Our Mexican Cruise Adventure!

Dearest Castillo Children,

So we left you. For like a WHOLE week. Don't worry, your Grandma came to stay with you while we were away. I asked Grandma to write up her week with you so you know what happened while your dad and I were gone. But here's what we did on our cruise! (without you...)

Early Saturday morning, after Grandma arrived the night before, Todd and I left to drive to San Diego. Now, I wasn't sure exactly when we were suppose to board the ship. I thought it was by 3 and Todd was sure it was by 11. Turns out that 11 was when they started boarding and it went all the way to 4. We really didn't have to leave that early but it was nice to get on the ship as soon as possible. We were able to unpack and have lunch after our morning drive. It's about 5 or 6 hours to San Diego from Tucson and the drive went really quickly. We listened to musicals (thank goodness Todd's dad was a theatre teacher, or else my life would be less musical filled!) I love that we listened and sang along to Phantom of the Opera and on another trip he sang every word of Into the Woods with me. That's how I knew I had a keeper on my hands.

After we parked at this lot where our car was to sleep for the following 8 days, we got into a shuttle with another couple that was going on our same cruise. They were so nice and we had a blast chatting with them. They lived in Peoria, my hometown! Their kids go to Centennial, my old school! He was an engineer at Honeywell, where I WISH Todd could get a job! I just miss Peoria, it's such a nice town to grow up in. They told us about some cruising tips (like the brought their own wine, water and soda with them. A whole suitcase filled up. So funny!) We kept running into them on the ship and on excursions. We told them we didn't know what we were doing so we would following them around for a while. I LOVED the people we met on the cruise. Such nice people. I couple of them I wish we could have been closer friends with!

After we were settled on the ship (I almost wrote boat, but they get offended at boat...so it's a ship) We watched San Diego disappear as we pulled away. It was so beautiful. The sun was setting and we were on this large floating island. Unfortunately, we had to return to San Diego after about an hour out since some people fell down some stair and had to be returned for medical reasons. HOW SAD! Only get to be on your cruise for an hour. Todd and I walked around the decks and I learned something interesting about my husband, he doesn't like standing near railing. He says it's because he's tall and the railing doesn't go up high enough. He is still heavy enough on top to be pushed over.

 

That's as close as I could get him to go.

 

 

I was so fascinated by the sea being so endless.

 

 

Had to have my Titanic moment.

 

 

That first night Todd wasn't feeling well. The ship was rocking side to side and it was a little unsettling. We went to dinner in the main dinning room (which was AH-MAZING!) and sat with the neatest people. We talked about gardening and Alaska (one lady was a stewardess for an Alaskan airline). It was a pleasant evening until Todd said he needed to go the restroom since he felt off. Todd NEVER gets sick so I was worried. I sat and ate my dessert until all the other dinner guest left. The nice mother and daughter couple stayed for a long time with me since I was sure Todd would come back. After quite some time I figured he must have gone to the room since he was feeling so bad, because he would never leave me without good reason. Sure enough, there he was laying on the little couch asleep. Poor thing felt ill. He discovered that he could only eat about half as much as he could because once he hit a certain limit in his stomach he felt sick.

 

 

The next day was at sea so we spent the day exploring the ship. We spent hours reading by the pool and I enjoyed the hot tubs. Todd, however, found the ping-pong tables. He found a couple of (please excuse the stereotype) Asian guys to play with him. He spent a good hour or two there. And that continued through most of the cruise. In the mornings he would go find his friends by the ping-pong table and play them. He said he won about maybe a third of the time but he would come back so sweaty! It was so funny. I'm glad he found something he enjoyed while I laid by the pool. We also went to this Dancing with the Stars dance class. It was the waltz and I am bad at dancing gracefully. Todd was picked along with 3 other people to dance it on stage with the professional cruise dancers. Sadly, he came in 4th and got a lot of sympathy from people on the cruise ship. The next day people kept recognizing him on the ship and letting him know they liked him best. Apparently his fan base is old women.

 



 

Got to love the towel animals and chocolates every night!

 

 

We did a lot of trivia, where Todd was awesome and I was horrible. I don't have the freakish memory that my husband does. I failed him on one area of knowledge where I should have known! The question was, "Who wrote the lyrics to West Side Story". I was blanking. It was Sondheim. WHAT!? I totally thought that but I kept thinking that was before his time. Nope, one of the first shows. Oh, well. :)

 

The following day, still at sea, we tried our had at another dance class. This time it was the jive and since we knew how it worked this time, we actually worked at learning the movement. We thought we would be just dancing and not doing a set routine. Nope. So we were actually paying attention. I'm better at faster songs and Todd and I rocked that dance! Rock it! We were both asked to dance with the professionals. I got this amazing dancer that we saw the night before. He was leaping through the air and was great. I can't imagine doing that kind of dancing on a rocking ship! The four couple performed and the top two would move on to the finals show at the end of the cruise and compete for a free cruise! Sounds awesome, right? Except it's like a chance of winning in like, a hundred. ANYWAY, guess who got second? Todd! But guess who got first, that's right! ME! I wish we had a picture of us dancing.

 

The following day we arrived at Puerto Vallarta. We stepped off the ship and the humidity hit me! We ran across the street to the Wal-Mart. Yes, the first thing we did was go to Wal-Mart on our cruise. We're awesome, I know. Todd had a burn on his arm that needed some medicine, we were low on sun block and I wanted to see what crazy stuff they had at their Wal-Mart. The best find were these Tang packets with flavors like hibiscus and their rice drink. Got a bunch of those! We also got some bottle water since they charge for everything on the cruise. Newbie mistake not to bring our own water bottles. We know now. I was impressed with Todd since he can speak some Spanish and was able to ask questions in the store. He struggled with a few words but did great. I also found this candy bar called Milch that I loved!

 

 

I got both the white chocolate and the regular. It was chocolate covering a hazelnut cream. Amazing.

 

 

We went back to the ship to drop off all of our stuff and then headed out to have an adventure. We didn't book any excursion through the cruise line. We were told by plenty of people to just ask the local people to do something. We didn't have anything planned to do in Puerto Vallarta, so we figured we would just site see a little.

 

 

 

 

 

We started walking and met this guy named Carlos. He drove a taxi and told us he could take us to the shops or do a little tour for the city for a few hours. We decided it was a good deal to have a tour guide for awhile, plus it was about $150 cheaper to do it this way than through the cruise line. He drove us all around and showed us the highlights of the city.

 

 

Iguanas just hang out in trees. (can you see him?)

 

This was a beach of the dead and there was a memorial for someone who died.

 

At the top of the city.

 

I loved all the weird stairs they had everywhere. It went from beach so suddenly that they had to put stairs to get up the mountains.

 

A multi-million dollar home with 7 waterfalls on it.

 

The view from the million dollar homes. (there was this weird bird that flew around with little toes forked toes on it. Looked like a dinosaur or something)

 

Me in front of Steven Spielberg's house in Puerto Vallarta.

 

The three islands in the bay.

 

We drove to where Night of the Iguana was filmed.

 

There are a bunch of people with iguanas that will put them on you and then expect you to pay them money for doing that. But I sorta wanted a picture with it.

 

I love these pictures and it was worth the couple of bucks I gave the guy.

 

Carlos told us about a zoo nearby that baby tigers you could go pet. I asked him how much it was and he didn't know so we stopped by. Carlos talked with the man but he wanted $50 dollars for admission to the whole zoo and feed for the baby tigers. Carlos tried to get him to just let me see the tigers but the guy wouldn't do it. I was sad. I offered $30, since petting a baby large cat has been a dream of mine since I was a little girl. The guy wouldn't budge so we left. I was a little bummed about it actually. We had Carlos drop us off a this gorgeous church in the center of Puerto Vallarta.

 

 

Carlos and me in front of the church.

 

Inside the church.

 

I loved that you had to pay to light a candle, and they were electric candles.

 

More of the inside.

 

The outer courtyard. We met a really cute couple our age from Canada that won a resort trip to Puerto Vallarta on the radio. I wish they were on our cruise, they were super nice.

 

The church on the outside. I loved the crown on top.

 

 

I liked it so much I wanted to wear it myself.

 

After that we wandered and did some shopping in the market area. We found this candy store that I just loved because the owner just made me laugh. He was an older gentleman that spoke English fairly well. He asked if we had kids and I said two girls. He told Todd he needed to get some type of liquor with hazelnuts in that so we could get a boy. He told me about how in Mexico there is a tradition of waking up somebody on their birthday with hot chocolate and a piece of cake. He was trying to get me to buy some hot chocolate at the time, but I loved the idea. Maybe we'll do hot chocolate and donut though. I ended up buying some guava candies that were pretty good. I just liked his store a lot.

 

 

 

Todd checking out the candy.

 

 

Walking the streets of Puerto Vallarta

 

Todd saw a sign he wanted a picture standing near.

 

Now you can read it! He said walking the streets reminded him of Brasil and made him a little homesick.

 

 

There was this little bridge made out of wood that I had to try out. It freaked me out! I'm such a spoiled American! I thought it was going to fall and kill us all.

 

 

Once again, my weird love of stairs.

 

 

Seeing this dude walking around just made me laugh.

 

 

The beach had this great walkway with statues along it. I liked this one since it scream Mexico!

 

 

Todd with the statue of the city founder, Vallarta

 

 

I liked the random architecture in the city.

 

 

Random - a Woolworth!

 

A smaller but still lovely church

 

Todd liked the stained glass

 

The courtyard of the church.

 

Then came the worse decision I made on our vacation. We decided to head back to the ship and walk so we could see more of the city. We had a late breakfast and we figured we could eat on the ship. Now, I didn't realize how FAR the ship was from the center of the city. I don't know, but it was hot and far. I enjoyed by walk at first but then I soon regretted not getting a bus or cab to drive us back. But we saw some weird and crazy things on our walk back.

 

 

Like this bus

 

We were excited to see phone booths.

 

Outside of a night club

 

Don't ask me why they had these random statues.

 

 

We had forgotten to ask what time the ship was leaving port so we didn't know what time we needed to be back. It was about 4 and I was getting worried. What if they already left? We were walking, I was getting too much sun and the ship might leave us!If I could change anything about our trip it would have been that afternoon. I kept thinking the ship must be close but it was much further away. I was exhausted and feeling sick by the time we got back on the ship. I took a nap and then went to their Mexican BBQ fiesta on the boat. The pork was awesome. We made some friends with an older couple named Joel and Renee who were on the cruise with their sons and their wives. They offered us tickets to a beach party but I wasn't feeling good enough to go. They were super sweet people. And rich from the sound of it. They had a boat they would sail down to Cabo once a year.

 

 

Well, kiddos. I'm tired. I only got through 3 days of the trip and I need to take a break from typing. I might have to do this vacation thing in two parts. Until the next half!

 

 

Much Love,

 

 

Your Mother