Sea Day and my birthday--August 21, 2008

Hayley and Chase
Meeting the 3 Caballeros.

Yummy birthday cake!

Earlier that day, I planned to have Palo brunch on my birthday. We ate at 10:30 and had a great table for 2 by the window.

My favorite part, the carb station. They had fresh berries, home made whipped cream, stolen bread, cream puffs, sticky buns, and fruit pastries.

Palo brunch dessert table.
Our view from our table
Jared's Palo pizza, half spicy sausage and half sweet pizza.

Puerto Vallarta---August 20, 2008

Some pictures of where we docked in Puerto Vallarta. We were actually docked right across the street from a huge Walmart. It was a good thing, because Jared and I needed some scotch tape and a sewing kit which we had forgotten to bring. In all, the city was pretty clean and green. Crossing the main street to get to Walmart was very scary, due to crazy traffic, but we were able to do it. The ship was here the latest---it did not leave until 1:00 am.



We were also in port along with Carnival.

In Puerto Vallarta, the kids wanted to do a dolphin swim. Since there were 6 of us, we got to have our own dolphin to ourselves, since they keep the groups to about 5-7. It was a really fun excursion that we did as a family. Above, they also let everyone take a picture with one of the sea lions. Have to make extra money making opportunities to sell more pictures!

It took some coaxing, but we were really surprised at how brave Chase has been this trip (from the norm, anyway). He had a great time going on a long swim with the dolphin all around the pool.

Cabo San Lucas---August 19, 2008

Tyler and I went four wheeling on the beach of Cabo San Lucas. We had a blast! It was probably mine and Tyler's favorite excursion of the trip. We all traveled single file to the beach, and then had free reign on the beach for about an hour and a half. There were big and little hills on the beach that made it really fun. We had even seen a dead seal carcass that was being eaten by vultures. There was no one around, and our small ATV group had the trails and huge stretch of beach all to ourselves. The scenery was amazing, and the tour was very well run. We would do it again in a heartbeat.
Tyler did very well on his own ATV, Of course, we both had automatics. :)
Tyler loves the beach!

In our procession to the beach.

Panama Cruise---August 17 - September 1, 2008

August 17: Embarkation and August 18: Sea Day:
Some of these pictures may be out of order since blogger posts the pictures in a weird way. I tried to categorize them by day as best I could.

Courtney enjoying her birthday cake.
Courtney's birthday on embarkation day, August 17. They brought her a very good but very rich chocolate cake for her her birthday and sang to her.
Hayley and Tyler looked thrilled to be at dinner, don't they? Actually they are just excited to be done with dinner so they can get out of their formal clothes.
Chase lost his first tooth! I was not able to flip this picture around before I posted it, but I think its big enough to see. He was very proud that his tooth came out on its own. Here is his first hole in his mouth.
Courtney and Chase with Mickey and Minnie in their formal wear. These are for the Golden Mickeys Show, one of our favorites!

Some Embarkation pics at the LA Terminal:

All our luggage..... The porters here were very patient and helpful.
Hurrying across the street to get into the terminal. I was suprised at all of the people that were already there....dang repeat cruisers that know what they are doing. Good thing I booked a room at the Disneyland hotel the night before so we could have priority boarding.
Out of 2700 people on our sold out cruise, over 2000 were repeat Disney cruisers.
The shuttle we took (Primetime Shuttle) was excellent. On time, quick and helpful. He grabbed a porter for us, and dropped us off at the shuttle drop off spot that was across the street from the terminal entrance. We were pier #93

On-board and some sail away pics:
Watching the sailaway party on deck 10.

Hayley, Chase and Jared watching the sailaway party. We made sure to get up there early this time so we could get the best viewing spots.
Above, is the girls' stateroom #6047 (inside category 11). Below, is our stateroom---Michelle, Jared, Chase and Tyler #6046 (verandah category 6). We had done the staterooms right across the hall on our first cruise, and it worked out again really well this time too. We were able to have a balcony, but did not have to pay for 2. The girls enjoyed having their own room.

Overall, we really enjoyed this cruise and had a great time together. DCL had great entertainment and things to do for the 15 days, both for the kids and for us adults...so much that I still have not had a chance to do everything I wanted to. We were also really lucky to celebrate 2 birthdays on this cruise (we have never vacationed in the summer before so have never celebrated our birthdays on a trip. It was really fun and special for us to do this.)

I would rate the overall cruise an A
Service: A
Excursions and ports of call all averaged in: B (None of us really enjoyed the Mexican riviera ports much....Cabo and Aruba being the favorites.)

Having fun in Disneyland (8/12-8/17)

The park has been open for awhile and this is the first place people head to (Fantasyland and Tomorrowland) AND its SUMMER. Where are all the people?? I had to just take a pic.

So excited at the entrance of Disneyland.

We scored big time....2 seperate times!

Chrissy and Hayley on the teacups.
Brenner and Kylie on the Storybook Canal ride
We won 2 seperate sets of fastpasses at the same time. Grandma got one set while taking little B to the restroom, and Jared and the kids who were seperated from the rest of us, got the other as they were coming to meet us.Just finishing up Alice in Wonderland.

Wild animals in their proper Casey Jr. train cage.
Little B and Chase on the fire engine in Toontown. We were surprised at how uncrowded this usually crowded area was even about an hour after opening.
Chase loved blowing up the TNT!
Mom and Courtney on the Autopia cars. Jared and Chase were in a car behind followed by Tyler and Hayley each in their own cars. They really had fun on this ride.