|
Lodging: Better than I expected on a ship from 1995. We previously cruised on a brand new Carnival Pride in 2001, so had high standards to begin with.
Ports: My niece got married on Grand Cayman so that was all pre-arranged. Beautiful water and fabulous snorkeling. Did stingray alley. Don't miss this at least once in your life. Weren't able to stop at Costa Maya due to 10 foot waves over the dock. Spent the day at sea. Cozumel. Excellent spot for snorkeling pretty well anywhere. We'd been there two times previously, so knew what we were in for. Went to Chaddrau (Cozumel for Wal-Mart) Good deals on Kahlua and Tequila there! We rented a motor scooter and rode south, stopped to snorkel frequently. The storm last fall cleared out quite a bit of jungle that had previously separated the shoreline from the road. Now there is beach where there wasn't before.
Belize: Love Belize. This is a good place to do an excursion if you are only picking one. I have heard nothing but good reviews about the cave tubing (although we are fish and opted to snorkel). We reserved through Tsunami Adventures (I would recommend them). They set us up with tickets on a 12-seater Cessna Caravan airplane from Island Air to fly over to Caye Caulker. From there, we took a boat with two guides for a morning snorkel tour. We went to shark/stingray alley, and two other places I sadly can't remember the name of. The coral was fabulous. We went right out to the reef which you can't do from the shore - definitely need a charter boat. Apparently the day-long trip gets you farther and you see larger and more varied fish, but we didn't have the time. The plane ride was neat. 12 minutes. Would do that again in a minute. Cost was also reasonable, I thought.
Cruise: We even had lobster! The pools were salt water with a little chlorine. There were tons of kids, but the children's program must have kept them occupied, because they certainly didn't bother us at all. My husband did the rock climbing wall and enjoyed that. The two guys with the music (steel drum and guitar) were excellent by the main pool. Lots of chairs, lots of sun, lots of shade. Never a shortage of stuff to do.
We didn't make it up for the late night activities because we wore ourselves out during the day - even though we tried to nap. My 76-year-old mother, however, did EVERYTHING. She was up at the disco, did the arthritis seminar, line dancing, was up later than us every night and up before us every morning. Something for everyone.
Wait staff was fabulous. We had Anka and Daniel in our section. Room steward was very friendly, and aimed to please. All in all, a most enjoyable trip.
.
|
