Catching up

Saturday was a chill day. We had a port call at Boca de Valeria, but decided to not take the tender in and remained on the ship. A couple of reasons for this: first, Liz and I needed to do some school prep work to get ready for 4 consecutive sea/school days coming up. Second, while the area did look beautiful, the main reason given for stopping here was an opportunity to take photos with local kids who had “pets” with them – sloths, toucans, parrots. They naturally expect a tip for the experience. We weren’t really into that, so we passed.

We spent the morning doing school prep and reading. The library in the ship is spacious and a great place to do this kind of thing. Liz and I managed to snag a couple of treadmills late in the morning to get a bit of a workout in. We still need to pester someone about allowing the boys in there.

At lunch the gentleman who was the maitre’d at Toscana the night we were there for DJ’s birthday served us some water. He recognized DJ and the family and asked when we’d be back to the restaurant. We told him we had reservations for Valentine’s Day and Thomas’s birthday, but nothing before then. He asked if we’d like to come that night, and when we said sure he made the arrangements for us. I thought it was a very nice gesture and spoke highly of the boys that the maitre’d would go out of his way to welcome them back to the restaurant.

We got in a couple of games through the day – Dragonwood, highly recommended as a family game if you are not familiar, and Uno – and then headed to Toscana for our 7:00 reservation. Dinner was wonderful, of course, and I ate too much. We made a few laps around the ship in an effort to walk some of it off. The food is so good I’m really going to have to watch my intake!Read more