Iguanas, Macaws, and Capuchins oh my!

We arrived in Roatan, Honduras and took a trip to Gumbalimba Park. The big selling point for me was the description that indicated there were monkeys eager to be cuddled and held.

It was a nice tour through the park. They had an insectarium, a cave/museum with a brief history of the island, a swinging bridge, and animals!

 

 

This park provides a program that rescues and rehabilitates animals which is a big win in my book. 

They had animal trainers which helped us pose with the macaws for pictures. 

 

My favorite was definitely the sweet little Capuchin monkeys. They would just climb/jump up on you and jump from person to person. The trainer would give them sunflower seeds as treats so sometimes I would hear crunching in my ear and see shells falling around me. 

 

 

So stinkin’ cute though!! Definitely recommend!

Unbelizeable

We stopped in Belize and had two excursions planned. The first was snorkeling and the second was Altun Ha. 

When we first planned the trip I had been looking forward to snorkeling, but since my great experience with scuba I felt like snorkeling wouldn’t compare. I’m happy to say I was wrong. :)

The barrier reef was absolutely stunning and it’s the second largest in the world. I absolutely loved seeing the beautiful life underwater. There was a lot more to look at in Belize than in Cozumel, but both were super cool. 

We went with a company called Chukka. I really loved my time in the water and the guides. The only thing that was confusing was that when there’s a big group of people the guides were always yelling (speaking loud)… I never knew if they were yelling to me or someone else which was kind of annoying. I would pop my head out occasionally just to see who they were talking to.

 

 

After snorkeling we went with Chukka tours again to see Altun Ha. 

The Altun Ha Mayan Ruins are a beautiful example of the Mayan architectural accomplishments. It’s one of the most famous Mayan Centers founded around 900 bc. It was a critical trading post for the Mayan Civilization at the time.

Cozumel

We arrived in port a day early due to someone on our ship having a medical emergency.  We had an unplanned extra half day in Cozumel. 

We basically just walked around a bit and it was a typical cruise port with shops and pushy vendors. 

The following day though was our planned excursion day. 

Background: 

Mike has been scuba diving before and has loved it… I, on the other hand, swore I would never scuba because it scared the crap out of me.  There are so many things you have to learn and remember -it was very intimidating, but I decided to try it anyway. 

We went scuba diving with Sand Dollar Sports. Our instructor was a man named Sergio and he spent 30-45 minutes going over scuba basics. 

We then geared up and started practicing in the shallow waters. Once we were “tested” on different techniques we learned we went further out.

The max we were about to go was 25 feet and I loved (almost) every minute of it.  I’ve never done anything like it before so it was (quite literally) a whole new world for me.

I really liked this company and our instructor/guide. I felt safe and at ease the entire time. 

Mike attatched our GoPro to his vest so he got some video of our dive. Here are a couple of stills from our time in the water:

After we went scuba diving we toured the ruins of San Gervasio. It has been considered the center of pilgrimages where Mayans worshipped the goddess, Ixchel. Not only was it a sacred center it was also a site for commerce of the area. Here are some photos from the site:

Cruise time

As most of you know, Mike and I didn’t have a BIG trip last year… we had lots of small(er) ones. I’ve been itching to do a BIG trip again so sometime in the middle of last year I started looking up cruise options. I just so happened to stumble upon an itinerary I really liked: Central America. 

Central America was never high on my bucket list (if even on there at all) , but I had never been to Central America (or Caribbean until last year)… I loved the idea of a cruise for a couple reasons:

1. I love that your hotel comes with you wherever you go. You don’t have to worry about transportation from place to place or figuring out where you’re going to stay.

2. A cruise allows you to hit multiple countries easily.

3. It’s more relaxing. I would say most of my travels are never really “vacations” in the fact that there is no relaxing involved… it’s usually always go, go, go. 

The particular itinerary I saw was from Viking. I had always heard amazing things about Viking, going back to when I interned at a travel agency.  I loved that it was a smaller ship (around 900 people) and I loved that there were no kids on board. They seemed honest in their sales pitch and although it was more pricey than some of the other cruise lines, I felt it would be worth the money. 

I will wait to do my final review of Viking towards the end of our trip, but here are some photos of our ship, the Viking Star:

 

The Viking Star

The pool

The infinity pool

place to eat

Our bedroom

The atrium

Our bathroom