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Part Three, 5/4/07-5/5/07, is here.

May 4 (Friday, Day 8, At sea)

Phil got sunburned, sitting in the shade.  We sat out for about four hours in the afternoon on our suite’s balcony deck.  It was on the shady side of the ship, but still there was enough reflected sunlight to turn Phil into Lobster-Man.  We saw our first dolphins and sea turtles, and witnessed numerous rays leaping out of the sea and re-entering with a great splash.  A professional travel photographer cruising on the ship said that they did that to dislodge parasites from their backs.

At Sea

Veranda listening shack

Lobsterman!

There was a code blue announced during our dinner that night (it wasn’t Phil’s sunburn) and while we were leaving the dining room we saw the woman lying on her side on the stretcher being put in the glass elevator.  We later found out that she broke her hip and there was some discussion of skipping Huatulco to get her to a bigger Mexican port, but we ultimately did keep on course for Huatulco.

May 5 (Saturday, Day 9, Huatulco, Mexico)

We were supposed to go snorkeling.  Phil’s sunburn kept him on the ship, so Janet went by herself.  But it was an excellent dolphin- and sea-turtle-spotting day, as numerous dolphin pods and a steady stream of migrating sea turtles swam by our ship as it cruised into Huatulco.  Phil even got a couple of useable pictures!

Dolphin leap

Two dolphins!

Huatulco harbor

Janet had a good snorkel and the highlight was seeing a school of millions of sardines.  (The guide said millions, and since Janet can’t count that many fish, she believed him since they were all over the place!  It was the largest school of fish she’s ever seen while snorkeling.)

In the evening, we had our made-to-order Indian meal originally scheduled for May 3rd but mistakenly scheduled by the dining room manager.  Prior to it being served, we were treated to a dolphin ballet out the window.  And, since the restaurant is on deck 5 (the lowest deck for passengers) we were pretty close to them.  Mom said it was her first time to ever see dolphins while on a cruise.  Our Indian dinner was good as always and included three appetizers (fried curried cauliflower, onion balls and samosas) and four curries (lamb, shrimp, vegetable, chicken), rice, raita sauce and two breads (naan and papadam).  We had to order our desserts from the normal menu.

Indian appetizers

Curries

Spice cake

The executive chef visited our table to make sure we enjoyed everything (which we did).  We learned that there was an Indian chef on board who worked overtime in the afternoon to make our dinner!  He had his regular duties to do and the executive chef said that he was paid overtime to make our dinner.  We thought that was pretty interesting.  The Indian chef made extras, too, for himself and his friends so everyone ended up winning.

The story continues in Part Five, 5/6/07-5/7/07.