Comments on: Cruising the Pacific… http://www.violetcottage.com/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/ A Creative Wonderland of Blogging Sat, 13 Mar 2010 02:43:37 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: CaptainEdwardJohnSmith http://www.violetcottage.com/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/comment-page-1/#comment-937 CaptainEdwardJohnSmith Sat, 24 Feb 2007 12:13:36 +0000 http://www.violetsareblue.net/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/#comment-937 It's a pity you did not get to enjoy Acapulco, we have been there 7 times on cruises and always have had a nice experience. Yes, you will get hounded to death by all the vendors, but come on, they mean no harm and are just trying to earn a living, yes I know, it's a lousy way to earn a living. If you missed the cliff divers, you missed Acapulco. From the ship it is all but a 10-15 minute walk, al uphill thru the old town square. Going back to the ship, being downhill, it's more like 5-10 minutes! Another fun thing we have done a few times is to take the local bus from the pier all the way to the far end of Acapulco Bay, it's only like 50c each. We then walk back to the ship on the beach, it is a long walk, like 9 miles or so on soft sand and takes the better part of 4 hours. We have always felt safe there, oh, I forgot, we don't speak a word in Spanish. I hope you give Acapulco and the cliff divers a second chance! It’s a pity you did not get to enjoy Acapulco, we have been there 7 times on cruises and always have had a nice experience.
Yes, you will get hounded to death by all the vendors, but come on, they mean no harm and are just trying to earn a living, yes I know, it’s a lousy way to earn a living.
If you missed the cliff divers, you missed Acapulco. From the ship it is all but a 10-15 minute walk, al uphill thru the old town square. Going back to the ship, being downhill, it’s more
like 5-10 minutes! Another fun thing we have done a few times is to take the local bus from the pier all the way to the far end of Acapulco Bay, it’s only like 50c each. We then walk back to the ship on the beach, it is a long walk, like 9 miles or so on soft sand and takes the better part of 4 hours.
We have always felt safe there, oh, I forgot, we don’t speak a word in Spanish.
I hope you give Acapulco and the cliff divers a second chance!

]]> By: Christy Wilke http://www.violetcottage.com/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/comment-page-1/#comment-886 Christy Wilke Wed, 14 Feb 2007 20:24:06 +0000 http://www.violetsareblue.net/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/#comment-886 WOW! We are taking the EXACT same cruise in March. There are five in my family. I have been surfing the net trying to figure out what we will do. Your blog was THE MOST THOROUGH. I really enjoyed reading it. I could not register at carnival cruise because of my Mozilla brouser so I ended up finding out about the "swim with the dolphins" on the net. I called them directly and it is $160. After I realized why I could not register I went to Carnival.com through another brouser and found out it was $169 through Carnival. Not a big difference. One of my friends told me it is best to go through the cruise line in case you get injured or you are delayed and get back late. My husband had already reserved a bost to go fishing in Manzanillo. I speak spanish so I am going to try to get a good suburban driver like the one described above to take us around Acapulco for a set price. I do appreciate the warning though, I did not expect that. WOW! We are taking the EXACT same cruise in March. There are five in my family. I have been surfing the net trying to figure out what we will do. Your blog was THE MOST THOROUGH. I really enjoyed reading it. I could not register at carnival cruise because of my Mozilla brouser so I ended up finding out about the “swim with the dolphins” on the net. I called them directly and it is $160. After I realized why I could not register I went to Carnival.com through another brouser and found out it was $169 through Carnival. Not a big difference. One of my friends told me it is best to go through the cruise line in case you get injured or you are delayed and get back late. My husband had already reserved a bost to go fishing in Manzanillo. I speak spanish so I am going to try to get a good suburban driver like the one described above to take us around Acapulco for a set price. I do appreciate the warning though, I did not expect that.

]]> By: lucy http://www.violetcottage.com/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/comment-page-1/#comment-880 lucy Sat, 10 Feb 2007 22:48:05 +0000 http://www.violetsareblue.net/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/#comment-880 I had similiar experience going to dominican republic and hondurus on a cruise. I was shocked to see the huge guns and militia guarding the beaches! On several trips though we had very good luck with taxi drivers giving us a tour and it was a lot more affordable. We've opted to do this on islands where we just wanted to do shopping or stay on the beaches, and taken one or two tours for the things that we pretty much had to do with a group like the swimming with dolphins. Beautiful pictures and glad you had a chance to take a break! lucy I had similiar experience going to dominican republic and hondurus on a cruise. I was shocked to see the huge guns and militia guarding the beaches! On several trips though we had very good luck with taxi drivers giving us a tour and it was a lot more affordable. We’ve opted to do this on islands where we just wanted to do shopping or stay on the beaches, and taken one or two tours for the things that we pretty much had to do with a group like the swimming with dolphins.

Beautiful pictures and glad you had a chance to take a break!

lucy

]]> By: Rebecca http://www.violetcottage.com/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/comment-page-1/#comment-879 Rebecca Sat, 10 Feb 2007 21:13:39 +0000 http://www.violetsareblue.net/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/#comment-879 Hi There! I love your blog! Would you be interested in trading blogspot links? Thank you and hope to hear from you soon! ~Rebecca : Hi There! I love your blog! Would you be interested in trading blogspot links? Thank you and hope to hear from you soon! ~Rebecca :

]]> By: Leah http://www.violetcottage.com/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/comment-page-1/#comment-871 Leah Sat, 10 Feb 2007 00:58:41 +0000 http://www.violetsareblue.net/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/#comment-871 Thanks for your review. We did this exact same sailing on January 10th. We booked in advance so I spent lots of time researching and knew about the pitfalls of Acapulco and Manzanillo, we booked private excursions via the internet. We *loved* Zihuantenjo too, it was the best day of the trip. We had a different demographic on our sailing, couples in their 30's to 40's were the most common (I'm 33) and we didn't have any problems with food in the dining room, everything was wonderful, nothing dry or icky. We never heard any of that older music that you talked about, but then we like 80's & 90's rock, but there was a horrible county western guy in the casino that couldn't carry a tune! It made me run out of that smokey casino laughing :) Thanks for your review. We did this exact same sailing on January 10th. We booked in advance so I spent lots of time researching and knew about the pitfalls of Acapulco and Manzanillo, we booked private excursions via the internet. We *loved* Zihuantenjo too, it was the best day of the trip. We had a different demographic on our sailing, couples in their 30’s to 40’s were the most common (I’m 33) and we didn’t have any problems with food in the dining room, everything was wonderful, nothing dry or icky. We never heard any of that older music that you talked about, but then we like 80’s & 90’s rock, but there was a horrible county western guy in the casino that couldn’t carry a tune! It made me run out of that smokey casino laughing :)

]]> By: Vie Lee Walter http://www.violetcottage.com/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/comment-page-1/#comment-870 Vie Lee Walter Sat, 10 Feb 2007 00:43:12 +0000 http://www.violetsareblue.net/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/#comment-870 Thank you for your review and pictures. We are going on this exact cruise on Feb 27th. This will be my first cruise without my Husband, my first cruise on Carnival, but my 15th cruise. I am going with a good friend of mine that is in our Red Hat group and this is her 1st cruise. That alone will probably make this cruise fun. It sounds like Acapulco hasn't changed much. That was one of our ports when we went thru the Canal. We are doing a city tour/cliff diving tour offered by the ship. I would never, never go anywhere alone in that town. Do you remember what nights were formal? We want to eat in the Supper Club and we want to do it on a formal night and want to make reservations as soon as we get on the ship. Your pictures of the other two ports are wonderful. In both of those ports we want some beach time. We are from cold snowy Utah and are really looking forward to a sun break. Thank you for your review and pictures. We are going on this exact cruise on Feb 27th. This will be my first cruise without my Husband, my first cruise on Carnival, but my 15th cruise. I am going with a good friend of mine that is in our Red Hat group and this is her 1st cruise. That alone will probably make this cruise fun. It sounds like Acapulco hasn’t changed much. That was one of our ports when we went thru the Canal. We are doing a city tour/cliff diving tour offered by the ship. I would never, never go anywhere alone in that town. Do you remember what nights were formal? We want to eat in the Supper Club and we want to do it on a formal night and want to make reservations as soon as we get on the ship. Your pictures of the other two ports are wonderful. In both of those ports we want some beach time. We are from cold snowy Utah and are really looking forward to a sun break.

]]> By: Candi http://www.violetcottage.com/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/comment-page-1/#comment-869 Candi Sat, 10 Feb 2007 00:36:33 +0000 http://www.violetsareblue.net/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/#comment-869 I was on this same cruise a year ago. I agree with you about Acapulco. We were fortunate, we found a suburban and driver to take all 8 of us around the town for the whole day for $80.00 he did such a wonderful job I got his business card so if I ever go back I can call before I go. I think you are correct that Carnival really needs to inform people how pushy they are there. I did listen to the shore talk and they did mention being very careful, but I think it should be a bit stronger. We loved Zihuatnejo. Manzanillo we went to the pyramids wonderful excursion. Glad you salvaged the rest after Acapulco. Thank you for posting this for future and past cruisers. Candi I was on this same cruise a year ago. I agree with you about Acapulco. We were fortunate, we found a suburban and driver to take all 8 of us around the town for the whole day for $80.00 he did such a wonderful job I got his business card so if I ever go back I can call before I go. I think you are correct that Carnival really needs to inform people how pushy they are there. I did listen to the shore talk and they did mention being very careful, but I think it should be a bit stronger. We loved Zihuatnejo. Manzanillo we went to the pyramids wonderful excursion. Glad you salvaged the rest after Acapulco. Thank you for posting this for future and past cruisers.

Candi

]]> By: carrie http://www.violetcottage.com/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/comment-page-1/#comment-868 carrie Fri, 09 Feb 2007 23:47:28 +0000 http://www.violetsareblue.net/blog/2007/02/07/cruising-the-pacific/#comment-868 Yes, you have to do the paid excursion to swim with the dolphins in Ixtapa (it's about $180 per person but well worth it). I would suggest doing the later of the two tours (the one starting at about 1:00 pm instead of 9 or 10 am). The first tour in the morning was packed and we had a smaller group of 6 in the afternoon so we spent more one-on-one time with the dolphins. Your trip could be different, but we found that we got lucky being in the afternoon excursion :) Also, try to schedule your excursions right away! The have a little meeting the first or second day at sea about the excursions... check it out and schedule your excursions then... we tried to get into two other excursions and they were sold out so be on top of it :) ESPECIALLY in Acapulco... it's a scary city, make sure you take a Carnival recommended excursion :) Have FUN!!!!! If you have any other questions I'd be happy to answer!! Yes, you have to do the paid excursion to swim with the dolphins in Ixtapa (it’s about $180 per person but well worth it). I would suggest doing the later of the two tours (the one starting at about 1:00 pm instead of 9 or 10 am). The first tour in the morning was packed and we had a smaller group of 6 in the afternoon so we spent more one-on-one time with the dolphins. Your trip could be different, but we found that we got lucky being in the afternoon excursion :)

Also, try to schedule your excursions right away! The have a little meeting the first or second day at sea about the excursions… check it out and schedule your excursions then… we tried to get into two other excursions and they were sold out so be on top of it :) ESPECIALLY in Acapulco… it’s a scary city, make sure you take a Carnival recommended excursion :)

Have FUN!!!!! If you have any other questions I’d be happy to answer!!

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