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| So excited it is February Break! Miami hotel with the staff from ..... |
We traveled with Carnival cruise lines on the Conquest. This
is a fresher ship complete with an outdoor theater aka “Dive in Movies”, three
pools, a reasonably entertaining waterslide and lots of chairs to relax on the
deck in. While this is not one of the super ships like the Oasis, I think it
was a great way for the kids to experience cruising.
We had a nice outside room with a large picture window, to see the ocean, check what the weather was like and see the ports as we sailed in. For our sleeping arrangements we had a queen sized bed for the adults, a couch that converted into single bed and a Pullman bed that hung above that for the final single bed. Things seem to have gotten a bit more spacious since DaddyJ and I were last on a cruise ship. Everyone enjoyed the room when we were briefly in it while awake. With so many great amenities, who needs to spend much time in the room?
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| Our cabin aka home for seven days |
It is always enjoyable to sail out of Miami and see South
Beach, the massive condo developments, enormous yachts, canals and the start of
the bridges to the keys.
Our first full day of the cruise was spent at sea. We enjoyed brunch in the dining room, swimming/sliding/sunning on the deck, eating Guy Fiere’s burgers, watching the Olympics and a movie at the “dive in” theater. A great day was had by all and we were off to a great start.
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| Burgers and the Drink of the Day |
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| Where we watched the Olympics (Biladeau won GOLD BABY) |
Day two saw us arrive in the port of Cozumel, Mexico. We
disembarked the boat and wandered around the pier. While checking out the shops,
we came across a Fish Spa just as we did at Christmas. GuideJ managed to talk
DaddyJ into joining in on the fun, while ScoutJ sat at the neighbouring cafe
enjoying a Coke Lite and I had a massage while listening to the sea. I have
always wanted to get one of those seaside massages however I am usually far too
cheap to fork out for the exorbitant prices. Conveniently, since we were not at
a resort, I was able to get a 20 minute massage for a very inexpensive $20
Canadian! The combination of listening to the waves and getting a massage had me
nearly asleep on that table. What a wonderful experience and money well spent.
After our little indulgences, we jumped into a cab and headed downtown for some
further exploring. While we did not do anything to exotic, we enjoyed our time
in Cozumel.
Day three saw us sail into Belize City, Belize. Here we
embarked upon the River and Mayan ruins tour. Our tour was hosted by a
fantastic ambassador to his country, Ken Thompson. He guided us up the river
(ha ha ha)to see iguanas big and small during mating season, howler monkeys,
one of the largest birds in the new world a Jabiru Stork, crocodiles, dolphins,
turtles, snakes and manatee habitats. The river tour was a jackpot of wildlife
as it was a warm day. The river tour wrapped up at a little resort where we had
a traditional Belizean lunch of rice, chicken and beans with local beer/sprite!
The chicken was fantastically juicy fresh off the grill.
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| coins of Belize |
After lunch we headed off to the Mayan ruins, Altun Ha, the
site of a very impressive Mesoamerican pyramid. This site has three large structures, spread
out over a courtyard taking up almost five square kilometers. Interestingly,
the largest find at this site was a nearly ten pound jade sculpture of the head
of the sun god, found in the head priest’s tomb by a Royal Ontario Museum archeologist!
I really enjoyed that this temple gives you a clear picture of the organisation of the Mayan peoples’ culture, scope of how large their projects were and that the whole site has endured incredible well. GuideJ and ScoutJ seemed greatly interested in the history of the people who had lived there, the carvings and seemed to find the thought of building with such detail and size with rudimentary tools impressive!
Day three saw us in Mahogany Bay, Rotan. Here we enjoyed a
lovely day of relaxing on the beach, floating in the ocean and snorkeling off
shore at the local beach resort. It was a very choppy day on the ocean, which
had the water quite stirred up. Accordingly, the snorkeling did not lead to us
seeing much from the section from the reef off shore, nor for the people on the
bigger excursions. While the beach resort was wonderful, the real highlight for
the kids seemed to be the repurposed ski chair lift which got you to and from
the beach. In fact, they enjoyed it so much that they rode the chair lift all
the way around again on the return trip! I loved the young man working the
departing chairs, as we came upon the disembarking spot: I asked if he would
mind if the kids rode it around again, which he said would be no problem. I
started giving the kids a few behaviour reminders, be safe, don’t drop your
shoes, DO NOT GET OFF at the beach end etc. Then hilariously this young man of
about 20 calls out to them “and NO FIGHTING”, turns looks at me and says “my
mother would have added that!” which gave both DaddyJ and I a good chuckle.
Day four saw us sailing to Grand Cayman. My heart sings when I see this island! It feels like home to all of us after all of these years of visiting. Needless to say we were thrilled to be heading “home” for a visit on our trip, on Valentine’s Day no less. It would turn out that the choppy seas in Rotan the day before were actually a preview of the crazy seas we would have in Cayman. In all of our trips to this island, we have never seen the sea look like this. The waves were so turbulent, that all of the water excursions were cancelled and we did not come into downtown but rather took jetty’s in from the East End of the island. With all of the delays getting people into shore, we missed our tour of the Turtle Farm which would in fact turn out to be a blessing in disguise.
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| Turtle Farm 2014 |
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| Friends from the Ship |
Once we knew that we were going to be on our own for our
time on the island, we quickly located a taxi. I explained to the rather
skeptical driver that we were quite familiar with the island and wanted to
accomplish four things: the Turtle Farm, Chicken Chicken for lunch, drop some
gifts off a the Marriott where we usually stay and then head into downtown. As
is the way in Cayman, with the taxis’ being vans one gathers a few people
heading in the same direction and then gets going. We had a taxi full of people
who were not familiar with Cayman Islands and their strong banking community
(no, not sure either how you don’t know that one thing about the island, do
they think the Swiss only make chocolates?) and the highlight was listening to
a couple try and determine if they had Visa or bank machines on the island! So
as these travelers had these conversations loudly in the van while getting to
their beach spots, we started to look better and better to our driver. Once we
were the only remaining passengers, he asked us again about our plans. It was
so cute to see his eyes light up as we talked about our favourite places and
how much we love the island. Very kindly then, he got us into the Turtle Farm
as his guests at a highly discounted rate, returned for us in an hour and took
us to our next destination, Chicken Chicken for lunch. Despites my best
efforts, we could not buy him lunch as thanks for getting us into the farm as
his wife has him on a special diet! Following lunch we stopped by the Marriott
to see Mr. Omar and Mr. Neely with some maple candies. It was nice to catch up
with them and hear about how the year had gone and get a peek at the
renovations getting underway at one of our favourite hotels. These are the most
genuine and wonderful people. Mr. Omar’s face positively lit up at the sight of
the four of us and momentarily froze in shock as he was surprised that we were
there! You know you visit and amazing place when you just know you have to drop
off some gifts for the staff while on your cruise. For our final stop, we
walked around down town Cayman where ScoutJ found himself bright orange G-Shock
watch that large enough to be used wrist guard!
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| Lunch at Chicken Chicken |
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| Vising Romeo at the Marriott 7Mi Beach Resort |
A very very happy Valentine’s Day was spent on Grand Cayman
island, it was bitter sweet to sail away that night.
Our last full day on the ship was spent at sea. We made
maximum use of all of the amenities on deck, gorged ourselves on the plentiful
food offerings and generally relaxed while recounting all of the fun our trip
had been. I would say that without a doubt the cruise was huge hit with the
kids! A great time was had by all and we would definitely do it again.
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| pardon me, can you please pass me my pawn? |
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| Epic towel creations |
The next day we sailed into the port of Miami bright and
early in the morning. After disembarking the boat we headed off to the airport.
We made such good time that we were left with four hours until our flights.
Being as we had checked our suitcases and only had our carry-on bags, we decided
to jump on the Metro and do I little bit of exploring. Our original plan had
been to head to Coconut Grove, however by chance we happened to confirm with a
security officer at the train station that we were walking in the correct
direction when he looked at us incredulously and asked if we were heading to
the festival? We took that as our cue to walk around and see the other sites.
Our journey would take us to see the planetarium and to enjoy a snack at a
nearby Dunken Donuts. It was far more exciting than sitting around the airport.
It is exciting to realize that ScoutJ and GuideJ have grown
into the kinds of travelers who are happy to jump on the local metro and do a
bit of exploring rather than wait around the airport! Imagine that I had been worried
that it was going to be tough to get them off the ship to explore place like
Belize and Rotan with all of those amenities. It turns out that they to love to
travel and will explore when given the opportunity! Especially if there are
strange men selling perfume on the train....
