Carnival Cruise...

So, as most of you know, my dear hubby and I celebrated our 10 year wedding anniversary by going on a 7 day cruise to the Caribbean (April 11th to the 18th). And boy do I have a LOT of pictures to share with you... and probably some stories to go with them. All in all we had a great time!
Here we are boarding the ship in Miami... Hello Sunshine! LOL (it'd been raining back home when we left)

We were on the Carnival Liberty, which had about 3,000 people on board! If we go again we may want to try a smaller cruise ship. A bit crowded at times... But I have to say; the food was great! But we're not spoiled, so we loved it! (probably gained a few pounds to prouve it LOL)



The next day was Easter Sunday. Didn't feel at all like Easter without the kids (who were staying with grandparents & Crystal while we were away). We layed out in the sun moast of the morning on the deck reading, and getting very sunburned! LOL I was a little more careful, so mine wasn't as bad (though my shoulders are peeling now), but Tim got a really bad burn.


Monday we docked at Cozumel, Mexico, which was absolutely gorgeous of course... We went on a shore excursion to Xcaret, which is an Ecological, Archeological park on the mainland Yucatan Paninsula, so we took a ferry and a bus to get there. I think this was my favorite excursion we did. The animals were beautiful, as well as the beach, and we swam in an underground river that goes through caves, about a 45 min swim... cold at first, but since we were so hot and sunburned it felt great!! After that we did a little souveneer shopping and went back to the boat to sleep. LOL

jaguire god...
jaguire
macaws
sea turtle
more sea turtlse
puma
waterfall Xcaret

Tuesday was a "fun day at sea" LOL... Tim and I were too sunburned to brave the deck during the day, so we spent most of the day in our cabin reading, watching shows repeat themselves on the tv, sleeping, yadda yadda yadda. LOL No great pictures taken this day, so I'll share the ones we took of the towel animals that were in our room after the staff had cleaned it when we went to eat... LOL... I didn't think to take a picture of the first 2 which were; a rabbit (easter), and a lobster. Here are the ones that I did take pictures of...




Wednesday we ancored at Grand Cayman Island, which is surrounded by reef, so we had to ancor and take a ferry to the island. Some things I learned about Grand Cayman that I hadn't known before are; it used to be called Tortuga (if you're very familliar with the 3 Pirates of the Caribbean movies this will mean something to you), it's a Brittish colony (so they drive on the left side of the road, which felt scary. LOL), and tax free - no taxes! Wonder how they fix their roads & stuff? The shore excursion we took here was snorcling with the stingrays. This was really fun! I kept my shirt on though, didn't want more sunburn... and most of the pictures we took were under water, with the waterproof camera, and the film is not developed yet. But here we are riding the ferry back from the reef.

there was a pirate ship excursion too, we didn't do it, but took a picture of the pirate ship;

shops on Grand Cayman Isl.
... ... we also filmed quite a bit with our camcorder, but I still haven't figured out how to view those files on my pc yet.

Thursday we went to Ocho Rios, Jamaica, which I have to admit was the biggest let down. We were the most excited about going there, and it was an incredibly beautiful island, as far as we saw. We did the Dunn river falls & dolphin cove excursion, which we really liked. The part that ruined the fun was the people selling suvaneers, who were the most manipulative, pushy, kind of salesperson I've ever come across. They'd load you with whatever suveneers (none of it I would have looked at to buy in the first place), tell you it was a free gift, "because I respect you, mon." And then ask for only a tip... and if your tip is too small they'd accuse you of insulting them. We got away with only a few unwanted things, that I ended up just giving to my kids. But the whole ordeal stressed out Tim so much that we barely did any shopping before he wanted to just go back to the boat. It was a bummer. But we got some great pictures of the waterfall, and I have to give two thumbs up to the tour guides who took us up the falls and even took the pictures for us. They were great! The dolphins were cute too, and did cool tricks. Hard to get pictures of that, so most of them are with the camcorder... once I get that figured out I'll share those as well.






Can you tell the water was cold?? hahahahah! Unfortunately Tim slipped on a rock right near the end of this and scraped his shoulder, which as you can see was already very sunburned. Poor guy just got beat up on this trip!




Friday was another "fun day at sea", and my burn was more a tan by then, so I wanted to go on the deck. But Tim was still really burned, so we hung out in our cabbin most of the day again. I read and fell asleep. LOL We ventured out on the deck at sunset though which was beautiful! So we did take some pictures of that...






So that was my trip!! The book I read was called "Confesssions of an Ugly Stepsister", by Gregory Maguire. Just had to say that I really liked it. LOL The same author wrote 'Wicked', which was made into a broadway play. I've read that and it's sequil, 'Son of a Witch' LOL and so far I liked this one the best. But hey, I like quarky takes on classic stories. (as long as they're not too vulgar... Wicked was too much for my taste...)

BIG HUGS!