FUN ON THE MEXICAN RIVIERA

From the 7th to the 14th of November, we spent a fun-filled week with our good friends, the Shurtliffs on the Norwegian Star Cruise Ship, with ports of call at Cabo San Lucas, Mazatlan, and Puerto Villarta, Mexico. It was great to escape the cold weather that had descended on Northern Utah, and bask in the warm, summerish temperatures of Mexico.

We flew to Los Angeles on Saturday morning, and took a shuttle bus to the port, where we met Diane and Wayne.

After a day and a half at sea, we docked at Cabo. This was perhaps the prettiest of the places we visited. We had decided to find a local tour company to take us to Playa Santa Maria, a somewhat remote snorkeling destination. We saw tons of fish, and some pretty coral and learned that we hadn't forgotten how to breathe with a mask on and a snorkel tube between our teeth. It was really fun.

Our water taxi took us to the Arch and beautiful rock formations just off the coast, where we saw (and smelled) a huge group of seals. There were lots of pelicans to be seen as well. We enjoyed a restful hour on Pelican Rock, where we hiked around a little, and watched the sunset.

Our second port of call was Mazzatlan. The first thing we did was hike to the top of a pretty tall hill, to the highest lighthouse -- I can't remember if it was the highest in the world, or highest in Mexico, or what. But it was a work-out, AND, it was HOT!

We hired a taxi to take us on a city tour. This lovely Catholic Church was fun to visit. It was bright, and pretty. . . . much lighter than many other Catholic churches we have visited.




We spent some time shopping in the "flea market". The colors were vibrant, and there were many interesting things to see.
Those aren't watermelon seeds. . . they're bees!

We loved Puerto Viarrta! The last time we were there, we bought a ton of souvenirs, and feared that we might be tempted similarly this time. The whole town had changed drastically in the past ten years, since our last visit! It was clean, and much bigger! The shopping was fun -- but we found that there wasn't much that we couldn't live without.


The highlight of our trip was the "canopy tour" that we booked for ourselves. They loaded us up in this rickety truck, and bounced us up the mountain on a dirt road. The higher we went, the more the vegitation encroached on us as we entered the jungle.



I will add more pictures of the "zip line adventure" in a couple weeks. The Shurtliffs have those pictures for the meantime. This was "high adventure" and we had a blast! There were twelve zip lines, and each one was more fun than the last! We were harnassed in with straps around our upper theighs, and waist, and we used the heavy, leather gloves they gave us as the brake system. It worked great! There were probably about ten of us in our group, and we had fun getting to know the mostly young people that we shared this fun adventure with.

The view of Puerto Viarrta from the jungle mountain top was beautiful!

This was such a nice, relaxing vacation for us! Maybe now we'll be able to survive the Utah winter that's ahead of us. . . or maybe this warm, fun trip will make winter even more dreadful! I guess we'll find out, one way or another.

Bring on the snow.