Recife

Well we made it to Recife and it was worth the stop.  We both throughly enjoyed the day, be it hot and sticky.

Our privet tour, was suppose to leave at 8 AM, so we had to meet at 7:30 which called for a 6 AM wake up,,,, ugh,, and then the driver was late!  He didn't get there until 9:30, by that time we were all a wee bit aggravated and just about snagged another driver when he showed up.  He did agree to cut the price of our tour by $15.00 each and still take us where we had scheduled to go, to make up.

So we were off on the city tour and a tour of Olinda, very pretty.

The roads are all cobble stone, and the houses all have to stay the way they are archaically, but the people are allowed to paint them what ever color they choose, so it makes for a very colorful community.

They were getting ready for Carnival (Saturday) and that made the traffic horrendous, and the driver had to back up going down some steep hills to make room for trucks carrying huge paper-mache statues.

We went to Ground 0, where Recife started and then we went to the Old Prison, famous now for having lots of little shops in the old Cells.  We managed to find some goodies in the shops there.  As Ed found a very nice jewelry store,,,, just couldn't say no.  :)  So I am now the proud owner of some beautiful fire opal earrings and a spectacular blue topaz necklace, that reminded him of a stone, he bought 50 years ago.

We got back to the ship about 2:30, hot, sweaty and hungry, as we hadn't eaten anything all day except an apple.  So we showered and ordered some lunch and took a nap.

Sail-away, was late, as some of the tours didn't get back, but when it did happen we got to see the Seaborn Quest leave before us.  It was beautiful.

We have two sea days and then it is Rio right in the hart of Carnival!

3rd Sea Day

Feb 24, 2014

Ok here it is the third sea day, and I know I haven't posted anything since the 20th, so I will try to catch y'all up on all the happenings.  I know there are people that find sea days boring, I am not one of them.  It has been pretty much non stop for the last 2 1/2 days.  So I will start where I left off with Trinidad.

Feb, 21

Trinidad & Tobago;  We never saw Tobago, it is too far away,

but we took a tour in Trinidad, it was nice, we went to Mount St. Benedict's Monastery, our tour began with a drive past the Red House, the seat of Parliament, and the Magnificent Seven, a group of extravagant and eccentrically designed mansions.  Only trouble was they were all being refurbished, so all we really say was scaffolding and fences, oh well so it goes.  After going up a VERY NERROW mountain road we made it to the top of the mountain and arrived at the Monastery, and the Pax Guest house, where they fed us some wonderful cake and juice and tea, THAT was very nice.  Then it was down the mountain, to the Royal Botanic Gardens, where we saw some interesting plants and trees, but really didn't have the opportunity to explore this very much.

The bad news was that they rushed us to the busses, so we didn't get to see the dancers on the pier and when we got back they were gone.  So no pictures of "Carnival" dancers here.