Mexican Riviera Cruise 2007

Well, we survived!!! Tommy and I just got back from a 7 day cruise to the Mexican Riviera. It was tons of fun but I think we brought a flu bug with us. We went with Tommy's sister and husband and 2 other couples. The first night we were gone on our trip I got a call around 2 a.m. and it was TJ. He had been throwing up. Braxton and my little niece were sick that night too. I am thinking we may have caught something at the Halloween Carnival. That is when we were all together. So, having the flu with us but not yet manifesting itself, needless to say, the boat was a ROCKIN! (and not in the good way!!) Everyone of us was seasick at one point or another. If not the WHOLE time. In fact, 3 of the 8 of us were running to the bathroom every few minutes at the airport on the way home, and two more got sick after we got back. Luckily Tommy and I never did catch it too bad. I'll tell you what though. As much as I LOVE cruises, I think it is going to be a while before I want to get on another one. I have been on 4 cruises in my life time and one especially was super rocky and I still got more sick on this one. But either way, it really was fun!!

Our first stop was at Puerto Vallarta! We took a shore excursion there, and really.... how dumb are we? We got off of a boat and got on ANOTHER boat. This was a little sail boat though. My brother-in-law threw up over the side of the boat. It was a 2 1/2 hour bumpy bumpy ride to a little snorkeling spot that we got to stay at for about 45 minutes and then another 20 minutes to a beach. We had lunch there and sat on the beach for about a half an hour and then took another 2 hour boat ride back.












Right when we got on the beach a guy handed me an Iguana and said I could take a picture with it. Tommy snapped a picture then he took a picture with both of us in it and told Tommy that it would cost $10. I started laughing and Tommy REALLY paid him. I couldn't believe it! WHAT A RIP OFF!
Lunch was NOT very tasty but it did the trick. The beach was nice. I wished we could've stayed there longer. On the ride we saw a HUGE Manta Ray. It was AWESOME!!! It swam right up by the boat and then flipped water at us. On the way back we saw lots of Dolphins swimming. Oh, the snorkeling was okay, but for some reason where we were at, we didn't float very good. They gave us little things to help us float but we still had to work at keeping our heads above water. There were a few neat fish though. After the sail boat ride it was time to get back on the ship, so we really didn't get to see a whole lot of Puerto Vallarta.

Our second stop was at Mazatlan. When I was a travel agent I got to go there on a Familiarization Trip (Fam Trip). Ever since then I have really wanted to do Para sailing. Everyone told us to wait until the next port though because at Mazatlan they pull you up from the beach and in Cabo they let you go out from a boat. You don't even get wet. So, I waited. In Mazatlan we all took a cab to shopping and a beach. It was a really fun day!!!
The beach was awesome but I had a really hard time saying, "No" to everyone that asked me to buy something from them. Tommy and two of the others that came with us all got Henna tattoos. Fake tattoos are always fun to get...especially since they don't stay forever. I had a lot of fun finding seashells on this beach! Our kids love when we bring them shells home.


We had lunch at a little Mexican Restaurant and they had HUGE chips with their salsa. They were yummy! The food was good too!
I bought most of our souvenirs and kids things in Mazatlan. It was a great inexpensive place to shop. Tons of fun!

Over all we had lots of fun in Mazatlan. Being on land was GREAT!!

Our last port was in Cabo San Lucas. This day we decided just to find somewhere where we could snorkel and a nice beach to enjoy the day on. We took a cab to the Chileno Bay Beach. It was BEAUTIFUL!!! I loved it! It was a beach that looked just like a postcard!
The snorkeling was crazy. There were millions of little fish swimming all around you. Sometimes they were so thick you couldn't hardly see to the sand below them.








We'd be swimming through all of these fish and then all of the sudden they would all be gone. Then we'd look over and see some big white fish swimming by. Apparently the little fish didn't want to be dinner for the big fish. YIKES!!

It was cool too, because we were by a bunch of rocks and the pelicans were perched on them. Every once in a while one would fly up and then dive bomb straight down into the water and come up with a fish in it's mouth. It was really fun to watch!








Tommy and I had a LOT of fun on that beach but the seashells were slim pickens. I did find some pretty cool rocks for TJ though. We did some shopping on the streets and at the pier on the way back to the ship. The only sad part about it is that there were no Para sailors on that beach. I guess I will just have to go back some day!!!! Only maybe by plane next time!


Well, the food on the boat was great, of course! Me and my sister-in-law dressed up just about every night, just because it was so fun. Even though only two nights were strictly formal. We don't really ever get to get all fancy like that at home so we took full advantage of it. One night I actually had to leave dinner early though because I was so seasick. That stunk! Every night at dinner was when most of us felt the most queasy. We ate on the top level at the very back of the boat. Once we all got our sea bands, ear patches, motion sickness pills and ginger ale we could actually deal with it pretty okay!

Our waitresses were so much fun! Their names were Christina and Roxy (Loredena). Above is Christina.Tommy had a ball dancing with her during the dinner program one night. What a good sport!! I actually miss Christina. She had such a cute personality.
Both of our waitresses were from Romania.

To the right is Roxy. She was really sweet too, it just took us a while to get her to open up to us. After that she was pretty fun. Cruises are always so much funner when you have good waiters. Luckily we have always had great ones!













This is our Matre'd Peter. He was AWESOME!! We have NEVER had a good Matre'd. First of all, 2 of the couples we went with were accidentally put at a different dinner time then us. So, Peter switched a bunch of people around so we could sit together. One night we all were talking about one of the guys we were with really needing something and the next night he brought some of it to the table for us. How sweet is that? Man what a guy!

Well, the weather was only good enough to lay out a few times on the boat, but when we did... it was NICE!! This is me, my sister-in-law Alison, and my good friend Kimmel in this picture. This cruise ship also had a really fun water slide. Tommy figured out how to go really fast down it. Once I did what he told me, it was tons of fun!
So, how do you like me tattoos? Our last cruise we paid 20 bucks each for fake tattoos just because we thought they would be fun, but this year we didn't want to pay for them. So, before we came on the cruise I cut out some cute pictures with my dad's vinyl cutter and we used a can of compressed air and blew black permanent marker through them so they wouldn't bleed. We spent a whole afternoon all giving each other tattoos. It was so fun!! These were the two that I had. They didn't last very long but it sure beats paying $20 for a fake tattoo. Aren't they cute though?

This is Tommy and my brother-in-law, Troy, trying to win big money at the tables!! Tommy actually did pretty good. He won over $100. I am so glad he doesn't REALLY like to gamble though, or we could be in big trouble one day. In fact, the only time he has ever tried to gamble was on our last cruise and when we went to Vegas years ago. I tried in Vegas, but only on the nickel slot machines. Yeah, I didn't do very good! Surprise! Surprise!

This is our last breakfast on the ship. Tommy is so sad to be leaving..... I really was OKAY with it! I was REALLY ready not to feel nautious anymore.


Cruising is AWESOME as long as you don't get sick. It really is our favorite way to vacation. We love to be able to look over board and see nothing but water. It makes me feel like I have no cares in the world. Too bad that feeling only lasts for a week.

The trip home was very long. We had to sit in the airport for 8 hours. We played Yahtzee and Sudoku to help pass the time. It was so great to get home to the kids. I really hate leaving them for that long. We have actually only done that 2 times now. When we went on our cruise last year my mom got to stay with them all, but this year my parents were in Brazil while we were gone so she couldn't again. My mother-in-law was not up to par for most of the trip, but she took them all for the last weekend. The rest of the time, our kids went all seperate ways. All day today Braxton has had a pretty difficult time. Anything and every little thing has made him cry so easy. I guess it is his way of coping. All of the kids did pretty good most of the time we were gone though. I am so grateful to all our friends who kept them. My sister even kept our dog for us while we were gone and she had puppies. That was so sweet! Well, it's GREAT to be home!!!