Honeymoon, Day 3

Day 3 (cont.)
So we were upgraded from the regular dolphin encounter to the dolphin adventure.

We were in the water and rubbed the dolphins' bellies, danced and cheered with them, rode around the pool on their bellies and watched them do cool tricks less than 10 feet from us. We even got to feed them fish treats.

It was one of the most memorable things we did.

It was also funny to watch a man in the gift shop freak out when he thought a golf shirt was $495. That's pesos, amigo. HAHA!

When we got back to Samba it was back to our lounging routine. Naps, swimming and eating.

Day 4
The snorkeling trip was earlier than the dolphin trip the day before, so I had to bug Brad to get up early enough that I could get breakfast. The buffet wasn't set up in time, and I was pretty grumpy about that. Luckily they fed us repeatedly on our excursion.

We got on a catamaran for Marina Vallarta around 9 a.m. where we picked up more passengers. We then headed to Las Marietas islands on the northern tip of Banderas Bay. Because I am a geek, I found out about our surroundings. Banderas Bay means Bay of Flags because when Spanish conquistadors sailed into the bay they saw many big feather thingies the locals had put up around the mountainsides. Did you know it is the third largest bay in the world, next to Hudson Bay and the San Francisco Bay?

So Las Marietas are a chain of volcano islands at the northern tip of the bay. They are now an avian sanctuary, but were used in the 1960s as a bomb test site. Jacques Cousteau made a big stink about the whales and they stopped. So that is where we went snorkeling.

Hurricane Lane came through the week before, and the crew said the water was starting to clear up. Nonetheless, it was choppy and hard to see much. Brad was struggling with his deflatable life vest, and I kept getting water in my mask.

We got back on the boat a little early and they fed us HUGE Mexican ham sandwiches and cookies. (They were Mexican because the cheese was different.) They then took us to the south end of the bay to a secluded beach accessible only by boat. There were a few honeymooners' shacks on the cliffs, but other than that it looked like a beach straight out of "Lost."

The catamaran couldn't go all the way to shore, so we hopped out and swam in. I took a life vest as a pool float and just floated around for an hour or so. That part was the highlight of the excursion.

On the way back the crew of the catamaran lip synced to various classics to boost their tips. It was high entertainment.

That's when the cold started to really kick in. I had started to feel the congestion that morning, but trooped through it. Every morning I did stretches to make my back less tight, and after all the swimming I guess it was really tight.

Brad suggested a quick movement to pop it. I centered my chi, then went for it. I crumpled in a heap on the floor. I won't blame it on Brad either, he was just trying to help. I couldn't use my back muscles until I was home again.

Day 5
We began our trek homeward on Friday. We checked out at noon and headed to the airport, where we waited for over an hour for our flight. We played hangman.

We landed in Houston with over an hour until our connecting flight. Little did we know security would take all of that time. Unable to use my lower back muscles, we went as fast as we could through the massive Houston airport to our next gate, where we were just in time to catch a bus to the small jet going to Charlotte. Cool.

I don't remember much once we got back to Charlotte. I drugged myself with Nyquil and slept the entire ride back to Hickory.