Mexico

We took a cruise to Cabo San Lucas for Spring Break. Everyone thought it was extravagant. It was. When I was g-chatting with Sienna and Austin a few days before I left, I was in the midst of finals and I hadn't showered in who knows how long and I hadn't seen the light of day for a week as I was glued to my desk studying, but Sienna said - don't feel sorry for her, she's going to Cabo. So it's true. We sailed on the "Carnival Elation." It was fun. And the cruise went to great lengths to make sure we knew we were having fun. The daily print out of activities was called the "fun times" the pool area was called the "fun deck" the musical program had huge block letters spelling out "FUN" on the stage and Cruise Director Steve only referred to the boat as the "fun ship."


There were a few pools on the boat. It made me think about how unsustainable cruise ships are. It's more fun when you don't think about it. Although, I was happy to learn that the ships no longer dump raw sewage into the ocean. We're makin' progress! (as Bush would say).

Anyway, I tried to tan. It didn't work. I couldn't help but re-lathering my sunscreen every 10 minutes. Our friend Deats was like, wait, aren't you from Hawaii? I said, being from Hawaii doesn't change your genetic make up. He didn't get it.



My favorite part was the time we spent in Los Cabos. The ocean was beautiful. The marina area was cute. In the picture above you can kind of see our cruise ship waaaay in the background above the rock. Los Cabos is pretty touristy, but I still had fun practicing my Spanish. I tried to bargain down the price of a regalo I was buying for my mom, but señor would not have it. I said "pues, es todo lo que tengo." He said, "es todo lo que tienes."






Hoku loves ATVs so she wanted to do a "land excursion." I wasn't that sure I was going to have fun, but it was actually way better than I though it would be. We went on tandem ATVs so it would be cheaper, but we took turns driving. I liked that we got out of the touristy areas of the city and into the mountains. My favorite part was all the cacti. It felt very..."mexico."



We took a little boat out to see the arch and went snorkeling. The snorkeling was pretty good. I would say it was definitely as good as Shark's Cove. The masks kinda fogged up a lot, though, and they made us wear these awkward blue life vest things. Enrique said I didn't have to inflate it if I didn't want to, which I didn't. But this Mexican lady on board kept yelling at me to "inflate tu veste!" I told her I was just going to leave it, but she wasn't happy about it. On the way back, two giant humpback whales swam right up to our boat (I couldn't get a good picture though.) Our captain "Brian" (is he American?) jumped out so he could snorkel with the whales. Right. I suggested we sail away and leave him there.


At dinner every night we sat with these guys from the University of Utah. When we asked them how they liked Salt Lake City they said, "Well, aside from the Mormons, it's awesome." It made for some interesting dinner conversation. They made fun of Mormons for liking pizza and ice cream (in place of alcohol). I was like, whatever, pizza and ice cream are delicious. Get with the program.

Thanks Austie and Dad for the blue ray bans. I'm happy that I finally got to be in some sunshine so I could use them. I hope Spring is here to stay.