Volume 33

SUNDAY NEWS
January 10, 2010

Los Angeles

We were happy we got to spend some time with Alyssa and Karl’s younger brother Mark and his girlfriend Marie. One night we went to dinner at a Brazilian Churrascaria (steak house) prior to leaving on the cruise.



On another night we went to see the Glory of Christmas which is performed at the Crystal Cathedral. It is the story of Christmas performed with great music, fantastic sets and costumes, flying angels and live animals. Vayden was not being her good natured self that night so Karl had to take her outside. The cast was very nice to her. A lot of the cast is outside at times during the show and Vayden did get to meet some of them including all three wise men. One of the wise men actually held her for a bit and Vayden got to touch one of the camels and several of the other animals.

When we got back from the cruise we went the famous PhiliPpe’s and downed a dozen French dip sandwiches.
After Philippe's we walked Olvera Street. We also went to Hollywood and the ‘Walk of Fame’ We met some stars as you can see by the pictures in the Photo Addendum. We also drove to Beverly Hills and Rodeo Drive.

Walk of Fame
We also went to the El Teypeyac Café for some of the best Mexican food you can find. We ordered a Manuel Special Burrito and two tacquitos which fed all of us. The taquitos come with about two cups of guacamole. The Manuel Special Burritto weighs about six pounds.


El Tepeyac is in deep East Los Angeles. We needed a few thing for the hotel so we stopped by an El Mercado in East Los Angeles near the El Tepeyac Café which is an experience Lori will remember. There were armed guards, no one spoke English and the formula which we wanted to buy was locked up. Blonde Lori was wearing a pink shirt and hat and stuck out like a sore thumb. Even the manger approached her confused by her presence there. He must have thought she was lost. We didn’t end up getting the formula out from under lock and key, but we did buy the kids a pack of Canel’s Mexican gum and some pork rinds which they loved and ate for the rest of the trip.


Karl, Christian and Vayden went to the Museum of Natural History one morning.


Lori, Brittney and Shelby went down to the Santa Monica pier one evening.



After all the hustle and bustle of being down town Los Angeles for several days with all the crowds, standing in line, valet parking we thought it would be nice to go somewhere calmer. We stopped by Whittier, ate at Rocky Cola Cafe and spent an afternoon at Penn Park before meeting up with Mark and Marie at Miss Knott’s Famous chicken restaurant. The chicken and the boysenberry pie there is deleicious. But the real star is the biscuits, butter and boysenberry jam.


As an explanation for these shirts, Mark as many of you already know is battling a brain cancer right now. While mark was still medicated and in the hospital to undergo surgery to move his brain tumor, he nick named his brain tumor (bt) ‘ben thomas’ for some reason. The name stuck and the shirts followed.

Volume 33 - Photo Addendum 1

Photo Addendum 1

Julia
Jack
Robin
Brad
Steve

Volume 33 - Photo Addendum 2

Photo Addendum 2

Volume 33 - Photo Addendum 3

Photo Addendum 3

Here is to the best son parents could ask for.


Christian is funny, he inisited on packing a variety of dinner attire. He said he needed to look good for the ladies.

He came up with this getup himself.

Volume 32

SUNDAY NEWS
January 3, 2010

HAPPY NEW YEAR! December was busy and went buy fast. We realize that we haven’t issued any new editions of the SUNDAY NEWS since mid- November. We had a nice quite cozy Thanksgiving. Food, football, naps and movies ruled the day. Lori celebrated her birthday last month.

Karl got her an IPod Touch, which she can’t seem to put down. She is addicted to the game Bejeweled.

While we got news reports of recording breaking snow storms around the country, we enjoyed a non-traditional Christmas a
board a week long Mexican Riviera Cruise.







We have loaded a lot of pictures and stuff this week, so be sure to click on OLDER POSTS at the bottom right when you get to the bottom of the blog. Don’t stop until you finish with the Bonaventure.

The Splendor


Carnival Splendor is one newest and the largest Carnival ship. It has a retractable sky dome that covers the pool deck, which was perfect for our trip since it was a little cool on the days we were furthest north close to Los Angeles. The 113,300-ton Splendor is designed around the theme of "splendid things," a celebration of the magnificent, lustrous and elegant. Pink is thematic color throughout the entire ship. Everything is pink, even the wood banisters are stained pink. The girls really liked that. Lori seems to have the luck at seas. She won money again in the on board Casino.

Puerto Vallarta
Our first port was Puerto Vallarta and we really liked Puerto Vallarta. Puerto Vallarta enjoys over 300 sunny days a year with temperatures averaging right around 83 degrees. Puerto Vallarta is situated on the same latitude as Hawaii and enjoys a similar sunny and tropical climate. Because Puerto Vallarta lies on Bahia Banderas, the second largest natural bay in North America and has over 100 miles of coast line, it is a haven for anyone who enjoys any type of beach activity. The surrounding jungle is also beautiful. In fact the Arnold Schwarzenegger movie, ‘Predator’ was shot just up the hill from the resort we visited.

We started the day with an early trip to a Mexican Wal-Mart where everyone spoke Spanish and the prices were in pesos. Then we took a taxi from Wal-Mart down the coast about a half an hour to the Barcelo Mismaloya All-Inclusive Resort.

Mismaloya
Mismaloya is a secluded bay and beach down the coast carved out of the jungle mountainside. There is a freshwater river that flows into and by the resort as it joins with the ocean on the beach. Brittney said the resort was the most beautiful place she has ever been. It would be hard to argue with that. This place exceeded our expectations.

We had reserved a room for the day so Vayden could take naps. We were given room 218. This room was spectacular. It made it difficult to go back to our little rooms on the ship after spending time in this palatial room. The room probably had square footage just shy of our house. It also had a great walk-in shower with water that cascaded down from the ceiling. The shower was about the size of our entire master bathroom back home. Both Brittney and Karl agreed it was the best shower either one of them had ever used. We are sure that Lori would have agreed, but she never used it. We tried to get her to take a shower just for the experience, but Lori said she didn’t need one.
Since we were guests we were able to use the all-inclusive amenities. The resort had multiple lagoon-style pools with a waterfalls and a rock-garden islands sheltering swim up bars and spa tubs. There is also a family pool bordered by rock waterfalls and a children's pool featuring a waterslide. There is also a sports pool, and other spa tubs. We had access to snorkeling gear, boogie boards, and kayaks. We were able to use all the facilities including chairs, hammocks, towels and most importantly the Mexican buffets and all the on-site restaurants as well as ordering all the poolside snacks and tropical drinks we wanted.

Vayden fell in love with the ocean and the waves at this resort. She spent quite a bit of time in its gentle surf.

Karl and Christian snorkeled, climbed rocks and played with crabs. Lori, Shelby and Karl took a walk along the beach and saw a baby turtle as well as met up with a three legged puppy name Osso.

Since out ship did not leave until 10:00 p.m. we were able to have dinner there and enjoy the beauty of this place at night as well. We all agreed that we definitely need to go back to this beautiful place and stay. There were too many things to do and not enough time. Other recreational opportunities included such things as the use of bicycles and the many trails nearby, tennis courts, fishing, and volleyball both in the sand an in the pool. There was a playground on site for Vayden. There is also the opportunity to purchase banana-boating rides, parasailing flights, Sea-Doo and other personal watercraft rides.

Of note, there was a famous movie filmed here at this location in 1964 starring Richard Burton and Ava Gardner called “The Night of the Iguana”. We visited what is left of the old movie set.

Los Arcos

Less than a mile up the coast from the resort are three giant offshore rock formations that comprise Los Arcos National Park where we went to snorkel. The name Los Arcos (The Arches) comes from the arching caves and grottoes that have been carved out by time and the pounding surf. The area is now a federal underwater park and eco-reserve. It has some of the best underwater exploring along the coast. These small islands and surrounding reefs, tunnels, caves, and arches are teeming with marine life. We saw a wide variety of sea life. When we first jumped in, our guide threw some bread to attract the fish. Some of the fish were pretty large and there were so many fish surrounding us that Shelby started screaming.