We sailed on the Pride to the Mexican Riviera from Nov 30-Dec 07 out of Long Beach. We arrived at the Queen Mary for early checkin about 930 am. Checkin was a breeze and were told the ship would be boarding at approx 1130 am. We had checked our bags with a porter upon arriving at the pier so we decided to wander through the Queen Mary - well worth the time to check her out - very interesting history. There was some confusion with actually finding the right "zone" to be in to board the ship and quite a bit of waiting in the dome. We were VIP as we had been lucky enough to be upgraded to a suite - but this really didn't seem to make much difference as many, many groups went ahead of us. After a short delay, we were able to board and went directly up to the Lido for the buffet. I would rate the buffet food as quite good - the only thing I didn't like were the distance between the stations - it took alot of wandering around to really find and decide what you might like on any given day. Anyway, we were in our cabin at 130 as promised. We had a fantastic cabin - the balcony was huge - it was an aft cabin with a separate bedroom, living room, dressing area and large walkin closet. The balcony was huge with 4 chairs, two tables and a lounge chair with plenty of room to spare. The bathroom had double sinks and a jacuzzi tub which I thoroughly enjoyed! We had dinner in the Normandie about 1/2 the nights - excellent food and excellent service - the rest of the time we ate at the Lido or ate out while on an excursion.

PV-we really enjoyed this port - we took a tour through the ship - the city tour - our guide was Santa - she was wonderful. She genuinely cares about her city and country and was very proud to show it to us. This was our first taste of Mexico and I have to say - I found all people to be genuinely warm and caring - they appear to be very hardworking people for very little pay. I recommend this tour - it was a very good overview for someone who has never been to PV before.

Mazatlan-seems poor and tons of graffiti everywhere! We took the 7 hour tour - Sierra Madre. We drove through the city just far enough to get out into the countryside - we really enjoyed this - we saw small villages and towns that showed us how the Mexican people really live away from the tourists - we also feel the shopping was far better and far more authentic then in town. There were many things about this tour we just loved - the idea of living in the small town of Capella where the taxes are just 10 per year and your water bill is 10 per year - no crime - one telephone in the whole town - seems very appealing! Maria was our guide on this trip and she too was wonderful. Read more