheelchairs since it is hard for them to walk down the gangway. We waited there for about 45 minutes until we were told we could go. It did seem a little disorganized in the area I don’t know if they were not expecting so many people with wheelchairs or what. Once we swiped out off the ship we headed right down to our bags which we quickly grabbed and headed for customs. Customs took maybe twenty minutes or so and then we hopped in a cab and off to the airport. We got through customs there again very quickly thanks to my mother and her wheelchair.

I do have to say I did get an extra pat down at the airport because I totally forgot to take some papers out of my pocket when going through the machine. We could have been much faster if it wasn’t for me.

We pretty much waited an hour for the plane hopped on and headed to LA. Got to LA had our two our layover. We ate at Burger King and it was awful, they were out of most things on the menu and the pop machine didn’t work properly. I also loved how they had one staff working the counter and one in the kitchen while the manager and two other employees were talking in the office.

We hopped on the plane and landed in Seattle around 9pm. We then made our drive up to border. We did stop in Bellingham at Safeway so I could pick up som Smirnoff. We then headed over the border, took the family home and then my wife and I headed home. We got home around 1 am so it was a long day and we were tired.

So that’s it, that’s our cruise. I hope you enjoyed following along. Any questions again feel free to ask. I do have copies of all the dailies if anyone would like them. Also a lot more pictures of Cartagena and such if anyone wants to see them. Thanks for reading and until next time.

 

 

Day 10, Grand Cayman

Hello everyone and welcome back to my adventures on the Celebrity Equinox. Now we are heading into Grand Cayman our last stop on this cruise. I promise I did take a few pictures this day, along with my sister, as we separated and did our own things. Now on to the day.

So my wife, mother, grandmother, and I decided that today we would just explore the port and relax. Jeniffer, Sabrina, and Jordan had an excursion planned and such had to take the tender around 10-10:30 if I remember correctly. I will start with their day as ours was a little quite.

So off they went on the tender to get to shore. They were doing the turtle farm and string ray encounter excursion. I had done this one before with Jeniffer on our previous cruise so chose not to do it again.

Here they are taking their selfie on the tender. Don’t they look all happy. I think Jordan was still half a sleep.

Here is a picture of the ships in port that day. I believe it was six or seven, I don’t remember exactly. I did get pictures also which I will show later.

Once they got to shore they made their way to the meeting place and hopped on the bus to take them on the tour. There first stop was Hell. A little nook in the wall where you have a little gift shop and post office. They did send a postcard to our younger brother James from there.

Here is Jordan and Sabrina in Hell. Kind of want to say they should have stayed there but that would be mean.

Just for reference here is a picture of Jeniffer and I when we went to Hell. Again I know I should have at least stayed there.

After this they headed out to the turtle farm. I remember from our tour they said that it was a delicacy on the island and is eaten on special occasions. They are also one of the largest preservation for turtles.

Here are the turtles in the water.

Sabrina holding one of the turtles. Like the other animals on this trip she didn’t want to let it go.

Jordan holding the turtle. He doesn’t look to enthusiastic about it. That or he is still half asleep.

After visiting the turtle farm off they went to the boat to take them out to the sandbar.

My sister did take a picture of the pilot of the ship. I think she said he was pretty hot also.

Once they got out to the sandbar they hopped in the water. Jeniffer did say that since it was later in the day when they arrived there were not a lot of stingrays compared to when we did it. Also the waves were very large and it was hard to keep yourself steady.

Here are some of the stingrays in the water.

Here is the crowd our on the sandbar. Because it is later in the day the early groups feed them and so in the afternoon not a lot of the stingrays come by since they are not hungry.

Here you can see Jordan in the water with the waves almost going over his head and Sabrina wandering away from the ship searching for stingrays.

The picture above is from when Jeniffer and I did it two years ago. As you can see not a lot of people and more stingrays swimming around.

Once they got out of the water they took another selfie. Don’t they all look happy, even Jordan.

And off they went to get back to shore. They hopped back on the bus once at shore and headed back to the port. They got on the tender at 4pm one of the last tenders.

So that was there fun and exciting day, now on to mine. We decided since we were not planning anything to wait until the tenders opened up for everyone. We went and had breakfast and relaxed in the room. As we waited I went to the top deck and took some pictures.

So as you can see there were a few boats in port that day. Also I love how it is raining on one side of the ship and other is blue sky. Anyways we waited for call for the tenders which came around noon. So my wife and I collected my mother and grandmother and we headed on to the tender.

The line to the tender was very quite and we were right on before we knew it.

We got a quick selfie on the tender as this was my wifes first tender and she is not a fan of small boats. As you can see my grandmother was right in the spirit of things while my mother on the other hand was not. She does not like her picture taken at all.

Once we got to shore we started looking around the port area. My grandmother went into a shop to look for sunglasses even though she had scored the pair of Michael Kors from the lost and found. I took some pictures while in port.

More views of the ships in port.

My grandmother did end up buying some perfume from the port area and after that we headed out onto the streets.

We came across this area while walking down the street. The fort consisted of a canon and some wood planks. Not much to see there.

We ended up in a store which I don’t know the name of and looked around. I ended up buying a hat because my grandmother and wife both said it looked great on me. We left the store and continue to walk down the street. We came across some small places selling beer, which my grandmother really wanted to try. We walked past it and came back and on the way back she decided she didn’t want it for some reason.

We then walked the other way down the street and headed down one of the side streets. We then went into a jewelry store.

My wife looked for a ring to match my wedding ban. I have black diamonds in mine and she wants something to match that. The store did have something she really liked but it was around $700 US. A little expensive for our taste though cheaper than here are home. It old her our next cruise there we can see.

I took some photos of the buildings down this street.

We then ended up in a dollar store type shop. I ended up buying some key chains for the guys at work who all loved them. I was also “allowed” to buy a shirt. It was one of those Hawaiian type shirt in purple. I am told I am allowed to wear it in the summer.

After this we headed back to the main street.

As we were walking I saw this guy hanging out on the grass.

Once we got to the street we continued our way down. It was getting busy and hot as we walked and to our surprise we found…….

A DAIRY QUEEN.

Took the picture because there were different flavours then what we get here at home. I ended up with a milkshake, Jacqueline had sunday, my grandmother had a cone in waffle cone, and my mother wanted a water or pop and both were warm so she passed.

After this we headed to back to the port and went to the duty-free to get some alcohol. We ended up buying bottles of rum in vanilla, coconut, and pineapple. Havent tried them yet but I am sure they are delicious.

After this we waited around the port while my grandmother and mother shopped.

I took these pictures of gnomie since I hadn’t taken any pictures with him in a while. He likes his cigars and pirates.

We then made our way back to the tender.

I took this picture of the sign. This was the line for the RCCL ship. It was funny because people in the line up were commenting on how in our line we got cool towels, and different flavoured water to enjoy before getting on the tender. I guess it’s that little perk you get from celebrity.

After we got back on the ship, we grabbed a quick afternoon snack, and my wife and I hit the solarium again. I think this is one of the few times we have gone to the solarium that may times. I am not much of a pool person but I do enjoy this area of the ship.

After we met up with Jeniffer and the kids to hear about their adventures. I did do a time-lapse of us leaving grand Cayman as we relaxed in the room. The video is on my Facebook page if you want to see just follow think link below. We then relaxed and waited to get ready for dinner. Tonight was our last specialty dinner which was at Tuscan Grill.

Time-lapse

First up the menus.

Our waitress this night was fantastic. We all pretty much ordered our appetizers and main and she brought out an assortment of sides for all of us to choose from. There was also an incident in the dining room where one of guests was sick near our table. We did not witness it happen and the maitre’d asked if we wanted to move even though we had no idea anything happened. We did end up moving because the cleaners came in and they needed the room. Now to the food.

The crab cake that everyone liked.

The calamari which was delicious. I gave everyone a surprise at the table when I ate it as no one, not even my wife thought I liked it.

Homemade Braised Beef ravioli. My wife said it was great.

Steak Tartar. I had this and it was fantastic. It was funny to see my wife watch me eat this as it grosses her out. Jeniffer tried it and agreed it was very good. I believe my wife stole some of my cheese to.

French Onion soup as usual. It was very good as usual.

Minestrone soup. I was told it was very delicious.

Sabrina’s Caesar salad as usual.

I believe this was the Ravioli Ai Funghi Selvatici.

Pappardelle Alfredo con Aragosta or lobster alfredo.

Lasagna Con Carnae di Manzo e Vitello. Beef and veal lasagna. Jacqueline said it was really good.

Truffled Parmesan Steak Fries. These were fantastic.

Baked Pecorino Mac and Cheese. We ate three or four of these dishes it was so good. On our last cruise we got a celebrity cook book which had this recipe in it. My wife has made a bunch of these for our work lunches, the are so good.

Garlic Mashed Potatoes. These were also very good.

Roasted Herb Potatoes. These are also very good but would choose the mashed over them.

I believe this is the Filet Mignon. I didn’t seem to take any other entrée pictures. I know everyone dug in pretty quick. I remember someone having the rib eye steak, and maybe someone having NY steak. Seems it was a steak night.

So no dessert menu for some reason again but did get the pictures of dessert.

Tiramisu in a martini glass. My wife said it was very good.

The Fondu plate. Jeniffer ordered this and had to get additional fruit and candy to go with it as Jordan ate most of it.

The crème Brule. Sabrina had this and didn’t like it. I don’t think it was what she was expecting. I believe she ordered the fondu instead.

And lastly I had the assorted gelato. Very good flavour and a nice way to cleanse the pallet after that large meal.

Now there was one issue at the end of dinner that I should mention. At some point our waitress disappeared. We waited to receive our bill so we could leave a tip, even though we had a dinner package. I finally went to the maitre’d to get one from him. He told me he would bring it right over. He did come over after a few minutes and said there was no bill because we had the dinner package. We said we wanted to leave a tip for our waitress and he informed us that she was the only one who could print the check so we could and he had no idea where she went. So in the end we left without leaving a tip even though I swear we wanted to.

After dinner we went back to the room and I got changed into something more casual. I believe my wife hit the hay while I ran down to the casino and met up with my mother and Jeniffer for a little bit.

We gambled for a while and then I headed upstairs to the buffet to get my nightly drink. I also grabbed a Jell-O while I was there. I then headed down to the room, watched tv for a little bit and then went to bed.

Next up is our last sea day. Again not a lot of pictures but we will see what we can do.

I also want to mention to everyone following along that I have mentioned before that my wife, my mother, and I are diabetic. It’s this time of year that I do fundraising for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. Below I have included a link if anyone would be interested in helping me reach my fundraising goal. Thanks to anyone who donates ahead of time, and thanks to everyone for reading. Again if you have any questions please feel free to ask.

Click here to donate.

Day 9, Sea Day

Ok so I am going to come out and be totally honest here. I did not take any pictures this day other than food for dinner. I don’t know what happened. I guess I was getting close to the end of the cruise and got a little lazy. At least I know for my next cruise what not to do. So I will do my best for this day as I do have the daily to try to remind myself what I did. If all else fails I do have the food pictures at the end and this will be a short post.

Ok so looking at the daily, I don’t remember doing anything on it. So this is going to be an interesting post. I will try to do it from memory and if I get something wrong (which I am sure I will) my family I am sure will correct me.

So I do remember my wife and I slept in this day. It was one of the few times on this trip I could actually sleep in. I believe we got up around 9:30-9:45, got our selves somewhat presentable (which is shorts and T-shirt for me since, hey I am on vacation) and headed up for breakfast.

We got to the buffet in time for the late breakfast and I am sure we had our usual, eggs benedict, bagel and lox, that sort of stuff. I remember us just sitting there and people watching. We had an older couple sitting beside us who knew the staff by name, and even had the head chief come out and say hi to them, and take a picture. They were all excited because they were doing a back to back and had missed everyone on the ship. Not sure how much they cruise, but I wish I had the money to be on the ship that much.

After a little while I believe we came across Jeniffer in the buffet and she told us she was sitting on the other side. We were going to leave but decided to go over and join them.

They had taken the big table by the window and entrance to the buffet, which holds I believe 10-12 people. They supposedly had been there for a few hours now because they had come up for breakfast and were just waiting for lunch now. They were also having fun because there was a large Asian family at the table next to them which wanted theirs since it was large enough for their whole family.

We stayed with them for a little bit and talked and then decided to head to the casino.There was a James Bond game where you drop quarters to knock more of them down. I knew there was not way to win it but it kept me going for a while. In the end the machine won.

After we headed back to the room and I ended up going down to look at the watch sale. I took Jordan with me to see what we could find. We ended up going down a couple of times and in the end I got a watch and he got two. There were on sale for $20 so couldn’t complain.

I then headed up to the room to find my wife was watching the new Hunger Games movie. She was half way done it so little point in me watching it but I did. We also ordered room service since we were both hungry. We got a little too much food but it was all delicious. We also ordered lemonade, 4 cups of it, and room service called to ask if a pitcher would be ok instead. We said of course so that was a nice to have.

I believe after the movie we went for a quick dip in the solarium, and then relaxed on a couple of chairs. I remember going to the crush bar to get us both a drink. As we headed back my wife mentioned she hadn’t seen the kids area so I took her up there for a look. We were at the forward elevators so it was not hard to get there.

After getting a quick tour we headed back to our state room.I remember the cheese plate being there and we enjoyed that as usual. We then had our little afternoon nap. I then believe we started watching Hotel Transylvania 2 while we got ready for dinner.

I know I am missing more from this day, I will have to remember to make sure I take more photos and find a way to take notes each day. Anyways on to the food. It was formal night so we were all prepared.

Here is our menu for the night. Everyone was excited for the lobster tail.

Sabrina’s Caesar salad for the night.

I had the Scallops Rockefeller. It was absolutely delicious. Three of us had it at the table and Jordan kept all the shells as a souvenir.

The Shaved Prosciutto and Arugula Salad. My wife said it was very good.

Jordan eating his bread. He loves his bread. We would go through at least three baskets a night at our table with all the family.

The Creamy Smoked Tomato Bisque. I am not a huge fan of tomato soup but I did really like this one.

The Beef Wellington. I did have to take off the layer of mushroom that is between the meat and pastry as I hate mushrooms, but other than that it was fantastic. My vegetables also seemed to disappear when I wasn’t looking thanks to my wife. She likes to sneak food off my plate.

My grandmother had the Herb Crusted Haddock Filet. She ate it so it must have been good.

And then of course everyone else had the Broiled Lobster Tail. They all said it was very good. My wife even wanted to have another but she didn’t for some reason.

Now on to desserts where I did something I probably shouldn’t have.

This was dessert 1 for me. It was like a fruit bar with different fruit and vanilla ice cream. This was the sugar-free option that night.

This was dessert 2 for me that night. It was like a swiss roll with strawberry sauce and cream. It was very delicious.

And last but not least dessert number 3 for me. Yes I had all three desserts this night. I know I am diabetic and I shouldn’t but I just couldn’t resist they just looked so good. This by the way was the Baked Alaska.

So after dinner we decided to get a family photo since it is one of our traditions on formal night. Our waiter Glorio was going to take the picture but as he was going to the maitre D  came by and took over for him.

So these are the pictures we got, but it got better.

He decided he felt left out and took a selfie with us in the background. Not the best picture but you can see we were all having fun. Our waiters even made it into the picture. If there is one thing I can say about my family it’s that we know how to have fun with the wait staff and get them laughing and joking around with us.

So then I started taking pictures of the family. My beautiful wife and sister.

That handsome devil with that gorgeous woman. He must be one lucky guy.

And then us again with Jordan, Sabrina, and Jeniffer, playing with my camera modes.

After this I believe we went back to the room. I let my wife get settled for bed while I hit the casino with Jeniffer, Mom, and Grandma. We played the wonder woman game as my sister is in love with it. I know grandma headed back to the room after a little bit and we were there until at least 1.

I then quickly grabbed a drink at the bar and headed back to the room. Got settled in and waited till tomorrow which was our last port, Grand Cayman.

Thanks for reading. Sorry about this one I know it is a little short but I do what I can. Any comments or questions please feel free to ask.

 

 

Day 8, Cartagena, Columbia

So this was our second day in Cartagena. Our plan for the day was to relax and enjoy ourselves. After the tour we had the day before we thought this would be fitting. I cant remember what time we got up but we headed to the buffet for breakfast. After a quick breakfast my wife and I headed back to the room where we ran into the rest of the family.

We decided to head back to the duty-free shop and look some more. My wife decided to stay behind along with my grandmother. So we all gathered our stuff together and headed out.

When we got to the shopping area I went and took some pictures of the animals.

Just out front of the duty-free there is a little pen with flamingos, peacocks and other animals as you can see from the photos above.

So we went through the shop and picked up a few more souvenirs. I got myself a hat, some chocolate covered banana pieces which was delicious, and some key chains for the guys back at work. After doing my shopping I headed to the other side of the area to look at the other animals since I was bored with the shop.

Just outside the shop is this little area full of parrots. I caught a couple of them fighting which was interesting to see. Sabrina did get close to them and I believe pet one of them. If she had her way she would take them all home.

I then went walking along the boardwalk and found these poor birds in quarantine. I had to take a picture of the owl as it is my sister in-laws favorite animal.

I then found the estuary and went in. I found this guy sitting right by the entrance, almost posing for a picture.

I made my way back to meet up with the rest of the family and came across this monkey trying to get a hold of some food.

I then found this little guy hiding above the snack bar surveying the area. They were quick to grab any food that had fallen or was unguarded.

I then came across this tree which is the monkeys home. This little guy jumped down right as I came up so I could get a good picture. He probably just wanted food but oh well still a good picture.

I then met up with everyone else because they were done shopping. They came out to see the animals and as we wandered around we found a vendor selling drinks. I ended up getting another coke light which again was fantastic. My  mother was also nice enough to buy us all an ice cream. I don’t remember what I had but it was nice on a hot day.

At this point Jordan was tired and wanted to go back to the ship. I volunteered to take him back as I was getting bit tired also. After we left the rest of the family continued to explore.

They found the estuary like I did. Here is a shot of a vulture and hawk that they have.

This is a funny story. Supposedly right after this picture was taken one of the birds, I believe the peacock, came up to my mother and pecked her because it wanted food. My mother does not like birds so I would have loved to have seen her reaction.

There is also a little cave section that I found out about after that shows you what it is like in an emerald mine. We didn’t have the heart to tell Jordan about this as we knew he would want us to take him back to see it.

Once Jordan and I got to the ship I dropped off my stuff at the room and took him to get some food. He had his usual hamburgers while I grabbed something in the buffet. We then went back to our rooms where he could watch is cartoons and I could relax.

When I got back to my room my wife was there and I showed her what I had bought at the store. A few minutes later there was a knock on our door. It was my sister asking me to take my grandmother back out to the shops as she forgot to get coffee the day before. Me being a good grandson of course said yes, grabbed my stuff and off we went.

We took the bus to the end of the pier to make things easier for her and made our way to the coffee shop. I picked up a bag of coffee for some friends of ours and my grandmother got a couple of bags for her and my aunts.

We then walked around looking at the animals as my grandmother really wanted to see the monkeys. We got to snack bar area with their tree and none were to be seen. She was a little disappointed.

At this point she realised she didn’t have her sunglasses with her. I went back to the coffee shop to see if they were there. The girls in the shop said no they didn’t see them.

We retraced our steps and couldn’t find them. My grandmother was a little upset about this because my aunt had given them to her, but things would work out. We made our way back to the ship and headed back to our rooms.

My wife and I then ended relaxing a little bit and then headed out to walk around the boat. We ended up meeting with the family at Café El Bachio as usual and sat around having some snacks and drinks.

My grandmother told us she had gone to guest relations to see if her sunglasses had been turned in. The nice lady at the desk was showing her some and gave her a pair to try on. She then told my grandmother that they must be hers because they look so good on her. My grandmother not thinking said no they were the wrong color and put them back. We all looked at her and said that the girl was telling you to take them. My grandmother laughed and said, I think you are right.

After talking for a little bit we all went our separate ways. My wife, sister, and the kids went back to the rooms while my mother, grandmother and I went down to guest relations. My grandmother went back through the sunglasses and took the pair the girl had pointed out earlier. We then started to make our way back up the ship.

As we were walking my grandmother asked if I could read the name on the glasses as she wasn’t sure what they were. I looked at them and told her she had gotten a really good upgrade from her other glasses as these were Michael Kors. She was very happy that she had gotten some great glasses.

After this my wife and I relaxed in the room as usual. This night was a little different. I decided to go see the show this night before dinner which was comedian Keven Lee. I asked my wife if she wanted to go and she said no. I knocked on the door beside us and told Jordan to get ready we were going to go see the comedian and he was ready to go in a flash.

We made our way to the theater sitting in the upper area front row. We ordered some drinks and waited for the show to start. As we waited Jeniffer showed up to join us. Supposedly she told Jordan she was going to take him to the show but he didn’t tell me that of course.

Keven Lee was very entertaining. He has a good mix of comedy and magic. He got the audience to participate and knew how to work with things gone wrong, or dead jokes. I had seen a few things of his in the past but seeing him live was really entertaining and I recommend his show.

After this we got ready for dinner.

Here is the menu for tonight.

My wife had the Maine Lobster Ravioli. She said it was ok but you couldn’t really taste the lobster.

This is the BBQ Pork Springroll. Whoever had it did say it was good.

This is the Cream of Chicken soup. If you haven’t realised by now I like soup. This was a very good soup, lots of chicken flavour and very creamy.

Sabrina had the Panzanella salad. A bit of a change from her usual salad.

I believe this was the duck my sister had. She said it was really good. I do apologise about the picture, something got corrupted.

This was the Beef Brochette. The beef was tender and flavourful. I did enjoy this quite a bit. I also want to mention this while I see it in the picture. At the top left is the butter dish for our bread. I have to say I loved how you got three different options for your bread and it changed each night depending on the bread you got. I found this to be an excellent touch.

Sorry no dessert menu again. This was a bananas foster and lava cake if I remember correctly.

This was the no sugar added strawberry shortcake if I remember correctly. I remember it being really delicious.

After dinner we went back to the room got changed. I walked around the ship for a little while, grabbed a drink from Happy,and then went back to the room. My wife wasn’t asleep yet so we talked and cuddled for a little bit till she fell asleep. I listened to my music until I fell asleep also.

Up next is a sea day. Lets see the trouble we can get into. Again thanks for reading and any questions, feel free to ask.

 

Day 7, Cartagena, Columbia

So Cartagena on this trip was an overnight. We had never done an overnight before so we thought this would be an interesting experience. Now we were late getting into port since we were late leaving the night before. We had made arrangements with a private tour to see the sights of the town.

This morning I ran up to the buffet and got my wife some food for breakfast as we had to be off the ship right away to meet our tour. I don’t believe I ate anything till later. We all sat on our balconies and waited for them to announce that we could leave the ship. We watched as the buses pulled in for the ship tours, and had to laugh as some of them do not know how to park.

After a bit we got the announcement that we could leave the ship. We made our way down, and lucky for us they have a shuttle at this port to take you to duty-free shop area which is right but the entrance to the port. We made our way through here and got to our meeting spot for our tour.

Our tour guide and driver helped us all on the bus and within moments we were on our way to explore Cartagena. My sister arranged the tour through Dora the explorer. Sadly I don’t remember the guides name, but she was great.

So off we went to our first stop which was the monastery. Now it was palm sunday this day and as my wife tells me (she is religious) this is a very religious day. As we were driving up we saw many people carrying palm leaves which explains why. We were told that for the next ten days people have to walk up the hill to the monastery every morning. I know that is not one hike I would want to do.

We got to the top of the hill and luckily were allowed to park inside the gates of the monastery. I want to mention at this point that I found the vendors to be very aggressive in certain areas, but if you said no, like our tour guide said they would leave you alone. So we parked and got ready to get out. Jordan, Sabrina, Jeniffer, Jacqueline, and I got our, Jordan went right back in because of the heat, and we went exploring. My mother and grandmother decided to stay in the van.

Here is the view from the monastery. It is the highest point in Cartagena.

Here are some of the beautiful flowers that were in the courtyard. As our tour guide was telling us there are only three monks that live and take care of this monastery. It is very clean and maintained.

This is a small well that was in the center of the courtyard.

As we walked through our tour guide told us the history of the monastery. I missed a lot of it because I was taking photos. We came across this which I took a photo of and we told the tour guide that the Canadian dollar that is in there is worth more than a dollar now since it was replaced by the loonie.

Here are some more shot of the view.

Here is a picture of the altar.

One of the many statues.

Don’t remember exactly what this was for, I missed that part of the tour while taking pictures.

The statue at the top of the steps leading to the monastery. After our tour we headed back to the van, extremely hot and sweaty. As we learned later it was 46C at the monastery that day.

We headed off on our bus to our next stop which was the fort in town.

Here is a quick picture I took while driving by.

Here is a picture of the fort from the other side. We did not go up it just explored the lower region. It was funny here as we got out of the van one of the vendors noticed my wifes purple hair and was just astounded by it. He kept pointing at his head and saying something we couldn’t understand with just a look of shock on his face. It was quite funny.

Here is a quick picture of Sabrina. She joined us out of the van for this part of the tour. Again my mother, grandmother, and Jordan stayed in the van.

This is a statue of a one-armed, one-legged explorer that ended up dieing here. He was trying to take over the city but failed.

These are the crests around the above statue.

Another view of the top of the fort.

I was trying to take a picture of the exit from the underground tunnels but the security guard was there. Our tour guide was nice enough to get the guard to move for a moment so I could get a clean shot.

I think if we ever go back I would like to tour more of the fort. I know there are a lot of tunnels and such inside and I think it would be fun to explore it more.

So we hopped on the bus again and we headed to the old walled city. This was one area I wanted to see as I had heard it was very beautiful and interesting.

Our first stop was the old jail cells which have now been converted into shops.

This is the view down at all the shops. If you look at my wife in the picture, she picked up that hat after her incident in Costa Rica.

Jordan came out of the bus for this stop as it was shopping and he wanted some precious stones. This is the inside of one of the shops. The window is all you would get back when this was a jail cell.

So after the stop at the shops we started driving around the old city and here are a few shots I got.

So when we got to the theater here we opted to continue to explore the city on foot. Our guide was concerned about our family as they were only sitting in the van. They agreed that was ok and they were fine. So my sister, my wife, and I headed out on foot for what we thought would be a short tour.

Here are some of the buildings that lined the street. I will say I did take a lot of photos here so I wont be posting all of them to keep this down a bit.

One of the churches we went to. Sorry don’t remember the name of it.

The view from the top balcony in the church.

Some of the stained glass that was in the church.

The roof of the church. The priest that lived here came to help save the slaves. He would take the injured of sick ones, buy ones that he could and help them. The inscription says a slave to the slaves.

This is the priest’s body being shown at the altar in the church.

There is a large museum area where they bring artifacts from all over the country to be displayed here. This statue we looked at and thought it was bronze, but our tour guide knocked on it and when she did you realised it is actually made of wood.

These statues line the streets as they show the original workers doing there trades.

This is the main square in the city. They used to have markets here and sell slaves.

This was the original court-house.

Another one of the buildings lining the streets.

This is the clock tower at the entrance to the city.

This was one of the outdoor markets that we went through.

This is the center square. A few pictures of the surrounding buildings

This I found interesting. The middle window is where you could report if someone was not Christian. You could come here and if you could give them proof they would arrest the person. The two round windows are the jail cell windows. Our guide also told us back in the day if you weighed more than 100lbs, it meant a woman was a witch, and a man was greedy and you would be punished.

At this point we were getting tired, hot and hungry. We stopped at a small grocery store and bought some drinks. I had a Coca-Cola light which I have to say tastes completely different than diet coke from here and a lot better. After this we carried on.

Our tour guide seemed to know everybody and she got us into this closed restaurant so we could see how the old buildings are being used today.

This was the knocker on one of the doors. Our guide explained that they would usually represent what type of job you had.

A couple more buildings along the street.

So we went into another church at this point. Sorry don’t know the name of it.

Another body on display.

Since there are no graveyards in the area they would bury people under the floor of the church. The grave stones would then be used as the floor. Here is one of a pirate.

Some of the statues around the church.

So at this point my wife was feeling really sick. Her and I are both diabetic so I knew this was not going to be good if we didn’t head back. So we told our tour guide that we needed to go. So we headed out the church and she lead us to our van that was parked just at the outskirts of the walled city.

We got back to the van and as we found out had been gone for about 2 hours. Lets just say they were not to impressed. Our driver then headed back to the pier and our tour guide gave us a bit more history of the sights we were seeing.

We got back to the pier, thanked them greatly for the tour, gave them a good tip and headed back to the duty-free area.

My wife wanted to go back right away as she needed to eat. She took off and as she said didn’t wait for the bus and just walked back to the ship. She even beat the bus doing it.

I stayed with the rest of the family as they looked through the shop.

As I waited for them I went outside and took some pictures of the animals in the area. Here is a peacock.

Here are the monkeys that were playing in the trees.

After doing their shopping we  headed back to the ship. Once there I went and checked on my wife. She had eaten something and was feeling better. We then I believe went swimming. After I grabbed a quick bite to eat, and tried a drink from slush by the pool.

We then relaxed as usual, had a quick nap, shower, all that fun stuff and then got ready for dinner.

Here is our menu for tonight.

The poached Anjou pear and gorgonzola cheese.

I had the smoked ham and split pea soup. It was delicious.

Jordan had a large plate of shrimp for his dinner.

The Mesclun salad.

Sabrinas Caesar salad and the beef bourguignon.

The crispy chicken roulade.

Banana fosters for dessert. It was delicious.

Apple crumble I believe.

So after dinner Jacqueline, Jordan, and I went to watch Spectre which was tonight’s movie. I am a huge James Bond fan so anytime I can watch one I will. Jordan hadn’t seen it but he really liked it.

After the movie I took my camera out to do some night shots of the city.

Here are a few I took.

After this I took some shots around the ship playing with my camera settings and then decided to head to bed.

Next up is our second day in Cartagena and a little bit of a more relaxed day. Again thanks for reading and if you have any questions feel free to ask.

Day 6, Colon Panama

So on to Colon, Panama. This is another day where the family split up. Jacqueline, Jordan, and myself had an excursion while the other wonderful ladies stayed around the port and on the ship. Now there is a bit of a story for today and I am going to have to get into a little detail about Jordan. This will also be a bit of a precursor to the pool incident. So if anyone is reading this to Jordan or he is reading this please skip the next paragraph.

So Jordan is one of my many siblings, one of eight to be exact not counting me. Seven of these are adopted and I commend my parents for being so generous in doing this. Anyways back to Jordan. So Jordan is high functioning autistic. He is a great kid, fun to be around, good sense of humour and likes to have fun. One thing about Jordan though is he focuses in on certain things and becomes a bit obsessive. Take the cruise for instance, he got obsessed over jewels and wanted to get diamonds and emeralds and the sort wherever we went. Another thing that really bothered him to was that he was not allowed to leave the ship alone as he was under 19. He felt this was not fair as he is responsible enough and should be allowed to go out alone if he liked. Just remember this fact for the upcoming story.

So we all got up, I believe we had room service again for breakfast so we didn’t have to fight the buffet and then headed out for our excursion which was at 9:30 if I remember correctly. We were doing the tour of San Lorenzo fort and the Panama canal. This I thought was perfect for us as Jordan does not do well in the heat and this way we were bused everywhere. So we made our way onto the bus where Jordan wanted to sit in the back and started our journey through the town.

Here are some pictures of us driving through town. They are not the best as we were in a moving bus. The town was busy today because it was a Saturday and they had open markets that everyone was coming to.

As we were driving through the town my wife and I noticed that Jordan had for some reason gotten in a mood. He wouldn’t talk to us and he looked really mad. I asked him a few times what was wrong and he kept pointing at the two young kids sitting in front of us. My first thought was that they had said something about him but we wouldn’t find out the truth till a little later.

So once we got out of town we headed to Fort Lorenzo but first we had to cross the canal.

 

So the pictures above are parts of the new locks that are being built. As our guide told us they will be open in April. April of what year, no one knows.

 

Above are some pictures of the locks. You can see a ship going through.

So after going through the locks we got to this bridge which is over the canal that the french tried to build but had to abandon due to it being to hard to dig out. As you can see they didn’t get very far.

We continued our journey into the jungle to get to the fort. As we drove along we came across monkeys in the trees. I for some reason have two pictures of trees but no monkeys. Anyways at this point we pulled over and bunch of people got off the bus to look. This gave my wife and me some time to talk to Jordan. Turned out he was upset because he thought the two kids in front of us were there alone and he didn’t think that was fair as he wasnt allowed to go out alone. We explained that they were there with their parents but  he didnt want to believe that. Soon after everyone got on the bus and we headed off again.

Soon we were at the ranger station and pulled over as our last stop with a washroom before the fort. A bunch of people got off including Jordan to use the washroom.

I took this picture of Jordan because I knew if he was going to be in a bad mood he wouldn’t want any pictures taken of him.

Here he is next in line for the washroom. If look behind him, the boy in the blue shirt was the one sitting in front of us, and look he is with his father. Jordan did notice this. And when he got back on the bus he was a happy camper again.

Jordan and Jacquelines, happy face.

This is their sad face.

And this is their serious face. I just have to say this is a really good portrait shot of Jordan. I seem to have surprised myself with this picture.

So now that we had arrived at Fort Lorenzo we were allowed to explore. This is the Fort where Captain Morgan took over by attacking from behind. He then stayed here for three months and then headed to Panama city to take that over.

Here is my wife and Jordan being Captain Morgan on a cannon.

Here are some pictures from the top of the fort.

Jordan at the entrance to the fort.

We asked Jordan what he thought this was and he said a bathroom because that is what it smelt like.

We declared this Jordans beach. It looked very nice.

Jordan going inside the fort. We had lost my wife at this point.

Jordan hanging out in one of the windows.

Jordan took this great picture of my wife and I.

At this point we were all getting really hot so we headed back towards the bus. We looked around that area for a little bit before we got to go back on the bus and make our way to the canal and see boast going through. The fort was really interesting. They say that they are still uncovering more of it all the time and we did see a hill beside where we parked that looked like they were doing some excavating. It would be interesting see what they uncover in a few years time.

So we get to the canal and make our way in. First thing we see is locomotive that was used to open and close the locks.

Here is what it looked like.

We then made our way to the busy washroom to relieve ourselves. Not the cleanest bathroom I have ever been in that is for sure but with the amount of people they get in a day it probably is hard to keep spotless.

We then headed up these stairs to the view platform.

If you look at the above pictures you can see we watched the boat slowly lower so it could move into the canal.

Also as we were waiting a Princess ship came into the canal.

On our way back out we came across this GE locomotive that my wife just had to have her picture taken with.

And then my wife forced Jordan to take this picture with her. As you can see he isn’t happy here. Again getting to hot and tired.

At this point we hit the gift shop to get my father his hat and myself a key chain since I love my key chains from around the world. I am always looking for a different or unique keychain so if anyone out there reading this comes across any let me know.

So funny story about the gift shop. We go in and it is quite busy. We look around, grab what we want, and then head to the line. I see two people in line and a bunch of people looking around. I walk up and stand behind the lady at the back of the line. She turns around and says to me, “NO CUTTING IN LINE. THE LINE STARTS BACK THERE!” as she points behind me. I turn around along with my wife and I see everyone scatter out the doors since no one was in line. I turned back around the lady gave me a dirty look and stepped up to the cash. I guess the heat or something got to her but oh well I was on vacation  so no skin off my back.

We then had a long ride back to the port as we missed the light at the canal and had to wait for it to change.

We finally got back to the port and looked at the little shops around there and then headed back in the ship and to our rooms.

We got to the room and there was a surprise for my wife. Without her knowing I had gotten my sister to make an appointment for a facial later that afternoon. She was very surprised and angry at me since she has anxiety about doing unknown things like this. We decided to get some lunch before hand and so the family headed up to the buffet to eat.

Jordan of course wanted a burger so here is the burger story I have with Jordan. I decided to take him to get one so we headed out to the mast grill. We lined up and I told him he had to order because we want him to be independent. He orders two burgers from the fries guy who didn’t seem to understand him or respond to him in english. Jordan repeated himself and the guy still didnt understand him or respond in english. Jordan then totally out of character yells at the guy that he wants two burgers. The guy looks at him and casually in perfect english says wrong spot and points to the guy over. Jordan goes over and get his burgers and we head back to join the family.

This was very funny as Jordan does not get mad at people like that very often and we laughed a lot about it during the rest of the trip.

So after lunch I took my wife to the spa to get her signed in and settled. She was still really mad at me but once she met her specialist I guess you call them she relaxed and was fine.

I headed back to the room to relaxed and tired to watch a movie. I fell asleep during it. I awoke to our room steward with our afternoon cheese plate. I then dozed off again until my wife showed up. We ate the cheese plate, relaxed, I believe we went down to look at the watch sale, had drinks and snacks at Cafe al Bacio, and just enjoyed ourselves.

Also to mention my mother, sister’s, and grandmother had gone off the ship and ended up in a casino. They kept playing even though they had no idea what was going on since it wasnt in english. My grandmother kept wanting to go back and play more.

The ship was also delayed a couple of hours due to a medical emergency. So my grandmother checked if she could get off the ship to go gamble some more after our 5:30 all aboard call. They would not let her off.

So I am not sure what day this exactly happened but lets talk about the pool incident. So Sabrina and Jordan would spend most afternoons in the solarium relaxing and swimming. One afternoon they went to the main pool instead and were relaxing in the hot tub. While sitting in the hot tub two gentlemen joined them. One of the gentleman was older, Sabrina said late 30’s, the other was younger, late 20’s. As they were sitting in the hot tub one of the gentleman began rubbing Jordans leg inappropriately. Now this wasnt just a little anciently hand hitting leg, this was full on rubbing. They both immediately got out of the hot tub and went back to the room. Now Jordan with his past and such tends to block stuff like this out. His mind goes blank to give him time to process it. We didnt not find out about this till a few days later when he saw them in the main dining room. As soon as we knew we went to ship security especially since Jordan is only 17. They did find him on the security tape and were able to identify him. They informed my mother that he is now banned from all Celebrity and Royal Caribbean ships and that they will share the info with other cruise lines. In the end it was a good resolution to a very bad situation. Jordan is doing good, he has gotten past it and feels better knowing something was done about it.

So on to dinner. Tonight we were eating in Murano’s the french restaurant. Now the last cruise we were one it was great, the one before that was absolutely terrible but that’s a story for a different day. This time it was very good. So without any more delay let’s get into some food pictures. I apologise for the quality of these ones but the restaurant is very dark so it was a bit harder to get good pictures.

Here is the A La Carte menu. There is also a five course meal you can choose I believe.

This was my diver scallop.

I believe this was warm goat cheese souffle.

This was the lobster bisque.

The mushroom cappuccino.

Porcini and Morel risotto I believe.

Heirloom tomato and buffalo mozzarella salad.

This was Jordan trying caviar again. Still not his favourite.

Pork belly I believe.

Loup De Mer. My grandmother had this and said it was really good.

Lobster of course. I think almost everyone at the table had this.

My Dover sole. Good as always.

The dessert menu. I actually got a picture of this one.

I had the assorted gelato.

The dark chocolate souffle.

And the crepe ballon rouge. Jordan had two maybe three of these. He loves his crepes now. I know Sabrina had one because she didn’t like the souffle.

After dinner it was pretty late so I did my walk around the ship, relaxed on the deck for a while with my drink from Happy and then off to bed.

Thanks for following, again any questions feel free to ask away.

 

 

Day 5,Puerto Limon, Costa Rica

Well now on to day five. So this day was a day we separated as a family. Jeniffer, Jordan, and Sabrina went zip lining while my mother Jan, grandmother May, my wife Jacqueline and I took a private tour.

I had picked a private tour that was a little more accessible as my grandmother and mother can’t walk very far and I wanted them to be able to enjoy their day in Costa Rica.

We got up around 830 and all went for breakfast. We had planned a later excursion so we didn’t have to rush off the ship and fight the hordes fo people. After breakfast we got ready and headed off the boat and meet our tour for 10am.

The problem that I had not anticipated was the walk from the ship to the port. We had to go very slowly as my mother could only walk so far and it took us a good 15-20 minutes to reach where our tour guide was. We were late but he was very understanding and helped my mother and grandmother get to the bus for the tour.

The tour company we chose was Oscar Brown Tours. Here is a link to their website. http://www.oscarbrowntours.com/  They were one of the best tour companies I have dealt with. I got quick responses to my questions through email and they were understanding about our mobility issues. We did the 1-1 tour which is nice and easy for those with mobility issues and still gives you a great tour of the city.

Once on the bus we were with another group of people from the ship. They were doing tour 1 which is a little different from ours as you get a ride in the canals on a boat. I would have had no problem with that but the rest of the family were not interested.

Our guide for the day was Ryan. He was professional and was full of local knowledge. He answered all the questions that came up and really went above and beyond.

So we got on the bus and we headed out on our journey for the day. As we headed out our first stop on the side of the road was to see an iguana and a sloth.

Here is a picture of the iguana high up in the tree.

Here are some pictures of the sloth that we saw.

A funny story goes with this. So my mother and grandmother stayed in the vehicle as we went out to look at the animals. While we were walking through the field to see them I noticed the ground was full of holes but didn’t think anything of it. As we were looking at the sloth one of the other members of the tour asked what the holes in the ground were. Ryan said they were either crabs or snakes, and if they are snakes he will be running back to the vehicle and we were to follow. At this point I stop taking pictures to look at my wife and lo and behold she is tip toeing back to the van as she is scared of snakes and she was wearing flip-flops so she really didn’t want to get bit. I can say though we did not see any snakes but it was funny.

So after this stop we made our was farther down the road until we stopped at a local market. Ryan explained that you pay what you can. We made a stop here to check out the farm. We didn’t get out of the vehicle but the rest of the group did.

Here is a quick shot of our tour guide Ryan.

Here are some pictures of the farm. Now Ryan was so nice he brought us items to try as we sat in the van. I tried a fresh banana which I had done before on a previous cruise and it was great. Nothing beats a fresh banana. He also gave us fresh pineapple which was so juicy and nice that I could eat that every day. Jacqueline had papaya which she said was good but warm. She would have prefered it cold.

After this we hit the road again and headed to our main stop which was the banana plantation. We went to a plantation run but Del Monte and the largest plantation in Costa Rica which was 400 hectares large.

Here is one of the banana trees on the farm.

Here is my beautiful wife walking among the banana trees.

Here are some banana in the blue bags. As we learned the blue bags protect the bananas from pesticides, birds, and insects. Supposedly birds and insects don’t like the color blue so they leave them alone.

Here is one of the seeds that open up to become the bunch of bananas.

So this is the guide wire that is used to haul bananas to the plant. As we learned the workers will collect bunches of bananas each weighing 50-60 pounds and then take them along this wire to the plant. To get them there though the employees have to run them and must collect 400 bunches in one day. Ryan told us that Costa Ricans don’t do this job they get people from Nicaragua to do this unless they need they work. That is one job I do not want to have.

So after the banana plantation we headed off down the road and got a bit of a tour of the area as we headed to our next stop. We saw some of the schools, they banana plants that are the best place to work, and one of the docks owned by the banana companies.

So we dropped off the rest of the group at the boat for the canals and Ryan double checked if we wanted to go with them. We told him no that we didn’t. So we headed out to last stop of the day which was a little beach break. As we drove he gave us more information about the are and answered a few questions we had. He was also concerned about my mother and grandmother because they didn’t get out of the van for any of the previous stops. They told him they were fine and they enjoyed just seeing the views as we drove. They both are not big into excursions and enjoy such things as bus tours. Of course this would be put to the test in Cartagena.

We arrived at the beach stop with a little restaurant. He offered to get us a table but it was getting hot out and my mother and grandmother wanted to head back so we said we would only stay for a few minutes. At this point my wife and I headed onto the beach.

A few shots of the beach I took.

My foot in the water.

A few people playing the in water.

Gnomie made an appearance at the beach. He wanted to stay longer he was enjoying the sand so much.

So this lady in the picture was entertaining. She was telling us how she didn’t want to get wet and she kept jumping out of the way of the waves as we watched her. As you can see by this picture the waves won and she got wet. She came out after this and laughed saying she tried her best but at least she will dry off.

After taking some photos and enjoying the beautiful water we headed back up to the restaurant and met up with my mother and grandmother. We then grabbed Ryan and headed back to the bus.

I also took the above picture and sent it back to my work to tell everyone I missed them and that I wished they were here with me. Lets just say I was told I was mean.

So we got back on the bus and headed back to the port. The traffic was a bit backed up so we had to fight our way through the traffic. As we were driving through town Ryan picked up his uncle Oscar who is the owner of the tour company. He asked how we were enjoying the tour and how Ryan was doing. We told him we really enjoyed the tour and that Ryan was fantastic. He seemed to really appreciate the feedback. We were then dropped at the entrance to the port. I gave Ryan a good tip on top of the payment for the tour and thanked him for the great day.

Another quick note about our tour group. It was quite hot that day, and the bus we were on was older. Once we were picked up by Ryan he stopped to fuel up and turned the air conditioning on. It felt nice but needed time to move through the vehicle. The other people in the group who sat in the back of the bus decided that it was better to have the windows open as they could not feel the air conditioning. Once we got to the farm and everyone got out my wife closed all the windows she could and the bus cooled down right away. When the others came back the lady sitting behind my wife asked if she wanted the window open more and my wife told her no because the air conditioner works much better when windows are closed. Lets jus say the lady didn’t open the window anymore.

Once back at the port we wandered around the stalls inside the port and picked up a few souvenirs. We got my father his usual hat and a few things for the younger kids that were at home with dad. We then had to make the long walk back to the ship. stopping frequently for my mother and grandmother.

Here is a picture I took of the them taking a break from the walk. As you can see Gnomie made and guest appearance again.

Here is my staple picture of the ship in dock. I don’t know why I do it every time but I just do. I think it turned out really nice.

By the time we got to the ship my mother could barely walk. She and my grandmother went back to the room. My wife and I headed to the room, threw on our swimsuits and went to the solarium for a little bit. We then hit up the buffet for a late lunch. We then went back to the room and checked in on my mother and grandmother. My mother was doing better and they had ordered room service so they could relax.

So the other three that morning went off to do their zip lining. They really enjoyed it and saw lots of animals. Here are a few pictures that they took.

Here is the three of them about to get ready and doing there usual selfie. Also looks like a picture of the zip line.

They got back to the ship around 4-430. Jordan went and got a burger and I believe Jeniffer and Sabrina grabbed some food also.

Jeniffer also took Jordan to see the show this night before diner. Garry Carson was performing his magic in the theatre. Jordan wasnt to sure about it at first but by the end he really enjoyed it. They both said was a good show to watch.

We were scheduled to leave at 6:30 so as usual I had my little nap and then went out on our deck to take some pictures.

So here is a picture of the ship that was beside us loading up crates. Jordan enjoyed watching them load as he and Jeniffer would guess which one would be next. The second was of the shore line as we were pulling out of port.

So after this we relaxed, ate our cheese plate, watched some tv and then got read for dinner.

Here is the menu for tonight. Some good options.

So we start with Sabrina’s Caesar salad as usual.

My wifes crab cake. If I liked crab then maybe I would have it. She really liked it.

My beef carpacio. It was delicious.

I believe Sabrina had this salad also. This was the Chicory Apple Pear Salad.

My wife had the Tomato Watermelon Gazpacho. She didn’t realise it was a cold soup, said it was ok.

Jeniffer had the Cream of Broccoli soup. She enjoyed it.

This was the Barolo Braised Beef Short Rib. I cat remember who had it but I remember that they did enjoy it.

Sabrina had the Penne Primavera. She said it was okay but she ate the whole thing.

Oven Roasted Chicken Saltimbocca. I believe Jeniffer had this and really enjoyed it.

Again I didn’t take a picture of the dessert menu. This was apple pie I believe with vanilla ice cream.

I had this which was Cherries Jubilee. I could have eaten ten of them.

My wife had a Fruit Parfait type of dessert. She did enjoy it.

After dinner we were going to grab the movie for the night which was The Intern but no one wanted to see it with me so I was going to go alone. I got to the theater and there were about 15-20 people in there but they were a little intoxicated and very loud. After a few minutes I left as I was not able to enjoy the movie. I did my usual routine, went up and saw Happy, got my Jello, then headed back to the room to relax on the deck. I made sure I had a somewhat early night as the next day was Colon Panama and it was going to be another fun excursion.

Thanks for reading and if you have any questions feel free to ask.

 

Day 4, Sea Day

Hello everyone and again thanks for following along. Time for my next installment of my cruise review/blog. I don’t have a lot for this day so it may be a shorter post but I do hope you enjoy it and if you have any questions feel free to ask.

So the next day was March 17th which was St. Patricks day. Now at this point of the cruise I had finally got my body out of my morning routine. When I am at home I get up at 7 am everyday to feed the dogs or else they will start to bark at our bedroom door. So I slept in quite a bit today.

I got up around 930. I remember we had missed breakfast with everyone else but that was fine. I did run up and get something for my wife since she is a breakfast person not like me. I also ran into my sister and we decided we would try the gastrobar today.

So we headed to the gastrobar around 11 as they were supposed to open then because it was St Patrick’s day and a sea day. We sat there waiting and as we waited Jordan decided to play with the hats on the tables.

Here is Jordan and I wearing the hats. He really enjoyed them.

As Jeniffer, Jordan, Grandma, and Me were waiting I ended up wandering off to find the rest of the group. I was gone for about half an hour before I found everyone and got them down to the gastrobar.

When we got there my sister informed us that there had been an incident in the kitchen and they were delayed opening. They told her they would be open at noon. At this time it was about ten to twelve.

We waited and waited and waited and watched as the waiters went by but none stopped to talked to us. Finally my sister asked one of them if we could order and the waitress was surprised, thinking that we were just waiting here and not wanting to order. So we got our drink orders in and ordered our food.

Here is a copy of the menu.

As we waited we took some more pictures.

Jordan and Jacqueline.

My mother and Sabrina.

And Sabrina and Jordan.

We had to wait for around another forty five minutes before our food finally came out. This is where things get interesting.

Jeniffer had the truffled grilled cheese. I did taste it and it was good.

My grandmother had an order of us the fries and was told that they were so big she would have to share. If you look at the above picture her order was a little larger then this but not by much.

I had the grilled local sausages. Each sausage was a different flavour and they were all good. The mustard complimented them nicely. The potato salad was alright. I didn’t get my pretzel bun but that was fine.

So this is where it gets interested. My wife and mother had the Guinness and steak pie. Now if you look at the picture you will see that there is no puff pastry on this dish or if you look really close there are no potatoes like the description says. My wife at hers as she was hungry and said it was good. My mother on the other hand sent it back complaining that this was a stew not steak pie.

As my mother sent it back the waitress was very apologetic and told us to hold on as she was going to get the head chief for her. At this time the rest of the family took off on us. As Jordan hadn’t eaten along with Sabrina my sister took them up to bistro on five. My grandmother had left earlier and my wife went back to the room. This left me with my mother to deal with the chief.

When the chief came out my mother explained what the problem was and that she wasn’t blaming the waitress or anything but this is not what she was expecting. THe chief really didn’t understand what she was talking about and couldn’t explain to her why she got what she got. The waitress stayed there and actually laid into him to because she was not happy about wearing the St Patrick’s hat that she had to.

So it ended up that they were going to have my mother back so that she could make it right for her. She also said that the rest of the family were not allowed to come back because we had eaten our food. I know she wasn’t trying to be mean but I found it funny.

After this my mother headed up to bistro on five to get some food with the kids.

So I don’t have any pictures between now and dinner but I kind of remember what happened.

I remember going up to the room for a little bit and going back out for a walk. I went down to the shops to check out the $10 madness sale. I remember going down to look at it while we waited for lunch but it was swamped.

There was nothing grabbing my attention but I did run into the rest of the family. After looking we went up to the Café al Bacio and met up with grandma there. We read the Canadian news and had some snacks and drinks.

After this I met up with my wife and we went swimming with the kids in the solarium. We did this quite a bit on the trip. I am not a huge swimmer but I do like the solarium as its a big more quite and relaxed. I really liked it around five as a lot people would go and get ready for dinner so you were pretty much alone. Now there was an incident in the solarium with one of the family but I am not going to talk about it here and we will see down the line.

After swimming we went back to room, had our cheese plate, relaxed, may have napped, and watched TV before we had to get ready for dinner.

I should mention we always do the late seating for dinner. We all prefer it and I know my wife and I do as we work retail and a lot of times we don’t get dinner to late anyways. So here is the menu for the night.

Lots of interesting items on the menu tonight. So lets start with the pictures.

So my grandmother and few others at the table had the caprese salad. Similar to what she had the night before but made properly.

Sabrina had her usual Caesar salad.

My wife had the butternut squash soup. She said it was delicious.

I had the Pasta Fagioli soup. One of my favourites and this was great.

So my grandmother had the seared Branzino. She did not like it one bit. Had one bite and sent it back for something else.

My wife had the grilled NY steak. Always a good choice.

My sister had the toasted Israeli couscous cake. She was very surprised and liked it.

Of course me being daring had the steak and chips. Steak was a little tough but still good. The Bernaise sauce was great.

And back to my grandmother, she got the salmon instead. She really liked it

I believe Jordan had a burger again for dinner. The staff in the dinning room were very good and getting him what he wanted since he is a picky eater.

Now comes the desserts.

Sabrina and my wife had the strawberry shortcake.

I believe this was some kind of chocolate mouse. I know Jordan and Jeniffer had it.

This was the peach cobbler that I had. The peach taste was fantastic. Some of the best I have had.

And I spoiled my self and had the no sugar added chocolate ice cream also.

So after dinner, I could be wrong but I think it was this night, my mother and grandmother went back to there room, Jordan went to watch tv, and Jacqueline, Jeniffer, Sabrina, and I grabbed some drinks from Happy in the buffet and then went to the card room to play Cards Against Humanity. We were there for a while playing and then decided to call it a night as we had to be up early for our excursions.

So next up will be Puerto Limon, Costa Rica. Thanks for following along and now that I am feeling much better from my cold I will be updating a bit more frequent.

Also if anyone is interested I do have the Celebrity Today from the trip so if anyone wants to see them let me know. Also any questions feel free to ask.

 

 

Day 3, Cozumel Mexico

Hi everyone and thanks for continuing to read my blog. I apologise for the delay of this post as I have appeared to of come down with a chest cold so haven’t had the energy to continue but I am starting to feel better so here we go.

So we had arranged a tour through celebrity for today to visit the Mayan Ruins and the Mayan Cacao factory. We had decided to get room service for breakfast as the tour was early and this way we could eat and be ready to go.

I woke up with a knock on the door for our food at around 8:30. I brought it in and did my usual morning routine and headed to the washroom. After leaving he washroom and I started not feeling so well. I had a sharp pain in my stomach and just didn’t feel well. My wife was eating her breakfast and told me to eat but just the thought of food did not agree with me.

After a few minutes I headed back into the washroom and was sick. The shrimp from the previous night was coming up and it was not nice. After this my sister was at the door and explained to me that she was up last night doing the same thing. Now I do have to say my sister and I have very strong stomachs. It takes a lot for me to be sick and this was one thing that did. My sister also commented it was the shrimp for her also.

After speaking to my sister I had to run to the washroom again and empty my stomach. Once that was done I was feeling much better. The next problem was that my wife was not feeling good at all. She started feeling really sick but the problem with her is she does not throw up so it was not a good situation.

We talked and arranged that my sister go on the excursion instead of my wife so she could rest. So we gathered Jordan and Sabrina and our stuff and stopped by my mother and grandmothers room to ask them to check in on my wife a little later. My mother agreed and we headed out to the dock to meet up for our tour.

I had to take a picture of this as I found it funny to see a drug store and deli together. We met up with our tour group and waited till everyone was there so we could start. My sister took some selfies as we waited.

Yes she actually got a picture of me which is very rare. I think this trip we actually got a few of me which doesn’t happen much.

Last time we were in Cozumel on our cruise two years ago or so we didn’t do an excursion. We got off the ship and went to the mall across the street which had a couple stores in it and advertised a Hard Rock café but it was not open at that time.

This time after we had got on the bus and were headed to the ruins we saw the mall which now has more stores in it including the Hard Rock now and a Carl’s Jr. which Jordan asked if I could take him to after. We did not go.

So we drove for a while until we reached the San Gervasio ruins. I chose this tour as it was shorter then the others since my brother Jordan has issues with heat and thought this would be easier for him. I tour guide for the trip was Moy which Jordan and Sabrina loved.

Here is a picture of our guide Moy. He had lots of information to share and I don’t think we saw half of the site with all the information he had to share.

There were quite a few people here today as you can see from the crowds. But after the first house here we didn’t really see anyone but our group.

This is an arch to an entrance to the temple. The road has become rough but back in the day they were smooth. I found it interesting that the Mayan never used the wheel as it was a sacred object to them. Also every thing is based around two numbers 7, and 13 which was lucky to them.

Here is one of the houses they had. I don’t remember what it was used for again.

Here is Jeniffer, Jordan, and Sabrina posing in front of the ruins for me.

Here I am sacrificing Jordan to the Mayan gods. If I was better with photoshop I would put a knife in my hand to make it more authentic.

Sabrina was obsessed with the iguanas and was trying to get close to this one to touch it. She got pretty close before it ran off as you can see.

Here is a look down one of the Mayan roads.

So at one point Moy started talking about black coral and how you can still get it in Cozumel for now because it is going to get banned. Well after the tour we walked through the shops they had and Jordan came across the black coral and became obsessed with it. He was begging Jeniffer to buy him some. So she talked to the guy in one of the stores and he wanted to sell it to us at $85 a piece, and that’s with the Moy discount. Well my sister is great at haggling. By the time she was done we had him down to $20 a piece and if we had more time she thinks she could of got him down to $15. We ended up getting one for Jordan and  I bought one for Jacqueline. We would of got more but Jeniffer’s visa didn’t work in the store.

So we head back to the bus and as we are leaving this lady who took our picture when we first arrived showed it to us to see if we wanted to buy it. Jeniffer ended up buying it as it was a good picture. Sadly I don’t have a cop of it yet.

So we got back on the bus and headed to our next stop which was a little beach on the other side of the island.

Moy gave us more info about this side of the island, like the land being owned by the government and no one is allowed to build on it.

When we got to our beach stop we had 15 minutes to explore. They little shops selling stuff and a place to get drinks. We wandered down to the beach and took some pictures.

Here are some selfies that Jeniffer took as usual.

Here is a picture of the three of them I took in front of the water.

The land here has been eroded by the water so you have to be carful walking up here.

Another picture of my happy family.

A picture of the waves hitting the beach.

I also have a video of the waves but it wont let me upload the video so maybe after I convert it I can get it to work.

So we jumped back on the bus and headed to our next stop which the Mayan Cacao company. This is one place I had heard good things about and was excited to go to.

We arrived and headed in. You are given a tour of the history of cacao and how it is made. They also had parrots around everywhere and again Sabrina was enthralled with them always trying to touch and get close to them.

Here are some of the parrots the Sabrina was in love with.

Here is a replica of the Mayan calendar.

Here are some of the artifacts in the museum showing you how the used to make chocolate.

We were also treated to fresh tortillas and mole sauce. Both were fantastic and great as we were all getting hungry.

After this we entered an auditorium where we got learn about the process of making chocolate.

They give you a spoon of chocolate to try when you first come in. It was delicious.

Then this nice gentleman gave us a demonstration on how to make chocolate and the process the Mayans used to use like adding blood for color. Luckily they don’t do that anymore. He also told a story about when the Spanish brought sugar to the Mayans and they supposedly spent half a day tasting it.

After leaving the auditorium you were given a drink of hot chocolate made with unsweetened chocolate. I tried it and it wasn’t bad just not something I wouldn’t drink all the time. Jeniffer loved it and Sabrina and Jordan had to sweeten it up because they hated it.

We then went into the store area and bought some chocolate. I was excited as they had sugar free chocolate so I got a bar for myself (I am diabetic so always looking for sugar free). We also bought a few bars for some family member back home and I bought a chocolate bar or soap.

At this point Jordan and I headed back to the bus as Jeniffer and Sabrina kept shopping. Turned out they were the last two to get to the bus. After this we headed back to the port.

Jordan was getting tired at this point and when we got back to the port I took him back to ship while Jeniffer and Sabrina went over to the Hard Rock to see if they could find a hat for my father. My father always likes hats from all the places we go so we try and find him one everywhere we go. He has a large collection.

On our way back to the ship Jordan and I saw a mariachi band playing in the port area. We had a good laugh as I told him that was my wifes family as we always say he is a little bit Mexican. He then began to dance to the music as we went by.

I also stopped to take a few pictures of the ship.

We were parked beside the constellation and I had taken a similar picture two years ago so decided to repeat it.

Here is Jordan posing for me though he didn’t want to.

Here is a picture between the two ships.

After this we went back to our rooms. Jordan went and got food and I checked on Jacqueline. She was sleeping so I decided to leave her alone. I checked in with my mother and she said she had checked on her earlier and she was feeling better. I also ran into Baso and he wanted to know how my wife was. I told him she was doing better and he was happy to hear that.

I quickly ran up to the mast grill and grabbed a burger and fries. I then made my way down to Jordan’s room to watch sail away. As we waited we heard the captain come on saying that everyone was onboard and that we would be setting sail soon.

I know its bad but I love watching people race to get to the boat. I find it entertaining watching sail away for this reason and love having my deck overlooking the dock. This trip we did not have anyone miss the boat.

At this time Jacqueline woke up so I switched back to my room and sat on the deck with her during sail away.

Here are some pictures of us leaving port.

So after this I talked with my mother. I guess while we were off the ship she had spoken to the restaurant manager. She explained what had happened at silk harvest and how three of us were sick that day. He offered us to eat at silk harvest again as his guest but she said no we didn’t want to go back after being sick. He then offered us to have lunch at Tuscan grill on the last day. She said she would think about it and get back to him. To bad this isn’t the last incident at a restaurant we would have.

So did our usual afternoon routine, had a nap, ate our cheese plate and crackers, watched TV, and then got ready for dinner.

So tonight we ate at the main dinning room. We were happy about this after our meal the previous night.

So here is the menu for tonight.

Escargot for my wife and Jeniffer.

Shrimp Cocktail for me.

My grandmother ordered this. I am guessing cheese and tomatoes. She was craving this and they were nice enough to get it for her.

Roasted chicken. It looked good and Jacqueline said it was.

This was my pork tenderloin. It was really good. I was worried it would be dry but it was very moist and the sauce was great.

This was the braised beef cheek. Jeniffer said it was very tender and good.

This was the redfish. The barbecue shrimp was good the fish not the best.

I didn’t take a picture of the dessert menu but I believe I know everything everyone had. Here is some vanilla ice cream. This goes with my sisters lava cake as she doesn’t like the two touching.

Here is the lava cake my wife ordered.

Pecan pie that Sabrina ordered.

Here is my apple pie. It was very good and seasoned well. Good staple if your not sure.

After dinner there was the marriage game in celebrity central. My wife and I headed back to the room while the rest of them were supposed to go to the show. Jordan and Sabrina ended up back in there room and everyone else in the casino.

I ended up going to the buffet to get my Jello and drink from Happy. I then went back to the room and sat on the deck for awhile before I headed to bed.

So there is day three done. Next up is another sea day, another disappointment at a restaurant for my mother and St. Patricks Day. I hope to update faster this time as I am feeling better. Thanks for reading and again any questions feel free to ask.