The Coral, The Panama Canal and LA - An Aussie viewpoint!

[quincytoo]

Admit it, when you get home you are going to miss eating pastries :p

 

What a great report you are weaving, love love love the pictures

 

thank you so much

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

Fuerte Amador (Panama city) – 26th February

A private tour was arranged for a group of CC members. We met at our usual spot outside the patisserie on level 5. We were meeting a lady named Anne Gordon for a tour with the embera Indians. We paid our deposits prior to leaving Australia and were really looking forward to the trip.

When we gathered at the meeting point Anne came up to us and said her husband had just left her and she couldn’t do this. Then walked off. While we were all in sympathy with her predicament it then struck us – what in the world were we all supposed to do now? A guy came over and offered to have one of his guides take us to the village instead. Maybe the day would not be too bad after all. We agreed on a price and set off.

It should have taken an hour to get to the river and the canoes.

This guy didn’t know where he was going and the next minute he pulled into a police station, we thought for directions, but when he came back to the van he informed us that he was waiting for a police escort as the previous Monday some bandits had hijacked his friends van and robbed the tourists and bashed the driver. WHAT THE? By now a few of us were starting to feel really uneasy. After about 45 mins more waiting we all said, forget it – just get going. We were thinking about time running out and missing the ship if we were late back.

So off we went. I don’t see how we could have been held up because there was civilization everywhere we went and no place where bandits would be able to hijack the van. Another hour and we pulled into a spot on the river with canoes and embera Indian boys waiting for us…… YAY, finally.

But no, the driver rings someone and informs us that we are in the wrong spot. S###! By this time we are all getting more than a little pissed at the driver (as you do) OK , all back in the van. Down another road. Dead end! Enough!

We told the driver to forget it and take us to some shops for shopping. Over 3 hours and we still didn’t get to the canoes, let alone to the village. What a disaster!

Back to Panama City, where he dropped us at a modern shopping centre for an hour and a half and then picked us up and we went to the old town.

Now he knew where he was going, he was good. Why didn’t he say right from the start that he didn’t know how to get to the canoes. We could have found someone who did.

Panama city is a city full of contrasts. There were new buildings going up everywhere in amongst utter squalor. Rubbish was everywhere. Dogs roamed the streets and some of the houses were literally falling down and people still lived in them.

We were all disappointed in Anne Gordon, if she had taken 5 mins to organise a guide out of all the guides available the day could have turned out so differently.

Dinner in the dining room and off to bed, we were totally exhausted. ( I was going to say buggered but I don’t know if you can say that on these threads, so I said exhausted instead).

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

Bill & Charlies Mum, Eileen, great photos and review. I have got withdrawal symptoms already. NOW, you have not mentioned the Automatic Wage Subsidy yet, have you ? Get your flak jacket on if you do and maybe a helmet, tin, soldiers for the use of. You may need it on here.! LOL.

 

Now Les, I was trying to be diplomatic and not mention that the tipping was driving us nuts. I will probably touch on it in the LA segment.

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

At sea – 27th February

 

A lazy day today. Spent most of the day in the Lotus Pool area and played a game called Sequence with Linda and Stu.

 

Formal night tonight and the Captain’s Cocktail Party. We received our invitation yesterday. Have to get spruced up for that!

 

The captains cocktail party was the usual, free watered down cocktails and then the speech from the captain. (pity no-one could understand a word he said)

 

Off to dinner, spent some time with our friends and then off to bed.

 

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

Puntarenas, Costa Rica – 28th February

Up early to meet everyone at the piano outside The Patisserie on Level 5.

We walked to the end of the pier to meet our guide and tour operator Charlie Soto of Okey Dokey Tours. It was a full day.

We went to the Caldera Forest to see the capuchin monkeys. We fed them and they were so cute. There were a couple of nasty ones too! Strange looking coaty mundy’s too.

Next we stopped on the roadside to see sugar cane being pressed and sampled the drink that was produced.

Next we dropped off all the people that were chickens and didn’t want to do the ziplining at the river for the river cruise and the rest of us went on to the Villa Lapas and Leona canopy and rainforest where we went ziplining. It was certainly an experience! Some of the ziplines were quite short and easy. Some were long and up soooo high! Clive was so good at it. I was OK but I couldn’t get the braking down pat.

Everyone enjoyed it but we cut it short at the last zipline because we then would have had to rapelle down from the platform up this huge tree and there were some of us that didn’t want to do it. All the people from the river cruise were waiting for us.

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

Costa Rica continued......

 

 

We all then headed to Jaco Beach to a restaurant for lunch. Typical Mexican food, plenty of it and very yummy! As it was Charlie’s daughter’s 17th birthday and she had accompanied us with some friends as part of her birthday present I bought her a wallet and everyone put money in it for her. She had a birthday cake which we all shared and we sang her Happy Birthday.

We were running a bit late so we didn’t go for a swim but continued on to the Tarcoles bridge to see all the crocodiles along the riverbank. We stopped and bought some souvenirs and on the way back to the ship we also stopped at a supermarket for some supplies.

We all had an amazing day and for $99 each (which included lunch and all activities) it was certainly value for money.

We had an hour to spare before sailaway so we looked around the market area at the port.

We were late back for dinner so we went to the dreaded Horizon Court with some of our CC friends.

Then off to bed. Exhausted.

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

At Sea – 1st March

Another sea day, I just love the sea days – especially after such a full day like yesterday.

Got up late and met Linda and Stu in the Lotus Pool area. Played Sequence for most of the day and as a result missed the dining room for lunch. Went to Horizon Court and brought the food back to the Lotus Pool. We were having fun and missed our early sitting in the dining room so joined Linda and Stu, Jim and Kath and Moira and Vin for dinner in the lower dining room. Our friend Beth was sick with a head cold and had room service.

There was an announcement by the captain about something, but no-one could understand him so the second in command had to repeat it and it turns out that there was a very sick passenger onboard who needed hospitalization urgently. As a result we were under full steam to Huatulco, Mexico and instead of only spending 1pm to 6pm there, we would now be there all day. Bonus!!!!

In bed around 11pm.

[Kiwi Kruzer]

 

Just loving your review Eileen,

Its like being on a virtual cruise.

The photos, so natural and exciting

bring it all to life.

 

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

Huatulco, Mexico – 2nd March

Woke up already in port. We met Jim and Kath, Moira and Vin at the piano on Level 5 and set off.

There was a HAL ship berthed alongside. Apparently a passenger jumped off it a few days beforehand and they recovered the body. The ship also reportedly had a very large number of norovirus cases onboard too.

We walked into town as the pier is so close to the beach. Amazing how deep the water must be. The shops near the pier were very basic so took a taxi into the town proper. Not much appealed and only bought a few bracelets for the girls at work.

Huatulco is a very pretty place and not very built out yet with highrise buildings. I hope it stays that way.

Came back to the ship around 1pm and went straight to the dining room for lunch. A lot of people stayed onshore to have lunch in one of the restaurants scattering the beach. We prefer the ships food just in case. After lunch we went to the Lotus Pool for a swim. Played Sequence with Rob and Beth then went to dinner in the dining room.

Had an early night.

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

Acapulco – 3rd March 25, 2010

Some of our CC group arranged a private tour with Rudy from Tour by Van. There were 22 of us and we were allocated 4 vans and drivers. As each van has a capacity of 12 there was plenty of room for everyone.

I must say this tour was fantastic. If you want to see a side of Acapulco that the tourist buses don’t go use Tour by Van. Some of the streets were so narrow that the driver had to fold the rearvision mirror on the side of the van in so we could make it through.

Acapulco is such a beautiful city. Some of the places we were taken for the views and photo shoots were amazing.

There was also the side of Acapulco that the tourist bureau don’t want you to see. The poverty in some places was quite bad but the people still seemed happy. It makes you realise when you go into other countries like this just how well off we are.

This was a local shop!

[mytime53]

We did the opposite trip 2 years ago, and I am so enjoying your review-- love the humor!

The car rental company is supposed to give you a choice on the refueling option. That prepay option seems like a rip off to me.

Those Hampton Inn beds are comfy, aren't they?

We've had a difficult time Finding our way to hotels in Florida even with a GPS.

 

Looking forward to your next installment!

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

Acapulco continued.......

 

 

We were taken to the church up on the hill surrounded by the multimillion dollar drug money homes and then we were taken over the other side of the bay to a hotel that still operates but that is so rundown that hardly anyone stays there.

It was once a very popular meeting place and hotel. Very sad really.

 

We were taken to see the cliff divers and although I think it is a bit overrated, it was still interesting and quite cheap @ $3.50 entry. (this was included in the tour cost of $35) We bought a ceramic toucan from one of the market stalls at the cliff divers. Beth was on a different van and when we got back to the ship discovered that she had bought the exact same toucan. LOL

We were with Rudy and his team for around 6 hours and all in all a great way to see the real Acapulco.

We stopped to buy a pin. We relaxed in the Lotus Pool area when we got back to the ship.

A most enjoyable day!

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

Acapulco continued......

 

I love this photo for some reason so I am going to chuck it in for good measure!

 

 

It was taken through the front window of the van as we were going down that little narrow gutted street. This is the street that the driver had to fold the rearvision mirror in to enable us to get through (it was literally mm's)

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

At sea – 4th March

Another lazy day.

Went to the Lotus Pool (by now you will have realised that this was our favourite place on the ship) and played Sequence with Linda and Stu. (they have become hooked on this game too).

Clive and I ended a nice relaxing day by having dinner at Sabatini’s with Linda & Stu, Kath & Jim, Anne & Allen, Moira & Vin. The food was nice but I think I prefer the dining room.

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

Cabo San Lucas, Mexico – 5th March

Woke up early to go on our tour. We all gathered at our usual place – the white piano outside the Patisserie on level 5. As this was a tender port we got our tickets early and were lucky enough to be on one of the first tenders to leave. There was a Carnival ship in the harbour as well.

We had to meet our tour guides at Dock “A”. We had hired 2 sailboats for the morning to go whale watching. Dock A was right around the other side of the bay and was a good 15 – 20 mins walk. When we got there no-one was around so we sat down to wait.

The sailboats arrived at 8.45am and we set sail at 9.00am. There were six people in each sailboat.

It was a very relaxing day, we did see some whales, but I wouldn’t have minded if we hadn’t. We were taken around the other side of the bay and served lunch, then had a leisurely sail back into port.

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

Cabo San Lucas continued.......

 

When we were walking around the port in the morning looking for dock A we were offered a water taxi for $2 each, but we decided to walk. When we got into shore we thought we would save some time as it was getting close to last tender time, and take a water taxi back. Funny how all of a sudden the price jumped to $6 each to get back to the tenders. Needless to say, we told them to go jump and walked back. I hate getting ripped off and this was a blatant case. There was 6 of us and that equates to $36 to go about 1km across the marina.

Bought some gifts at the pier and took the second last tender back to the ship.

A nice day. Sad our cruise is coming to an end. Last day tomorrow, which will have to be spent packing. Lucky we have another week left of our holidays which will be spent in LA. We don’t feel so miserable that the cruise is ending.

We went to the Bayou Café for dinner with our CC friends. I will miss them, they have been great company and have helped make this cruise so special.

The Bayou was fantastic. I recommend it to everyone. For $15 covercharge it is worth it.

Bedtime was late.

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

At sea – 6th March

The last full day of the cruise. The time has flown – I suppose it is never long enough!

Had breakfast in the dining room (last lot of pastries – Noooooo!) Met all our CC friends for lunch and arranged to meet for dinner. We want to go to traditional dining first to tip our waiters and then we will go to anytime dining to eat desert with our CC friends.

We spent the day in the card room with Linda and Stu playing Sequence. We are all hooked on this game. If you have never played it buy yourself one and have a go. I bought our game in a game shop in our local shopping centre so it should be available anywhere. It is a great social game and easy to learn.

It is starting to get cool now. We have packed our large suitcases and luckily we didn’t have to be too particular because we still have a week in LA starting tomorrow. The journey isn’t over yet folks…… stay tuned.

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

San Pedro Pier – 7th March

I suppose now is the right time to give you my thoughts on the Coral Princess and our overall cruise.

The Coral Princess is a fantastic ship. It is the first US based Princess ship we have travelled on. It beats the Aussie ships hands down. However, we do have a soft spot for the Sun Princess. The Coral has many more facilities on her because she is newer and bigger than our ships.

The food – well apart from me putting on around 6 kilos because of those damn pastries, we found the food very good. As I have stated before, we enjoy the traditional dining room because we don’t eat as much and find the food to be a lot better. This is subjective of course and only our opinion. I did miss the vegetables. Here in OZ everyone eats a lot of vegetables and I found it was lacking on the Coral. I would have died for a large plate of broccoli, cauliflower, peas and green beans. I loved the ice-cream in the Lotus Pool area. Very convenient as you all know that was our favourite hangout. (Perhaps that contributed to my weight gain too…. Hmmm)

The passengers – I have to be truthful here and tell you all that I was a bit concerned because of the horror stories we had heard regarding the “loudmouth, rude Americans” that you find onboard a cruise ship. Well I don’t think we had any of them onboard our ship. We found our fellow passengers to be friendly, and happy and not in the least thoughtless and rude. There was generally a huge curiosity because we were from ‘downunder’, and they asked a lot of questions. The most common statement was “oh, I want to visit there”. By all means, visit.

Our CC roll call group – What can I say! What a wonderful group of people (even Jim) They made our trip just that much more memorable and I am sure that we will meet up with some of them again in the not too distant future. They were great fun and we had a ball every day. The tours were so much better because we were all friends. Thank you all! I miss you all!

The crew – Our room steward Rommel was fantastic and we can’t praise him enough. If you read this Rommel, thank you for your assistance and I hope you enjoyed the beers!

Our table stewards were fantastic and we thank them as well.

The captain needed to make himself a bit more conspicuous and maybe let someone else do the broadcasts, because no-one understood a word he said. Too much of an Italian accent and tended to mumble.

To Glenn in the Patisserie, thank you for your care and I did love those Peninsulars you made me every day.

We woke up already alongside the pier at San Pedro. We dressed and headed down to breakfast in the dining room. Sort of like our last supper!

We were due to leave at 10.15 timeslot.

Disembarkation was quick and easy and had no problem getting through customs.

Goodbye Coral Princess, Hello LA!

[regnig]

Good lord Eileen you are posting faster than I can read! :D Great review, keep it coming. Love, love, love your pictures. Pam is going to be sooooo very proud of you.

 

Another sea day' date=' love those sea days! Didn’t do much, just wandered around the ship and tried to get our bearings. Had a lovely breakfast in the dining room – my lord, those pastries! Is that normal for you Americans? Pastries every morning?[/size']

 

Nope! It was a conspiracy we set up just for you as thanks for getting all of us hooked on Tim Tams! ;)

 

 

[quote=Billy and Charlie's Mum;23721034

It was certainly an experience! Some of the ziplines were quite short and easy. Some were long and up soooo high! Clive was so good at it. I was OK but I couldn’t get the braking down pat.

 

OMG!! I'm pretty sure braking is an important skill to have. Glad you survived.

 

What kind of a pin do you want from Ft. Lauderdale? I'll look for one on Monday and arrange to mail it to you when we get back.

Barb

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

Anaheim California – 7th March

We waited outside the port for a shuttle bus for about 45 mins. Finally we were on our way. Our friends Beth and Rob were staying with us at the resort for the week as well.

We arrived at our hotel – Wyndham Anaheim – on Katella St West just before lunch. Our 2bed apartment wasn’t quite ready so we put our bags into security and took a taxi to a local shopping centre.

We all decided we needed some warm clothes. It was so cold. There was snow on the surrounding hills. We didn’t bank on that and had to go looking for some new pants and joggers for Clive.

As our apartment had a full kitchen we went looking for groceries too. It was very interesting to say the least. Guess what was the first thing I saw as soon as I walked down the first aisle. You got it – those damn pastries. You know the ones, the fluffy, soft ones with the cinnamon and all the icing drizzled over the top. Of course Beth bought 2 packets of them – 4 in each! I blame her because she was with me and could have stopped me!

It’s funny how different supermarkets are here. I couldn’t find anything that I normally buy. For instance – a loaf of bread. We have white, brown and multigrain mostly. You guys have everything under the sun except. We did find a small loaf of white bread that was really small and you would probably lose it in a toaster, and your brown bread is not like our brown bread. But we bought them anyway. Had to have something to go with the pastries.

At least you have Kelloggs cornflakes, bought those. Coffee was a challenge. Your instant coffee sucks so had to buy some granulated coffee (luckily our apartment is equipped with a coffee machine) Searched for sugar, only available in a round tube that you pour out. Wow, we have big 2kg bags at home that we put into a sugar bowl.

Your milk, well those big bottles wouldn’t fit into a shelf in an aussie fridge door. We bought one though, hoping the door in the apartment had a big shelf (it did).

Butter was interesting. Little blocks, very cute. We have them in 500g tubs mostly.

So you can see that our first day in Anaheim was interesting. I wished we had more time to peruse the shelves but unfortunately we all had to get back. Clive and I had booked a dinner show at the Pirates Adventure and was being picked up at 4.30. Beth and Rob were meeting up with friends who live in LA.

Called a taxi and waited, and waited and waited. It was getting later and later and I was getting worried that our room wouldn’t be ready in time for us to change and go to the Dinner.

Finally it came and we got back to the resort at 3.45pm. You guessed it – our room wasn’t ready. Time for plan B. Got the concierge to ring up the Dinner company and ask to change the night. They were very good and agreed to make it the following Saturday night. Pickup 6pm. Much better. Stress off.

Our room was ready so we gathered our luggage and were off to the ninth floor. Our apartment was lovely. The view was great. It overlooked Disneyland.

Beth and Rob were still going out so Clive and I decided to go across the street to the Cheescake Factory for dinner. OMG, OMG I wish they would bring those restaurants to Australia. I had prawns and steak Dianne Combo. YUM. Couldn’t have desert – too full. Which was a good thing, trust me.

Went back to the room just in time to go out onto the balcony to watch the fireworks over Disneyland. Fantastic.

Slept like logs.

[MAZANDSTEVE]

Fantastic review, I am really enjoying it, love the pictures. :)

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

Disneyland – 8th March

Up early, had breakfast. (cornflakes, yoghurt and peach slices, followed by toast) Huh you thought I was going to say pastries. But no – they are for later!

Off to Disneyland. Went downstairs and bought all-day shuttle tickets for Disneyland. We had purchased our 2 day hopper tickets online in Australia so we were set. The shuttle picks up outside the hotel every 20 mins and there was once waiting there when we walked out.

The day was so much fun – we went on lots of rides and because it was a Monday there were not that many people there. The longest we had to wait was around 10 mins. The people that paid extra for the front of line passes would have felt ticked off because there was no need for it.

We walked our little butts off and enjoyed every minute. I will just include some photo’s because they will probably tell you more than me describing it.

We left Disneyland just on dark because we had had enough. We will leave California Adventure Park to another day.

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

San Diego – 9th March

Off to San Diego today using the world’s most travelled rail tickets. I ordered the tickets through Amtrak months and months ago. Amazingly Amtrak does not have etickets. So I had to pay for them to be fedex’d to Linda and Stu in New York, who then posted them onto me in Australia. Those tickets went from LA to NY to Aust, back to LA on to FLL, then on our cruise through the Panama etc and back up to LA before we use them today. I would hate to work out how many miles that would add up to.

Anyway, today is the day we are going on a nice leisurely train ride down the California coastline to San Diego. Business class of course. (cost $13 extra) LOL (wish planes only cost that much extra).

Caught a taxi to Anaheim station and didn’t have long to wait before it arrived.

Settled down and watched the scenery go by. The train supplied free coffee AND guess what? Yep – the good ole pastries. They were yum too. LOL

If you ever get a chance to travel on the surfliner down to San Diego – do it. A great way to see the sights and very comfortable.

Anyway, it appears that we chose the coldest day ever recorded to visit San Diego. Typical! It was sooooo darn cold. I don’t do cold. Don’t like cold! That is why we live in tropical Queensland. I have never felt so cold in my life!!!!!!!

Notice the lack of people - it was too darn cold to go out. Everyone was hiding!!!!!

What happened to sunny California???

Took a bus to San Diego Zoo and decided to leave there around 2pm to catch a taxi to the old town centre. Glad we did because there wasn’t that much happening at the zoo. The poor little animals were hiding trying to keep warm, and who could blame them.

He was standing under the heater!

Just love Murkats. I bought a toy one and he now sits on our bed and keeps an eye on us every day. Even Clive likes him!

[Billy and Charlie's Mum]

San Diego continued..........

 

The old town centre was wonderful. Had lots of fun looking in all the shops and bought some great gifts for everyone at home. Found my pin too. So far I have managed to get a pin for everywhere we have been these holidays except for Fort Lauderdale (and a friend has offered to get one for me now – thanks Barb).

The trip back to Anaheim on the train was just as enjoyable. Because it was at 6pm there were no pastries but we were handed a snack pack and we could choose a drink (wine, soda, water).

A taxi was waiting at the station and it was a quick trip back to our hotel.

Went to the Cheescake factory for dinner again. Love that place.

Had to show you our poor little koalas - how cold would they be!

Another one for good measure.

[Colo Cruiser]

Great review, thanks. :)