We hope you enjoy the pictures and the narrative! This page was prepared for our friends who want to see our pictures, as well as anyone who might be taking their first cruise in the future and wants to know what our experience was like.
We needed to board the cruise ship around noon, which meant that we would either have to fly-in to Miami on a red-eye or get there the previous day. We opted to arrive the day before the cruise and check-out Miami, since we'd never been there before. We stayed overnight in the South Beach area, which is known for its art deco building style.
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The last picture is what someone told us was Star Island, home to celebrities such as Shaquile O'Neil, Gloria Estefan, and formerly Madonna and Sylvester Stallone.
Pete enjoyed the outdoor pools on the Lido deck immensely, and also spent a lot of time reading on the lounge chairs.
 | Every night when we would return from dinner, our room was magically cleaned, re-stocked with fresh towels, the bed made, and there was a towel animal to greet us. |
| Another shot of our state room -- this is me crashing-out after returning from one of our excursions. |  |
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These photos show views of the grand three-story lobby, including the bar and the glass elevators. |
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Note: Most of our "people pictures" were taken on our other camera, which takes better indoor and evening photos. Unfortunately, the memory chip seems to have gotten damaged. Hopefully we can post some of those photos soon. They were some of the best ones!
Grand Cayman was the one destination where we chose to book an excursion independently (not through Carnival Cruise Lines). Not only did this save us some money, but it also turned out to be better because it was a smaller group of tourists (about 30 people, I estimate). About a month before leaving home, we found a company online called Captain Marvin's (www.stingraycitytrips.com). They were wonderful. This was by far my favorite excursion. My snorkel mask fit extremely well and was very comfortable, and I saw the most fish I've ever seen in my life, not to mention lots of neat coral and other plants. The water was delightfully warm! Our boat (the "Miss Jackie") took us to two different coral reefs to snorkel, and then to Stingray City, which is a shallow area where the stingrays have become tame becasue they love having the tourists feed them. They are so tame, they will let you hold them and pet them. They will swim right up to you and brush your leg. They have super-soft bodies that feel like suede against your skin. The staff at Captian Marvin's was great at making sure everyone got a chance to pet the stingrays and get their picture taken with one. It was a wonderful day!
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The island of Roatan is part of the country of Honduras. The native people are mostly black and Hispanic; the main language is Spanish, but many people speak English also. The bus and boat tour we took here (called "Discover Roatan") gave us a glimpse of how the local people live, and unfortunately, they seem pretty poor. |
The island, however, is lush and green and abundant. The hillsides are dense with banana trees, pineapple bushes, and other flora.
Some of the other things we got to see on our tour were native dancers and two shipwrecks (only one is pictured here). These boats got stuck in the shallow coral reefs in the second half of the 20th century, were abandoned, looted by the natives, and left where they were so as not to disturb the coral.
We started our Belize experience with a snorkeling excursion to Goff's Caye. We booked this excursion through Carnival. The good parts about the trip were that the water was wonderfully warm and clear, we did see fish, and our guide found a turtle that we got to hold and examine up-close (he was sooo cute!). I don't like to complain, but for the purpose of letting future excursion-booking people know why I would not recommend this particular excursion, here is what I didn't like about it. 1) It was crowded (approximately 100 people(?)), 2) the trip guides requested the whole large group stay together while snorkeling, ostensibly so that no one would get lost and so that the guides could point-out the rare fish and other marine life, however, only the first 20 or so people got to see the cool stuff (it was gone by the time the remaining 80 people could get there), 3) it was so crowded in the water, you always had to dodge fellow snorkelers' kicking feet and make a lot of effort to avoid bumping into or accidentally kicking other people, and finally, 4) the snorkeling mask they provided for me was seriously leaky. (Once in the water, I had to stop swimming and empty it every two minutes, which was very annoying, and there was no way to get a different one once we had swum away from the ship.)
Our snorkeling excursion was over by lunchtime, so we changed from our bathing suits to regular clothes and went to explore Belize City in the afternoon. The touristy restaurants and souvenier shops at the port were fun to look at, but when we ventured beyond the "safe area", things got a little scary. We were continually approached by people trying to sell us taxi rides and trinkets, recommend restaurants and tours, etc. We couldn't get away from being swarmed/hustled and felt like we were going to be mugged, so we returned to the touristy area where the guards were stationed. Pete had a Belizian beer (verdict: okay, but nothing exotic). I had a fruity rum-based drink that I swear didn't have much rum. We returned to the ship after a while, not too enchanted with Belize City, but at least we were not mugged!
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Our final destination was Costa Maya, Mexico, where we did an excursion to the Kohunlich Mayan Ruins. The field-trip started with a two-hour bus ride, during which we saw how the local people live. Sadly, most all yards and medians are sprinkled with trash, roofs are thatched or rusted tin, and often windows are doors are mising. It made us appreciate where we live. |
| Our bus, however, was pretty luxurious (clean, nicely upholstered, and air-conditioned). Our guide, Luis Tellez, was excellent, entertaining us on the bus ride with telling us about the local plants and we were seeing out the windows, playing indigenous musical instruments and passing them around for us to see, and telling us about some of the local foods grown here and how they're used. He passed these around as well (coconuts, cocoa beans, chewing gum base, etc.) Once we arrived at the ruins, Luis was not only knowledgeable about the building ruins and the ancient people, he also pointed out different birds and trees (and even a frog) and told us their names and some of their behaviors. If you book this excursion and get Luis as your guide, he's the best! | |
      I had worried that you had to be super-fit to do this 7-hour hiking excursion, but it turns out that four hours were taken-up by the bus ride. Some tourists even did this "hike" in flip-flops and mini-skirts and did just fine.      The Mayan ruins were very impressive. I'm glad we went!
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p.s. Anyone with a few hours to kill wanting to see ALL of the pics can click here.