NCL Spirit Photos

The Marchese Family......boarding the ship....ready to CRUISE!

Sunglasses ON.....

Me and Rob...both sporting our New Orleans t-shirts.

(Mine is an Essence Music Festival Shirt and his is NOLA Jazz)

Belize City

Belize City, Belize

July 7th, 2011

Rob and I went on the NCL's excursion called Crystal Cave Tubing And Waterfall Lagoon.  We were lucky enough to be on the first excursion of this particular tour.....before others have not participated in the Waterfall Lagoon part of it!  At the end of our FUN TIMES...they gave us a free hot sauce gift set and a t-shirt for being the first to participate!  FUN...another few free souvenirs!

Our tour guide on our bus with AC was "Flowers"...she was terrific! Very knowledgeable and made our day even more fun with all they history of the area. A strange fact about Belize...they don't have funeral homes...when someone dies their family takes them home with them. The family redresses them and fixes their make-up, etc.......and keeps them in their house until the following day and they are then buried above the ground following a huge block celebration. Death is a celebration for all!

 We got off our bus and hopped on a HOT bus and rode another 5 minutes up a very steep hill. They assured us our other bus would not be able to make it!?!? The forest was so dense and green....it rained on us a little while...but then became hot and muggy again!

 We found all the equipment and got fitted with the goods....vests, helmets and tubes!

 Ready or NOT....here we go!

 We were in a group of 8 people. We had a young tour guide through the caves and he told us if we talked to loud or yelled the crystals may fall from the ceiling....so he was very soft spoken and very hard to hear.

 We walked and walked ~ up and up.....it was WAY HOT!

We were so excited to get to the chilly water in the caves!

 When we got to the very top....we walked back down into the cave to board our tubes.

 Rob had the underwater camera and was the photographer this day!

I am in front of him and ready to get started.

So many stalagmites and stalactites.....simply beautiful!

"cave pearls" and you know how I LOVE PEARLS!!

Rob in his tube...too bad I took the picture backwards and totally missed his tube!

A cool formation called the "waterfall"...not the waterfall lagoon we were to visit next!

Rob loved these stalagmites under the water...he got some great shots of them, too!

Our group tubed through the "waterfall lagoon"...almost impossible to photograph because it was so dark in there...but the lagoon water was a turquoise blue. GEORGEOUS!!!

This is near the exit ...with the light shining in you can kind of see the color of the cave water.

 We walked back up and then down to get back to the main entrance.

 Rob and I ate nachos while the other tours in our group finished.

Back to Belize City to get on the ship... I was so disappointed the restaurant that I loved last time I was in Belize was closed....The Wet Lizard..and I was so looking forward to their Panty Rippa drink! Oh well, there is always NEXT TIME!

 An amazing day together.....now to catch the tender back to our ship!

Goodbye, Belize....until next time!

Roatan, Honduras ~ Our Home Away From Home!

Rob and I have visited Roatan several other times.....unfortunantly this time we could only spend about 8 hours there. It was very hard to do...we wanted to stay another week! We have close friends in Roatan that run a tour guide service...and it is one of the most popular destinations on the island. We ziplined, played with the monkeys, drank monkey lalas and banana sodas, played in the crystal blue water, and most importantly spent a day with friends we consider family!

First things First....this is a Monkey LaLa

The best tropical drink you will ever drink!

Monkey LaLa Recipe

1 oz Baileys

1 oz Kahlua

1/2 oz Vodka

1/2 oz Rum

2 oz cream of coconut

splash of  cream

1 bannana

Pour over a full blender of ice, blend for 60 seconds.

 Ziplining at Mayan Jungle Canopy

(check out the slideshow on the website...you can see my brother, Matt!)

He is the webmaster......and PR guy for Bodden Tours!

Angie

Michael

"My PGA Guy"  ~  Roberto

Sandra

Joseph

"Tia Esperanza" ~ That's me!

The group.....

Rob's brother ~ Paul

Mallory

At the Bodden's New House.....It is just BEAUTIFUL!!

 Their avacado trees were loaded with the fruit...yummy!

Sweet Angie...she has grown so much since we had seen her last!

Rob and Victor

                            

Shelsie, Angie, Me, and Janeth

Angie and Mallory.....Sweet Girls!

Monkey TIME.....

 Birds, Birds, and MORE Birds!

The Lemur

Victor and Janeth's Beautiful New Home

"Mi Casa Es Su Casa"

LOVE!! LOVE!! LOVE!! LOVE!!

 The Boddens took us to Half Moon Bay for Coconut Shrimp...Our Island Favorite!

The Bodden Girls and Michael....Oh, how I hate to say goodbye to our Roatan Family!  The tears started flowing at the house before we came to the resturaunt!  What a sweet family...love them with all my heart!

 Fun at the Beach.....along with Monkey LaLas!

Shopping before we got back on the ship...after we said our tearful goodbyes!

Rob bought me a new John Hardy bracelet from Diamond's International.

Victor's sister and nephew both work there...and gave us a special price!

 Goodbye Roatan...we will be back for a week long visit soon!!