Today we were quite looking forward to our dune buggy and snorkel tour. We met our first guide Santiago, who claimed not to speak English, whilst actually speaking English! We knew that we were going to be in for a few laughs with him, given his cheeky demeanor.
True to form, we had to wait around a bit to allow for friggen late comers. All good, as previously mentioned the weather was nice and it was just good to be alive!! First things first, dune buggy time! Our tour started straight from the port, no bus to a special destination required. These buggies were ok on the clutch, but had the worst brakes of all time. We got very very close a couple of times to the buggy in front of us, not to mention the slam of brakes just before an unexpected speed hump. It gave the Segway tour group next to it a chance to give us a 'woooohoooo'! Good times people!!
We stopped at a nearby beach for our snorkelling. Usually there was a different spot, but apparently the seas were too choppy, so a new area was required. The snorkelling was quite nice and the water itself was a really good temperature. So easy to just go straight in. There was a variety of fish that swam right near us and didn't seem at all scared. We definitely preferred the snorkelling with the sea turtles much better, but this tour was still good. At one stage there were around 10 lobsters, but a bloody dickhead killjoy in our group dove down and was literally poking them to a point that they all scurried off before most of us saw them. What a friggen TOOL! This also just so happened to be the moron who was driving his buggy like he was warming his tires up for F1. Not hard to dislike these sorts of tourists. He was engaging the You Jack system....."F U Jack, as long as I'm right!"
Moving on, we drove quite a distance to our next destination, which was a crocodile lagoon. We took the opportunity to switch drivers and also offered it up to our Brazilian passengers in the back, but they were keen to be shauffered. No worries with us, we were keen to zoom our buggy!! There may have been a bit of The Presidents of the United States singing coming out too, but unfortunately we didn't have a little blue dune buggy - we had an orange one!
The crocodile stop was ok, there was one croc there named Julio and apparently the other crocs were out hunting. This was a natural reserve and not some staged tourist enclosed park, but a least there were some man made walking paths and a lookout tour in case old snappy jaws liked the look of the tourists!!
Next it was passed a light house and off to the point area for lunch and along the way we saw a Mayan ruin, which used to used for offerings to the goddess of fertility and also to detect hurricanes. The lunch was a delicious Mexican buffet, which was a nice inclusion to our day. The eating area looked over a very clear blue beach area, which enticed most people in for an afternoon swim. Before heading back to ship, we actually stopped in at the lighthouse and had some time to look around and take some pics. A green necklace was purchased and this helped us to clear our Pesos. Win win!
Our Brazilian passengers Julio (not the crocodile) and Adrianna tried really hard to have a conversation with us. It was pretty successful. They speak Portugese of course, so we felt bad that we had nothing to give back. At least being from Australia, they were very understanding. At times our limited Spanish helped us to communicate. We're now Facebook friends, or at least will be by the time this posts. No Internet hasn't helped us over these past few days, but in hindsight, we didn't die!
We finished the day with some shopping at the port, which was relaxing and for a change it didn't feel like people were begging us! A couple of tops each, a mug and a cap. Winner! Very cheap too. No bargaining required. Again a nice change!
It was around 430 and damn hot, so it was a good move to head on back and shower up for the afternoon's activities. This also involved watching Shrek 2 in our room and a snooze. The late night from the night before caught up with us.
After we finally got our act together, we headed for some pizza and then onto the Rising Tide Bar to kick start our daily installment of drinking (surprise surprise). We look forward to our detox in Miami! At least there isn't a drinks package there. We're not entering into anymore drinking contracts Rumplestiltskin (Shrek 2 reference)!
Once we'd necked our Rising Tide specialty Martini's, which perfectly matched Tanya's dress (just to clarify), it was off to dinner, which comprised of seafood chowder, seafood ceviche, shrimp gyoza, pork scallopini and a cheese plate. No dessert, but that was because of the pizza earlier.
We finished off our great day with the Glow party. This was a chance for people to bring out their flashing lights and glowing best at a dance party. The entertainment crew basically ran this, with their choreographed dances. They had a heap of good songs and the crowd got into it. We got our opportunity to buy the flashing cups that we wanted from early on in the cruise. Perfect for this year's NYE celebrations. Woohoo!
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