30th Anniversary Cruise

30th Anniversary Cruise

Thirty one years ago I met the love of my life, my soulmate, my best friend, my one and only. A year later during a very trying time in my life, we got married. Now here we are, retired enjoying life and each other and thought it was time to celebrate our thirty years of our lives together. We decided to go on another cruise and explore more of our world together. It was a twelve day cruise and this time we went on Celebrity Cruises. This was the first time we have cruised on a line other than Holland America. It was an older ship, the Constellation and it showed a bit. We hear that it will undergo a total upgrade next year. It was still a very nice ship and we enjoyed it. Now I could write a novella about our trip, but I plan on keeping this post as concise as possible. It will just highlight our stops and adventures. The pictures in our photo album will show the true visual log of the trip and can be viewed here!

THE ADVENTURE LIST

Key West – Our first port of call before leaving the US. We had never been here before and it reminded me of my days in Southern California. There were lots of shops, restaurants, bars, and other cool things to do. We walked the main drag of Duvall Street and had drinks near the water at Sunset Pier! It was good that we had a pleasant first stop to make up for the trip from Washington to Florida. We took a red eye flight that arrived on the same day as the cruise departure. We will NEVER make that mistake again. For the both of us it is almost impossible to sleep on a plane. Luckily, the plane was only half full which is a surprise these days. I wandered off to an empty row and tried to catch a few winks. After rolling around and having my face catch the faint aroma of 10,000 assholes, I eventually gave up. As for Debbie, she got not a wink and was an absolute grump when we deboarded. We had a very long wait in the airport in Tampa which did not help matters. I kept my distance. Needless to say, our first night on the ship was a quiet one.

Cartagena, Columbia – We had two days here and we took full advantage of it. Cartagena is a very busy city with lots of traffic. It seemed very chaotic and very large. We signed up for two separate excursions here. One was a sightseeing/food tasting tour. It was quite fun. We saw many interesting locations and tasted different foods and also some very nice Columbian coffee. One of our stops was at the Palace of the Inquisition. It was interesting and spooky at the same time. Very dark time in human history. Leave it to us to always get into some type of trouble. We were told we had roughly half an hour there so we weren’t in any hurry. We had wandered around the palace(museum now) and were on the second floor and happened to be looking out into the square below and saw our tour group all together and leaving!! Oh shit, we hurried down the stairs and headed for the exit just as the museum people were closing and locking the doors!! What a scary thought to be locked in this house of horrors and also to be left behind in Columbia! There was no way we had been there for half an hour! At any rate, we never seem to learn! Another fascinating location was the Castillo San Felipe de Barajas. We briefly saw it on our first excursion, but on day two we did a bus “hop on, hop off” excursion so we could just do things on our own and we went back. This time we went on it and climbed to the top, took in views of the city, then went into the many tunnels located within. I’m glad we returned to explore. We went around the old walled city and explored as much as we could before we had to return to the ship! It was fun and amazing!

Panama – On to the country of Panama. Debbie was very excited about visiting here. We had an excursion planned to go on a boat into the canal and through the locks, but luck would have it that it was cancelled. Nothing the cruise people could do about it. We saw others booked on it doing nothing but incessant complaining. It was all about weather, fog, and cargo ship scheduling. We did the next best thing by booking at least a tour of the canal, locks, and then Panama City. The canal was impressive but it would have been much more fun had we gotten to go through it. There were no ships traversing while we were there, so it was kind of boring. I was much more impressed with Panama City and had no idea it was so big! The skyline is huge and modern. It was much cleaner than Cartagena and traffic flowed much better. It was very busy for a Sunday that we were there. We walked around and saw squares, churches, places of interest, and shops. It was truly amazing!

Costa Rica – Another new country and adventure! I think we had the most fun so far! First we took a river boat tour on the Tortuguero Canal. Our tour guide was very knowledgeable, funny, and really enjoyed what he did. We went cruising up the canal and saw a variety of wildlife including howler monkeys, sloths, iguanas, caymans, herons, among others. It was a very pretty area and so green, also very hot and humid! We then drove through the countryside and stopped by a small banana plantation and learned a bit of growing, caring, and harvesting bananas and pineapples. Costa Rica is rich in biodiversity and also produces many different fruits, vegetables, and coffee. The country also has a very aggressive green policy in place. They are also extremely environmentally friendly…..mostly….as we soon learned. We finally ended up at the Sloth Sanctuary. I had heard about this place many years from a podcast I used to listen to called The Dawn and Drew Show. They were one of the first podcasters and lived in Costa Rica for awhile. Dawn actually volunteered here and they would talk about it on their podcast. Now, here we are actually visiting the place. Most of the sloths here are rescues. They have either been abandoned by their mothers, lost a limb, or blind. Frequently, sloths will mistake a power line for a branch and grab it. They get electrocuted, and if they are lucky enough to live through it, they usually have to have one or more limbs amputated. Many sloths are showing up blind and there are theories, unproven, that pesticides that are sprayed on banana and pineapple plantations are the cause of it. But the plantations and owners of them are protected by the Costa Rican government, so will not listen to concerns. These poor things will live out their lives at the sanctuary and will be taken very good care of. You can see a video we took of one of them just going about their day by clicking here!

Cozumel, Mexico – Cozumel was our final stop on the cruise. We have been to other parts of Mexico, but this was our first time here. We didn’t really see much, but it seemed way more commercial than what we had seen in all previous stops. We had one destination planned and were very excited about it. We went to the Dolphinaris to play with the dolphins! Debbie was like a little girl she was so excited!! It was an absolute blast. We were fed, had drinks, and then got to play, get kissed, hold fins, and get a belly ride with them. They are so cute and playful and seem to be treated very good. They each have their own personalities and some times get in trouble or act up when they don’t get their way! That ended our ports of call for the cruise and it was very exciting.

Sea Days – I will end the post with just some final thoughts of our voyage. We had numerous sea days where we just had fun on the ship. We hit the gym a few times, had drinks by the pools, enjoyed some of the entertainment, and ate most dinners in our favorite restaurant onboard called Blu! But the best thing to happen on this cruise was meeting an enchanting couple from England, Bob and Jane! We had so much fun with them! Most of the time you’ll meet some very cool people on a cruise and bump into them from time to time. We actually hung out together almost every evening and usually ended up in the Martini Bar. They are so much fun and we are going to try and maintain a friendship with them from now on! As of me writing this, Debbie is off to England with her sisters to visit family. She will be planning on getting together with them for dinner while she is there. hopefully, we will be cruising together again in the future. That’s it for now…. Bon Voyage!

VISIT THE PICTURE ALBUM HERE!

CHECK OUT OUR NEW RUMBLE VIDEO PAGE HERE!

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Hawaii 2015

Yes it has been awhile since or last post and it has also been awhile since our last vacation, so here goes! Back to Hawaii we went, our second visit and my second birthday spent there! Our last time in Hawaii saw us in Maui, this time we tried the island of Kauai! It is gorgeous and of course we loved it! The first thing I did was bitch about the humidity…..but that is just me! We drove up to Princeville where our condo was located. We stayed at the Makai Beach Club Cottages which was part of our timeshare network! They were a bit older, but all remodeled and very accommodating and the staff was excellent!

Our first couple of days were spent getting food and supplies, figuring out what activities we wanted to schedule, and getting our bearings and exploring the island. We decided to drive all the way around to the island to the west side which we did and went all the way to the end of the road to Polihale State Park! Absolutely beautiful and the longest stretch of beach in Hawaii. Go there if you visit Kauai, but be prepared for a long drive down a very rough old dirt road. On the way back, we just looked and stopped at anything that interested us. We drove down into Poipu and wow!!!! That is a very cool place and is on the mark for a future stay! We strolled the beach and found our way to the beach bar at the Marriot Waiochai Beach Club. We could only stay for a couple of drinks as we had to head back and get our activity schedule, but we planned to return later in the week for a hang out on the beach there! The next day we went and got some snorkeling gear and hit the beaches of the north coast, Anini Beach and Hideaway Beach. It was fun, but the tide was low so the water was shallow and you had to be very careful not getting yourself banged up against the reefs! We then dropped back into the town of Hanalei Bay and hit one of the local restaurants for dinner. It was a great vacation so far!

Our first excursion was sooooo much fun! We did the kayaking trip up the Wailua River. We kayaked for awhile then hiked into the back country and ended up at a magical place called the Secret Falls! You can only get there by boat and hike, there are no roads! It was beautiful. I have videos on our YouTube Page, go check it out! We ate lunch in front of the falls then hiked back out and kayaked back down the river! Very fun trip! Another cool and very fun trip we did was a catamaran ride on the Na Pali coast. We saw some beautiful sights and went snorkeling at the Lehua rock, part of an extinct volcano cone. After, they served us lunch and we had an “exciting ride” back to the dock. We headed back to Poipu for another look around and came across The Spouting Horn, a blowhole that shoots water out of the rocky coast……beautiful! Our last organized excursion was a tubing trip through the old Lihue Plantation! This is an old sugar plantation that was in use in the 1800’s. You don a lighted helmet and tube through irrigation canals and tunnels that were hand dug by plantation workers in 1870. It was finished off by a picnic lunch next to a river in a serene park. Again, money well spent on another fun excursion.

Aside from excursions, we did A LOT of driving around the island. We saw the Kilauea Lighthouse, drove to the end of the north road at Ke’ e Beach, hit some of the many various roadside farmers markets, ate at some of the local eateries: Tiki Iniki, Kalypso, Bouchons, Olympic Cafe, caught some rays at a couple of different beaches, and spent the last day (my birthday, second one in Hawaii) sipping cocktails and eating a wonderful assortment of pupus at the St Regis Resort. What a gorgeous place. If we can ever afford it, we are staying there! We watched our last sunset as a duo played genuine Hawaiian music in the lounge, a very emotional point! So we have now been to Kauai and Maui and we have decided we like Kauai much better. It is just so beautiful there!

And so our wonderful Hawaiian vacation came to end and once again having to face reality, we loaded up and headed off to the airport! On the way, disaster almost struck. A construction truck made an abrupt stop on the road ahead of us. The car in front saw it, we saw it, but the guy behind me didn’t! There we are, two small cars watching what is going on in front of us and here comes an inattentive tard in a Toyota Tundra that can see over both of us barreling toward our rear end. I thought in the split seconds I had, that he was going to blast us and ruin the end of paradise. Last day, on the way to the airport, in a rental car, in a no fault state, and possibly injured, just great!!!! Luckily he came to a screeching halt just inches away from our bumper. I thought briefly about getting out and taking the phone he was probably looking at and shoving it up his rectum, but figured against it after swallowing my stomach that was in the back of my throat and regaining my composure! The best thing about coming back home, was seeing the excitement of our boy Cordell upon seeing us come through the door. Thanks for reading our post and pictures coming soon……Mahalo!