carohs

I forgot to share a picture of George. He's been with us for about 3 days. Steward has fixed him every day since we keep knocking his face over accidentally.

Either people used up their minutes or idk but the demand has eased and wifi is again usable

2nd round

First drinks of the evening

Line for Splash was extra long tonight. The kids are now watching Ratatouille while they wait for the phone call that there's space available. I had sent them ahead to get in line but DD played with her friends in line rather than get in line herself. Cherry Pie says there's around 600 kids this sailing, the prior week they had around 700. Capacity is capped at 8 kids per youth counselor and the average week has about 200 kids.

Dessert: more lava cake, pear charlotte, and apple cobbler.

Dinner tonight at Azura

So sad to be debarking tomorrow but we've got our suitcase packed and ready to go before heading to dinner. It has been a great mix of relaxing, exploring, and dancing.

The reason the coco pic looks half empty is because it is. We ate about half of it before remembering to take a picture.

We ventured out after all and explored the plaza by the port. We window shopped and MIL braved the Ferris Wheel🎡. The guys let us go around so many times I eventually had enough and asked to get down. We took pics with Mario and saw some dressed up folks in native attire. At the end we shared a coco. If you haven't purchased coconut in Mexico the guy whacks it with a big machete and gives you the water to drink. Then he takes it again and whacks it some more and gives you freshly cut coconut meat still in the shell. Usually it's served with limon y chile but we declined this time. It's one of my favorite treats.

The winner looked about 90 and very much living his best life.

During last night's show, Scotty asked the audience to keep their hands up as he counted up, put them down when he passes the # of cruises you've been on. I put my hands down at 3. DS and DD reminded me we've been on 5. Anyway, Scotty got to 120 before resorting to asking the last two how many. In 2nd place.....112 cruises. In first place.....drum roll.... 🥁 🛢️....153!!!

They brought back paella today!!! Oh, no I got closer it wasn't paella. It's chicken Biryani. Never heard of it but I got some anyway. It was delicious.

One thing to note, the Jewel deck plan still shows a kids pool area next to Topsiders. There are no pools there, the area is now occupied by ping pong tables.

Yay we are now close enough to Ensenada to have cell service again. It's a beautiful sunny day, although the pool is closed because the ship is rocking too much. We are scheduled in Ensenada at noon, so hopefully they open the pool then. We'll take advantage of people leaving the ship and stay onboard this afternoon.

Here is the info on the officers:

Today I only took one picture, can you guess what this is?

This evening there were two showings of Scotty Goff. Ema assured me it was family friendly so DS and I went. Scotty was hilarious again and did a few bits requiring audience participation. I don't even remember hearing a single curse word which is quite an accomplishment I think for a comedian. DS and I went to Splash afterwards to see how full it was. Yup, there was already a waiting list 14 kids long so we went back to the stateroom and watched the end of the newest Black Panther movie. The selection movies available in the room is actually pretty decent. We've also seen bits of Lyle Lyle Crocodile, Minions Gru, Wizard of Oz and one other Marvel movie. Too bad there isn't movie theater or movies playing in Stardust. With as many families onboard this week and the limited availability of Splash, a movie in Stardust would give the kids something else to do and alleviate some of the demand for pools and kids club. I plan on saying something in the comment cards.

We also decided to spend some more time in the hot tub this afternoon. The ship has been rocking all day and it was especially evident watching the water in the pool slosh back and forth. It has also been very windy. This has been more of an issue for MIL who takes the time to brush and style her short hair every morning. My long hair is either in a bun or pony tail and if I don't end up with hair in my mouth than I haven't had a successful cruise.

We've eaten at O'Sheehans twice now and both times service has been insanely slow. I don't recommend going there for lunch or dinner. Better service and better food is available elsewhere on the ship.

Our second sea day has gone fairly uneventfully. DD went to Splash in the morning around 9:30. DS changed his mind about going but by 9:32 they were at capacity. No worries we folded origami dollars into t-shirts then went to the officer's Q and A. I was able to sign DS in around 11:30 as other parents started to pick up their littles. He had really wanted to play Super Mario but they didn't pull the game out before it closed for the morning. For lunch, the cafe had a Mexican theme and I saw wraps they called enchiladas. There was no sauce so they were definitely not enchiladas. There was also a build your own taco area. We actually ended up eating at O'Sheehans because MIL and I were both craving burgers, and they have blue cheese ones. I asked MIL if it's supposed to be pronounced "oceans." She laughed but didn't agree or disagree. Okay you guys tell me: how do you say O'Sheehans?

In the evening the kids and I went to Cirque Bijou. It was very well done. The kids found it especially exciting and DD repeated "holy moly!" a lot. MIL said she's seen something like that before so she decided not to join us. I meant to meet up with her after but the last several days caught up to me and the three of us fell asleep.

Yesterday the glow party. Kids version at 6pm wasn't much of a glow party since the sun had not set. They played hot potato with a plate of whipped cream. In the first round a woman ended up with the plate while her DH sat in the sidelines. He joined for the second round and you should have seen her excitement when her DH ended up with the plate. He was a good sport and smashed all the whip to his face. The kids also got glow sticks. The lavender appeared to be defective so DD asked for another. One advantage to waking in am inside stateroom this morning, is that it's pitch black. The kids were excited to find their sticks still aglow, even the lavender.

It was booked on our own. It took us approx 20 min to get there. It's right in the middle of the malecón which is very convenient. It was fun to take a stroll down the boardwalk beforehand.

The birds in the aviary were very active. Mateo in particular liked to hang around our guide. He pecked at her belt, her hair, etc. He also likes to perch on heads. Mateo said hi to me and saw the beads in DDs hair. She got it done in PV yesterday so we asked the guide to help shoo Mateo, after a quick pic of course.