San Francisco, here we are!

We awoke to a beautiful sunrise and some sadness as well. It was a glorious 15 day cruise and one we will cherish. We think we could get used to this!
We were escorted into the harbor by boats - some pleasure boaters but mostly by the military.

The icon of San Francisco - the Golden Gate Bridge!
Alcatraz
Our escorts! Made us realize how incredibly serious our military and coast guard take our safety and security. Guns were in full view and they had a no-nonsense approach! We had 4 of these bad boys next to our ship.

Sailing under the Gold Gate Bridge. Quite impressive.
The bridge is behind us....on to port....

We truly did have a great time....can't wait for the next cruise....oh wait.....that would be in 8 weeks!

Three days at sea!

Once we left Mexico, we spent the next three days at sea. Our final destination was San Francisco, but it wasn't an easy three days. There were very rough seas for two of those days so we hunkered down with books and hot drinks. The shorts were put away and jeans were donned.

We took in the galley tour along with a presentation by the chef and maitre d'. It was quite informative and humorous. Who knew how much consumption there was on board with 2400 cruisers and 900 staff???

I'm not sure who was in charge of cleaning the kitchen every day.....what a job!


These two sous chefs really hammed it up for us during our tour!
One of the MANY arrangements the kitchen crew made - the flowers are made from radishes.
So only one person is in charge of making all the coffee?? Not really.....he/she just makes sure the machines are well stocked.
There was always an abundance of desserts!
Greg and I with our waitstaff. These guys totally spoiled us on this trip!

Last port before home: Acupulco, Mexico

We chose not to take an excursion at this port. We spent the day just wandering about the town. When we first got off the ship, we were bombarded by the locals to "hire me...I can take you to the best places!" One particular gentleman was so persistent he followed us for about a 1/2 mile before he realized we weren't going to take him up on his offer. We had amazing weather and a beautiful sunset and sunrise. We knew it was soon to end!

Huatulco, Mexico

We arrived a Huatulco, Mexico for a day of swimming and sailing. We didn't take our cameras with us on the sailboat as we weren't sure how much water we would be exposing them to. So we took pictures of the port, dock and a lone bird fishing for its lunch. This town is quite small but an "up and coming port of call" according to the brochures!!!

Back to blogging!

Okay, I've had enough grief from family to start this blog back up. So bear with me as I begin to edit the rest of the cruise pictures and find my momentum again. And stay tuned....a new blog has been started that chronicles my bucket list adventure: The Goofy Challenge. Once I figure out how to make things work in the layout (Aimee, I need help!), I will add the blog to my list and you can follow those adventures as well.

Costa Rica part 2

After we completed our tour of the gardens and had an amazing traditional lunch, we boarded our bus and headed out to the river. This was the only time we encountered rain. As we started the tour, we experienced a warm rain shower. It only lasted a few minutes; we did get some sunshine back and it was warm.
Our tour guide....he's been doing this for several years and was quite entertaining!
One of the boats going by...ours was similar to this.
Birds were prolific in this area and just beautiful.
Iguanas were fun to watch. They are quite skitterish and didn't like hanging out for pictures.

This bird had the most interesting tail. It actually was in sections and the bottom part just appeared to be hanging by strings! This bird nests in the mud and there were times when we could only see the very tip of his tail.
Sticking out his neck!
Mama alligator......
watching her babies. The mama stays in the water next to the babies on shore. The babies don't get in the water until they are about 4 months old so mama's job is to make sure they are safe. She becomes quite aggressive if anything/anyone comes even close. We kept our distance in the boat. Greg captured all of these shots with the 300mm telephoto lense.
Meet Osama. He is about 18 years old and lives on the river. Alligators are very territorial and Osama has been tagged and watched by the naturalists to study his behavior, habitat, etc. He got into a fight with another alligator named Tornado. They believe he was fighting for more territory. Tornado lost the battle and an eye and now Osama has taken over the end of the river. Our tour guide was able to get this guy to swim up next to the boat and show his teeth.
Osama is about 30 feet long and this is the end of his tail. We literally could have touched it from the boat; that's how close he got to us.
More interesting birds.
These are pink hawks. There were about 10 of them roosting in this tree.
Pink crane.
Local fishermen/woman trolling for dinner. Most of the boats are wooden and are powered by oars.
The trees in the river grow their roots from above the ground. It's an interesting site. The saddest part of the tour was seeing all the garbage that has collected at the mouth of the river. The people who live in this area dump so much garbage into the river and it floats down to the mouth of the river at the ocean and collects there. The country has now developed strategies to improve this situation and is providing more education about recycling, etc. Part of our fees for this excursion went to support this effort.
The insects on the trees in the rain forest region of the river were big and ugly! These spiders were creepy! It was a great tour, though and we learned so much about the Costa Rican lifestyle and country.

Back to cruising...Costa Rica part 1

It's now back to our Panama cruise. We arrived in Punteranus, Costa Rica on a day that was supposed to be somewhat overcast and rainy. We had booked an excursion into the jungle and then onto the waterway that leads back out to the ocean. After an hour bus ride, we arrived at this gorgeous national park area where we were escorted onto gondolas. The weather cooperated throughout this part of the day...no rain....some sun...warm temps.
Our chariot!
Looking back over the jungle canopy as we arrived at the top of the gondola ride. We didn't get off, just rode it back down.
Amazing how things grow in this dense plant land.
We saw many native birds....
and monkeys...
He even stopped for a photo shoot!
This bird was hard to see at first but had brilliant colors.
Once we were back down we strolled through the rest of the park where flowers were in full bloom....we took many, many pictures of them but here is one example.
And Greg thought he would be funny....in the middle of this beautiful bed of flowering plants, he spotted this "flower!" It was really hard to see unless you were looking for it!!