Ya Mon, Welcome to Jamaica

We should have planned an excursion in Jamaica, winging it was not a good idea.

We got off the ship around 9:30AM in Montego Bay. We hopped on the "bus" for 5 USD per person to the city centre about 15 minutes away from the terminal. As soon as we got on the bus, we were pitched a city tour for 20 USD per person. It sounded like there would be a lot of shopping stops so we passed on the tour and got off at the city centre. We didn't make it two feet off the bus before random people started offering us anything from taxi service to tours to marijuana to "brownie".

We walked along the Hip Strip. It wasn't that hip. It was mostly run down souvenir huts. We came across Doctor's Cave Beach first which charged 5 USD per person entrance fee but we wanted to explore the rest of the town. Later we found out there wasn't much to explore. The second beach we came across seemed like a public beach with no fences. The water was gorgeous but the beach was really dirty and full of garbage. The third beach we came across was again gated. It appeared also to be an amusement park with a rusty go cart course and played really loud music.



Offering of Jamaican "hospitality" continued every couple of minutes as we walked along the strip as if we were a moving target. At the Old Fort Crafts Market, we got dragged into endless souvenir shops that all sold the exact same things. The Old Fort itself was very underwhelming. It consisted of two tin like canons on tracks. This one looked like it was protecting the people in case of an invasion from the flower bush.


By the time, we walked by the second market which, was the Montego Bay Market, we avoided it like a plague. The sun was very brutal. I got myself a refreshing coconut by the road for $2 USD. It was the best part of my day.


Then we were followed by a man who claimed he was not a riff-raff and showed us his passport with a bunch of Japanese visa stamps in it. I think he wanted to show us the city or something and walked along (followed) with us for more than 15 minutes. He told us the reason no one has bothered us yet because we were protected by him. We took a chance and told him we liked to be left alone.

It wasn't even noon yet, we had already ran out of the things to see. Montego Bay is a world famous tourist destination but so far it can only be described as lacking charm and run down which really surprised me. On top, the constant harassment really made us regret not going on an excursion with the ship. At this point we tried to seek out a tour company to see if there was still a tour we could get on and do but it was too late. Nothing that we could do that would get us back on the ship on time.

We were bored and hot so decided to turn back to the "famous" Jim Buffet's Margaritaville for some cold drinks, lunch, and most of all wifi! The place was a tourist trap in the worst way. Packed with tourists, the young spring-breaker types, tacky decor, and expensive drinks and food. We wanted to turn back, but it meant going back on the street to those tourist pirhannas. We did manage to get a good table: ocean side and far from the 18 year olds.









I had the jerk chicken. It wasn't too bad but I was sure it wasn't authentic. We did pass by a place later called Pork Pit with a giant outdoor BBQ and lots of local eating there. I really kicked myself for not find it sooner. The place smelled really good.


To go back to the ship, we just hailed a street taxi which was very convenient. We negotiated a lower rate than this morning, $3 USD per person. When the taxi driver dropped us off, he said to me as I paid him "don't let the police see you pay me". Ya man, no problem! I can't say I loved MoBay. Maybe it was due to our poor planning or lack of time. I was glad to be back on the ship in time for an afternoon nap.

Tonight our cabin guy left a frog!


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Location:Montego Bay, Jamaica

Day 2 at Sea

After breakfast we hung out on our balcony instead of fighting for a deck chair on the sun deck. It also kept me out of reaching distance of the yogurt/ice cream machine. I think it worked out well!




But of course we couldn't sit still for too long. We decided to join the trivia games by the casino. We did pretty bad. Who knew the most popular cat name in America is "Kitty" (our guess was Chairman Meow). We faired a bit better in movie trivia and got 17 out of 22 correct.
After another gut busting lunch, we headed to the sun deck. We were surprised we didn't have to fight for a chair, so more vegging around.
The best part of a sea day is always dinner. I had sushi to start. The tuna seaweed salad roll was very tasty and different.




I ordered Indian Vegetarian for dinner. The spinach paneer, curry and chutney were surprisingly delicious and very authentic. It even came with fried papad and yogurt.








Our cabin crew left this creature. We think it was a rabbit in a rather compromising position.




Tomorrow is a shore day in Montego Bay, Jamaica. We have no excursion planned, just going to wing it.
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Location:Gulf of Mexico

Day 1 at Sea

The major difference between travel and vacation is I can sleep in until whenever I want and still make it in time for breakfast. We headed to dining room and were sat at a long table by the window with three other couples. Half way through, I really noticed the familiar mid-west accent from the couple next to us. Turns out they were from Detroit. Being originally from Windsor, across the Detroit River, that accent was especially endearing to us.

The couple was very sweet, but almost predictably American. They like to drive six hours to vacation at their cottage up north and thought there was no need to travel anywhere else since America has everything in her back yard. I agreed partially that America is a very diverse country with unique and interesting culture from coast to coast. But you just can't get Ethiopia in Idaho or Vietnam in Texas. The husband then went on to say we should explore "our country" more. I nodded and said "in our case, our neighbour's country.". He laughed and said "we are the same."

We finished our breakfast at this point and said see you around to our American friends. It was time to get some much needed sun.

We made our way to the top deck and walked around twice looking for free deck chairs. But I guess there were disadvantages of waking up late. People were very protective of their deck chairs. We finally found a couple of chairs, the relaxation was on!






There are always photographers running around taking photos as you walk by. These photos then are posted in the photo gallery for purchase. We browsed through them looking for the really funny ones. But I must admit most were very cheesy, especially the ones with the fake backgrounds. Why didn't people just go to a Sears portrait studio.



The sunset on the ocean was again a pretty sight that I never get sick of.


Today's dinner was LOBSTER! I could've had two (which my husband did). I wanted to save room for desert. Our dinner conversation with our dinner mates Timothy and Reneesia mostly involved food and weird food. Reneesia and I bonded over the fact that heads of crawfish, fish and lobster were the best part and most tasty of the animal. The husbands were not impressed.


After dinner we went to see the adult only comedy shows. We were joined by a couple from Alabama. They were very seasoned cruisers with 16 cruises under their belt. They even recognized a few of the staff. They are going on an Alaskan cruise in September with an overnight stop in Vancouver. We gave them some tips of must sees and generously bought Greg really really big Foster beers.

It was a beautiful night on the ocean and I was again hungry after the comedy shows. Thank God for the 24 hour pizzeria and late night grill. We ended up grabbing popcorn (and fries) and watched Dances with Wolves on the pool deck.


Time for bed. Our cabin server left this on our bed. I had no idea what sort of animal this was suppose to be...


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Location:Gulf of Mexico

Carnival Easter

Today was our big Carnival cruise day! We slept in and took our time checking out of the hotel. We decided to drop off the luggage at the Carnival terminal first. The taxi there was again a flat rate of $7 per person. The drop off was a bit chaotic. It took us awhile to figure out we needed to grab hold of the men in flower Hawaiian shirt to check in our bags.

We didn't want to check in and board to the ship already. Instead we headed back to Bourbon street for the Easter parade and lunch.

Easter parade starts at Canal and Bourbon street so we picked a restaurant with a good street view for lunch and people watching, Le Bayou. For appies, it was Boudin Balls. It was a lot of different things like pork, shrimp, cheese etc. rolled into a ball form and fried. It was pretty tasty. But what isn't when it is in a ball form and fried.



Since i can't have raw oyster, we had them cooked: Charcoal oyster ya-ya. They weren't as good as the raw ones.




For the main, we shared the Taste of New Orleans which consisted a sample of three cajun food signature dishes: Gumbo, Étouffée, and Jambalaya. Étouffée was my favourite.



The Easter parade started as soon as we finished our meal. We headed onto the street to watch it and maybe catch some beads.

I think New Orleans is single handedly keeping China alive. I can't believe how crazy people got over 50 cent plastic necklaces and trinkets.









We scrolled back to the terminal around 2PM to embark on our 7 day fun in the sun. As we boarded, we were given a card that served as our room key and on board credit card with our dining info. It was very handy, but also potentially very expensive.


Lobby of the Carnival Conquest.


Beautiful sunset.


Towel Easter bunny with chocolates.



First cruise dinner: sweet and sour shrimp with noodles.


Lava cake with vanilla ice cream. Yummy!


I have a feeling future posts are going to be full of food photos. Our tables mates were a couple of grandparents from Lafayette, two hour drive from New Orleans. They looked way too young to be grandparents.

After dinner, we finished off the night with going to the Welcome Aboard show at the main theatre. The opening song and dance was very cheesy and felt like they were shoving "fun" down my throat. They brought on a couple of comedians for a preview of their upcoming shows on the ship. They were pretty entertaining.

Tomorrow is going to be a good day to get some sun, catch up on some reading and of course, more eating.

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Location:New Orleans

The first taste of the Big Easy

We landed in New Orleans just before 2AM. The warm breeze really agreed with me, I was officially on vacation! There was an airport shuttle which was $20 per person ($38 round trip) but the taxi was a flat fee of $33 to downtown New Oleans, so we hopped into a cab playing cool jazz. The taxi driver listened to her iPhone the whole way. I wonder what she was listening to?

By the time we checked into our hotel, it was well pass 3AM. We kicked off our shoes and ran towards dreamland.

The morning came with tons of sunshine and sights of people gathering by the pool side. I was excited to get out. I must admit the biggest appeal of New Orleans was the food. We made a bee line for THE Bourbon street. I could smell the street from a couple of blocks down, a smell of garbage unfortunately. But you get use to it after awhile.




We picked Bourbon House as our first restaurant and oyster po-boy sandwich as my first meal in New Orleans. The fried oyster inside the French bread was very flavorful. Even the fries was seasoned with cajun spicies.


We spent the next few hours exploring the rest of the French Quarter and walking off the food.



Not sure what type of street art this was suppose to be...









The French Market was full of hand made craft, lemonade stands, home made ice cream, and... raw oyster bars. I was salivating watching fresh oysters being cut open and drizzled with lemon and Tabasco. Unfortunately, I couldn't enjoy them since I'm almost 6 months pregnant.



We had to settled for cooked food for dinner at Montrel's by the river. We had crab cakes to start.



Although I couldn't eat raw oysters, I was able to eat this! All 3 lbs of it! I have been looking forward this since we booked the trip. Since it was also the season, the boiled crawfish doesn't get any better!!! I could've eaten another 3lbs, so finger licking good.



We decided to save the jazz bars for another night and pack it in early to make up the lack of sleep last night.


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Location:New Orleans

Going on the Road again... Water, actually

I will be on the road again, more on the water actually, in less than a week! I am heading to New Orleans and then hopping on a 7 night carnival cruise to Jamaica, Mexico and Cayman Islands.

I am excited to be hitting the crawfish season in New Orleans and other tasty southern food.



This will be my first cruise. It has been awhile since I have taken a beach vacation. I am looking forward to getting some sun and much needed R&R.




More food and beach photos to come very soon!!

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Temple Fair

It is now officially year of the dragon! The parking lot was littered with last night's fireworks bits in the morning. I wondered if the cars with alarms still had any juice left.



The start of the new year marks the start of temple fairs. Although temple fairs rarely happen at temples anymore, the name nevertheless has stuck. These fairs are full of traditional Beijing snacks, folk art, performances, acrobatics, and useless trinkets and toys.

There are at least 7 or 8 different fairs around Beijing area. We decided to check out Ditan, the biggest one. The entrance fee was 10 RMB (1.7 CAD) per person and opened from 9 to 5PM daily for 1 week after New Year's day. Ditan was packed full of people, shoulder to shoulder. We had to fight our way through to every booth but it definitely felt like new year!

Decorated gore, a folk art craft.




Really not sure what this is suppose to be. We even came across a guy dressed up as this character. Hmmmm....




A sedan ride around the park.




This I found really funny. All the bamboo sticks sticking out of the garage bags were from the thousands of BBQ meat skewers sold at the fair.





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Location:Beijing, China

Happy New Year

The loud cracking of fireworks hasn't stopped since this morning. The neighbourhood is in full throttle welcoming the year of the dragon. Our family is celebrating the New Year in Beijing this year. Due to lack of space, we decided to host New Year dinner in a restaurant. I must admit I was a little disappointed. Small part of me was looking for that childhood memory of what New Year should be like.

During the day we cleaned the house. It symbolized a clean "sled" to start the new year. Dinner was great. Fish for a plentiful year, fried pineapple turnover for a sweet year, chicken, braised pork, veggies and of course dumplings! One dish baffled me a bit. Mashed yam set on a potato chip and topped with jam. It was a strange combo, but it tasted light, fluffy, sweet with hint of savory.






When dessert came around, the waitress dropped serious hints that she would like to go home soon and celebrate new year with her family. We felt bad for her and left shortly. As soon as we hit the street we were bombarded with people everywhere setting off even louder and brighter fireworks.

Line of firecrackers just about to be lit.






By the intersection of our neighbourhood, they set up a giant dragon head lantern made out ceramic plates, spoons and cups.






Dragon lantern all lit up at night.






Everyone gathered in front of the TV right around 8 to watch CTV's annual spring festival show. We ate more food like sunflower seeds, peanuts, oranges and candies as we commented on the celebrities that showed up perform, the quality of the sketches, and other random gossip. Minutes before midnight, the neighbourhood became insane. Imagine that the Celebration of Lights wasn't lit up way out in English Bay but rather in the parking lot ten meters away. I felt I could reach out and catch a spark. It sounded like a war zone. Car alarms were going off everywhere. I watched everything like a little kid with my mouth open. People looked like they were having so much fun. I was kicking myself for not buying fireworks too. People didn't stop with the fireworks until close to 2AM.

Fun note, it is tradition that during your zodiac year, you have to wear something red on you all year long. A popular item is red underwear!






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Location:Beijing, China