Hi All! I posted from key west. But it got lost in space, I guess. Yeh, water there was cold. Our dives were nice, but chilly in 70 degree water. Saw a nice big nurse shark. Dives yesterday in Cozumel were spectacular!!! Fantastic drift dive at Santa rosa wall - big turtle. Second dive shallower but incredibly beautiful corals and tons if tropical fishes! I forgotten how beautiful Coz is.

Dinners have been so fun!! We keep getting to eat with FUNsters by coincidence! Margo and Lars in Compass rose and Mike (count Florida) and Pat in Sigs last night! Wonderul, wonderful times sharing storied and delicious food!!

Loving these AM seamails.

WOW, Karen, congrats on the slots win..... just walk away with the ca$h. More shoes??

Kim, your dive sounds FUNtastic!!

Finally I am posting been a busy little bee since arriving on January 3rd.

FIESTA was really wonderful. Regent did a great job. We were all free to wander around the offices and talk with the staff. Saw a model of the proposed new ship I sure hope it becomes a reality. Time will tell.

The dinner at Hughes was excellent and the group had a wonderful time meeting old friends and finding new ones. Mark Conroy was wonderful as usual. Going to be hard to top this one.

The port authorities were not very co-operative and boarding was slow but eventually we got on board and the lunch we had in Compass Rose for the group was worth the wait.

The Mariner is really in good shape and the food we have had has been exceptional. Last night I had the full maine lobster at Prime 7 - absolutely perfect. We have a dream team of senior staff with Captain Felice, Frank Galzy (GM)and Franco in the dining room, plus everyone loves Paul Reynolds, Elsa and Lisa on the social staff. Also lots of my favorites in the crew, Rommel Head Waiter and barman Mario who was the barman we requested to work our big party on MINT when Todd made his famous Cosmos. Todd was delighted to see him again.

Such a wonderful group of people I just wish this cruise was longer as so many great people and so little time!!

Boy, the right name was picked for this group.
Keep the fun coming
Lynn

Have to echo Ngaire's comments, its just been such a fun trip and everyone and everything has been great.

Yesterday we did the Lamania ruins, the jungle boat ride was really interesting and the animal annimations were soooo good. LOL. Today we have decided to not do the Amitique resort and just hang out onboard and have a "sea day". Dinner last night in Signatures with Tom, Mona, Ralph and our friends traveling with us Dick and Nancy. Great dinner, lots of good conversation, food and drink.

Casino has not been as good to me as it was to Karen. We have enjoyed post dinner gatherings in various places with everyone.

Just got informed the internet is cutting off in two minutes, so more later.

checking in before trivia begins. All is GREAT. Nice dinner last night with the Kimmi's, Tonya & John and their friends on board Greg & Vivian. After dinner several of the guys played craps while a large group of us gals kept the casino bartenders busy.
Shortly after midnight Suzanne & Mark came into STARS and we joined in Happy Birthday..although Suzanne kept saying, it's not until 9:42pm tonight. Always lots of fun times.

Yesterday we went on a snorkel excursion, well at least we tried. Half way there one of the engines on the catamaran caught fire (?) and the cabin was quickly smelling of smoke. We turned around and went back to our "mother ship" where a 2nd catamaran was to come 40 minutes later. At that point many of us said forget it and decided to just stay back on the Mariner. No big deal, we'll snorkel tomorrow. It was an UN-Belizeable excursion.

Today we went to Amitique resort. Many who had tickets cancelled because the excursion lady on the TV channel made it sound lousy...brown ocean, not really a 5 star resort as we know it, wouldn't be her 1st choice, etc. She was very wrong and it's unfortunate that she made it sound as if it wouldn't live up to our expectations. It was a wonderful place with what seems like a never ending huge swimming pool, swim up bar, water slides, right on the ocean. The beach was beautiful with lots of bamboo type cabanas for those of us who wanted shade. There was Caribbean type music pool side or if you wanted quiet, there was the beautiful beach. The ocean water temp like a bath tub, probably about 80. Good bar-b-que steak & chicken lunch. They even offer kayaking and horseback riding at the resort. All and all a perfect, very relaxing day. I overheard others say that they plan to inform the destination desk to change the information on the destination channel as not to discourage people from going to this nice island resort. It was an A+

Tonight prime 7...yum yum!!

Apologize for hurrying and probably lots of mispelled words.

What a FUN cruise this is turning out to be. The ship is in great shape, food could not be better,and the fine Mariner staff is taking swell care of us..
Prime 7 tonight. Yummmm

Glad to hear you are all having such a great time! Even so, I keep wishing that you will all just hurry up and get the heck home so I can get onboard!! Just kidding (sort of :p ) enjoy the rest of your days!

I can't believe we only have 2 days left! Others have said it before but this cruise has been perfect. The food, the weather, the seas and the people have just been unbelievable. I have never had weather and flat seas like this, day after day it has been perfection!
Last night was our Prime 7 with Olivia and Teresa and of course I overdid it again!
I had steak tartare and crab cakes for my appetizers and O ordered a platter of crab legs for the table. I pretty much could of stopped there but then I had the French onion soup and surf and turf. And I guess I should mention the Key Lime pie...YUM!!

I always think the food on my cruises is the best I have had each cruise but we haven't had one dish that wasn't wonderful. If it is possible to OD on escargot, I might of done it as we have special ordered it several times and it is the best I have ever had.
I finally got to meet Franck the GM last night, I was so tickeled that he recognized me from LCT! I must say that he does a wonderful job and how very impressed I have been with the food and service. I really do mean it when I say that this cruise tops all my previous ones!

Yesterday we walked to the market and found a jade chess set that we couln't resit. Not sure what I was thinking, it weighs a ton and my suitcases were at the limit before I even left the house! I guess I can put it in my carry on.

Today we are going on the mini rhino excursion, I bet that will be fun. I hope it's not as dusty as the atv excursion that Mark, John, Todd and Mike (what a SWEETIE Mike is, everyone just loves him) went on. I didn't go because you had to drive your own and I could just see me going over a cliff. Anyway, the boys came back to the ship wearing their offical bandanas and their faces were plastered with dirt, I have never seen Mark look cuter. His face was BLACK with crusted on dust and even after his shower he still had bits of dirt here and there. He had a blast so I guess that is all that matters.
When they boarded the ship, Mark said security just stared at them. They probably thought the ship was being invaded by hooligans!

We have dinner with Suzie, Marilyn, Kim and Alice and Teresa tonight. Mark will be one happy camper! :)

I guess I better go wake Mark up, our rhino excursion is an early one.
More later!
PS
No more big wins in the casino yet but each night I have been winning at least $50 and I can' complain!

We are in Costa Maya this morning. The seas are a bit choppy and it is windy. The ship is shaking and bumping around. The captain came on the room pa this morning announcing we might have to leave and continue on to FLL.

Adding we are out to sea now.

that would be a shame, but still fun with everyone. hold on.

I can't believe we were just on the Mariner saying Bon Voyage to y'all, and your cruise is about to end already!
From reading the reports here, you seem to have packed more fun into a week than most people have in a lifetime!

Well, it's official, we are having a sea day today, doubling our leisure time on the Mariner from one to two sea days!

You know the FUNsters won't have any problems with this. We are all just deciding how to spend our remaining SBCs!

Good Morning! We are having lots & lots of FUN with a great bunch of people. Weather has been nice, food delicious, ship is lovely and late nights, after dinner, filled with continuous laughter!! Have taken lots of pixs and will post when I get home. Our 2 night pre stay in Lauderdale was so enjoyable. We have forced sea day today and fine with me as I love sea days. This trip has been everything I expected and more - LCTers are such a neat fun group!!!!

Wonderful time at the pool this morning, saw many FUNsters...then a nice quiet lunch at Compass Rose. This is a wonderful cruise...maybe a little short, but wonderful!

Gil...we'll see you in SRQ, but so sorry you weren't here! YES, it was too short!

All is Swell in Cozumel

We had a slow start to the day, managing to put the crew together for the 'drink of your choice' mile walk before we arrived on time in Cozumel (appropriate, doncha think, since Cozumel means “land of the swallows”?)

The shore excursion (take your own boat out at your own risk) was canceled the night before. We expected to take a short, self-directed walking tour. Instead, we were delighted to meet Cheron and Mark and enjoy a long lunch in Compass Rose. It was then time to at least set foot on terra Mexico. Like many Mexican ports, it errs on the side of basic. We tore ourselves away from the charms of Senor Frog's bargain margaritas in the souvenir half-yard glasses and the opportunity to sport your very own , custom designed twisty balloon headdress.

Cheron put me on to the Mexican vanilla shopping opportunity. “Si, senora! Vanilla for only 5 dollars!” rang from every other store as we continued our walking tour. We then spied the grocery store, and Cheron scored the vanilla for half price. We saved ourselves some grief and came back along the water. We rang up the big win on Trivia – actually had a perfect score until I over-analyzed one of the questions, resulting in a final score of 14.

We followed with dinner at Prime 7 with Ngaire, Ken, Michele and Don. Ngaire clued us in to the Alaska king crab appetizers, which were sublime. I could not decide what to order, finally settling on the oven baked half chicken. Word to the wise: when Ngaire says, “why would ANYONE order chicken here?”, pay attention. It was perfectly cooked, but dry. I chalked it up to another calorie management victory.

The Un-Belizeable Day

We were up bright and early to tiptoe over to Belize City. We were tendering (this should have been our first clue) as the cruise director announced we had one shot to get across before the thundering herd of all-inclusive shore excursion participants required the services of the tender. We hoofed it down to the tender door, where 8 other folks were waiting to visit the city. We had to wait for the rest of the shore excursionees, meaning we lost 40 precious minutes of absorbing Belizian bliss. At last, we head for Jaguar dock at the splendid new cruise ship dock. It was a ghost mall. Evidently three big ships were there the day before .. and we did not look like big spenders. It took some doing to figure out how to get out of the terminal. Once we exited, we had to recalibrate our definition of Caribbean port amenities. Cozumel looked positively swank by comparison. We picked our way through lots of self-styled taxi guide/drivers. We looked at a few colonial era buildings and walked along some of the main streets.

This is the place to get your cut-rate prescriptions. Safety girl says: “do take care. Only shop at the 'officially licensed to sell both drugs and poisons' sign in the window – paired with the 'Ask for Your Favorite Pharmacist' placard. I should think so! No one wants the Z-pack mixed up with the arsenic.

We headed back in time for a lovely pool grill lunch and prepared to board the catamaran for Absolute Paradise. The water was beautifully clear as we pulled away from the Mariner. Our lead guide got through our safety talk “we are going 14 kilometers to the reef, which will take us 5-1/2 days and all the rum punch you can drink”. Absolute Paradise quickly morphed into Absolute Hades as the port side engine sputtered, seized up and poured smoke into the catamaran. I was wearing a size XXL snorkeling buoyancy vest (just snug up that waist strap and you'll be fine .. Umm .. it was still half way up my head) until we safely pulled up to the Mariner. “We'll send another catamaran over and you'll have just as much time to enjoy the excursion” pleaded our crew. I was torn – this might be my last chance for a Caribbean snorkel. The Champ quickly deduced the most relevant information: water temperature. Best guess was 68 degrees. Eeek! Safety Girl made up her mind. 'Where there is smoke, there's a risk of fire. On a boat, this is dire. Alight on the pier and STEER CLEAR.'

The cave tubing excursion, and the air boat excursions, got very high marks from fellow travelers.

We opted for our date night, and decided to be inagural guests at La Verandah's French Bistro menu. We attended Ray Solaris' music and ventriloquist early show, then headed up for un bon diner. Mais non! Tout le monde est ici (French for “it was a stampede”). The food was very good, and I enjoyed a serving of Crepes Suzette for dessert. We turned in early as the total day trek to Tikal would come quickly the following morning.

Yours, Mayan and Hours

Not wanting to oversleep, I was jerked awake at 0430 hours (0 dark hundred for those not familiar with military time). Breakfast was due in our room at 0600. I twisted to grab more coffee and felt an unwelcome twinge of pain in the middle of my back. Oops .. this is not a good development. I decide I will proceed on the planned "Tikal or Bust" 10 hour tour. First step is The Champ (a/k/a Gary) finds most of our group in the coffee bar. We must turn in our tickets together if we expect to be on the same bus. Gary is unanimously voted in as Mom to keep the Nine Niftyfooted Neighbors together. We learn we will fly up with the 23 strong "Guatemalan Gorrillas Group". We crawl through San Tomas, where Belize is now looking like a swanky destination. Every humble abode is enclosed at the property line with fencing - chain link, barbed wire, electric .. take your pick.

Finally, we arrive at a little-used airstrip and are given the Obsidian Opportunity - be prepared to explain, in sufficient detail, why the Mayans would locate Tikal (properly pronounced ti-ka-hol; rhymes with al-co-hol) 33, count 'em 33 km from the second largest lake in Guatemala. There's 1/2 pound of Obsidian waiting for the FIRST person to provide the correct answer.

After boarding our prop jet carrying 34 out of 34 passengers, we enjoy a 30 minute, 3 course breakfast service. Chewing gum trees were a big part of the Guatemala greenbelt, so it was only fitting we got the 2 pack of Chiclets for our dessert course. We were greeted with cold towels, a guava smoothie and a snack box for our one hour ride to Tikal. Cool!

We found our "Lunch is Better than Climbing a Bunch" group van. Two of our fellow passengers joined the NNN - Michele, Don, Marc, Susan, Russell, Andrea, Richard, Anne and Mom.

Julio is our guide, along with Carlos 'El Toro' the driver. His English is superb, but he's a graduate of the 'why use a sentence when a paragraph will do?" tour guiding school. It's his job to let us know lunch is scheduled for 2:30 pm following our Tikal Tiptoe Tour. We are assured we will walk in the shade and do more drive-by then climb-high touring of Tikal. Anne immediately drills Julio with the Obsidian Opportunity - we need the correct answer! Julio obliges with a 45 minute, four possibility answer. Hmm .. no slam dunk for our team. Mom thinks the best answer is for defense reasons.

Julio is negotiating hard and fast to secure the services of a genuine Guatemalan experience - stuff an undersized truck with 13 people in a space designed for 8. We spot the national bird of El Salvador along the way, amidst the bumps and bruises of ancient Mayan walking paths now rutted out due to vehicular traffic. Julio reminds us the driver would appreciate a tip. Our unanimously elected Mom morphs into Dad, who explains to Julio he'd best arrange for our truck to show up at Tower 1.

Ohh . we are greeted by a raccoon like creature whose distant relative must have dallied with a weasel. He's in it to the finish so long as we have munchies. We don't feed him, but there are lots of others who want to toss him a bite or two. We walk up a rutted out hill, and are at the next challenge: sashay through the Lost World. Lacking Indiana Jones and the Bull Whip, we send in our lead explorer, Alabama Marc Levin with the graphite walking stick. He's followed by Texan Bravehearts Michele, Richard, Susan and Russell, armed with the long shot and high tech Canon artillery. Massachusetts Andrea is next in line, with her Canon and Golden Bear Don. Philly Patriots Anne and Dad bring up the rear. We learn about the cardinal points and why East and North beat the pants off of West (emerging underworld) and South (shove the dark beings back into the underworld) as far as Mayans are concerned.

There's a big tourism opportunity scheduled for Dec 21, 2012 (12/21/12) - the end of the 5200 year mayan calendar. Come to Guatemala - either the world will end or they will simply start on the calendar all over again. the Pleides star constellations (the fuzzy stuff around the belt in Orion's constellation) are the only ones who know for sure.

We sally forth and search out the Grand Plaza, where we climb Tower 2, surveying the immediate part of the ruins. The ladders are an OSHA-free experience. Safety girl says 'one slip of the step means personal ruin in the ruins' - sort of steep leads to really steep. Anti-wuss kicks in: I may never return and it's time to scale the stepladders. I get to the top and am rewarded with perfect light and a place to catch my breath. Backing down the ladders, we are greeted with the oscillated turkey, a bird who shimmers as the sunlight glimmers.

Tikal is a breathtaking experience, and well worth doing should your travels take you to Guatemala. We were very glad to see that part of the country. As Marcie said, the other excursion with high marks was the beach resort.

Our truck shows up promptly at 1 pm Guatemala time - 1:30 and we hoot and holler down to the van. Off to our lunch in San Elena, followed by our trek to the airport. We're only 45 minutes late - or early, depending on whether you are Guatemalan or not. Dad is stopped by airport security, being lectured about the danger of the nail file attached to his nail clipper. They snap off the nail file attached to his nail clipper, then allow him to proceed. Alabama Marc, on the other hand, is allowed to board with the claw-tipped graphite walking stick. Go figure!

We finally depart at 3:45 pm and enjoy the 2 course flight back to San Tomas. We missed out on tea time trivia, but saw a breathtaking display of spinner dolphins in the river on our descent to San Tomas from Tikal. All in all, it was a magical experience.

The Slow Row to Ft. Lauderdale

As reported, we are on the Slow Row to Ft. Lauderdale. We've circled the football pool for both the Packers-Eagle game (winner take all; right now Suzie of the Sistahs is in the lead) and the BCS bowl game tomorrow. Hearts was the card game of choice this morning; the constellation theater is broadcasting the Eagles-Packers game right now.

I must sign off - tea time trivia is quickly approaching. Thanks for sailing along with us.

Cheers, Anne

love the report. courses on airplanes! hope the back is ok

Thanks for the reports, y'all.

The b2b sea days will rest you up for the trip home! :mecry: :mecry:

Anne, I know that shopping trip with Cheron was filled with fun. She and I had a good time sweatshirt shopping (say that 3x) in Tasmania on DINGO. Mexican vanilla is so good. :yummy1: Tikal is a place I'd like to visit, but it does sound like a lengthy day trip from the ship. A few years ago, I took the trip to Lake Izabal, but I think it is the largest - quite beautiful. Is the second largest Lake Petén Itzá?

Continue to have FUN and send warm seamail to us getting snow and ice today in the South!

Beth - you are correct! If only I had the obsidian to send you as a parting souvenir of Guatemala ...

The NNN reminded me to include the post-flight security clearance required at the deserted military airstrip. We were kept on the plane while a mysterious can of bug spray changed hands between flight attendant and ground staff. Hmmm .. I've seen them spray the interior of the plane but this is a new take on that idea. We exit the plane to be searched again. The bottom two steps of the bus have towels soaked with bug spray. Rest assured we did our part to avoid introducing highland species into the San Tomas deserted military airstrip microecosystem. Peten, on the other hand, must have been cross populated upon our arrival.

We cooked up a couple of football pools - one for the Packer Eagles game and the other for tonight's BCS game. Winner takes all - and the winner was Harry Hufford!

Tea time trivia was a 3 way tie - all FUNster teams.

The sun is shining brightly. We'll do our best to send some over to melt that pesky snow accumulation.

Cheers, Anne

Greetings from the Mariner!

This trip has been fantastic; we have had the chance to meet so many more wonderful friends and spend time with friends we haven't seen in a while.

After returning to our cabin last night, I learned that FUN may be extended two more days; our flight from Atlanta to Hunstville had been cancelled, we hadn't been rebooked, and when I called the earliest they could rebook us for is Thursday. :eek:

After a half hour on the phone, we did get rebooked for a later flight on Tuesday; still, no idea when flight will actually take off. Alabama is expecting roads to be bad until Wednesday so driving from Atlanta Tuesday night may not be a good option, either.

Marc and other FUNsters,

Looks like the snow/ice storm in the South may keep some of you in FLL tomorrow. Heard from my brother in N. Atlanta and they have 6 inches so far this AM and it's still falling. Good luck and safe travels home tomorrow!

Always a little sad thinking about good byes tomorrow...this has been a wonderful trip and we'll miss all the people we have enjoyed this past week - it sure has been FUN FUN FUN!!!!!

I feel sorry for the Auburn fans stuck at the Birmingham airport waiting for their flights to be cleared to come to Glendale, AZ for the game. We are grateful we came early and are here. Hope everyone has a safe flight home.

Just returned from wonderful Steak Tartar lunch! Thank you Marc for organizing. Wonderful LCT friends, conversation and recounting memories!

It will be hard to say goodbye tomorrow morning.

I am sitting here in the computer room with Kim, waiting to print out boarding passes for tomorrow. All this talk about the weather has me hoping for a hassle free trip home!
This is day 7 of sunny skies, I am not looking forward to the real world weather! ;)

A big thanks to all for the sea mail. Can't say I had as much fun as y'all, but I did enjoy travelling along with you. Hope everyone has a safe journey home. Lee

safe travels. love steak tartare. thanks for the mail.

Yes, Robert....Anne's posts are so fun....admittedly sometimes i have to read them twice.....even before wine. Just over my head!!!
love them though!

We are in the delta club at FLL waiting for our flight to Detroit. I hope we get in there ok and our connecting flight to Boston goes. Our original flight from FLL to Atlanta was cancelled, so we got routed thru Detroit.

We had an awesome time on FUN 2! The cruise certainly lived up to it's name!! It was so great to meet so many LCTers and reconnect with those we met at ho down!

The Sky Club feels like it's rocking

Land mail from the Airport Hilton. :(

Flight cancelled; hotel booked; flight tomorrow.

Cruise was wonderful. We had a long goodbye party in Observation Lounge last night staying long after closing time. Staff were sure glad as we started heading out around 1230. I am sure others were up all night.

We are looking forward to seeing many FUNsters in just six weeks in Sydney. :D

Jerel & I are in the Admirals Club at MIA awaiting our flight to BOS. We should get home just in time for tonight's nor'easter. We were supposed to pick up Tigger from the doggie hotel tomorrow but since the storm will be wailing we will get him on Thursday. We were originally supposed to leave on the 10:10 am flight this morning, but onboard we were told we wouldn't begin disembarkation until 8:45 so I changed the flight. Glad I did because the 10:10 was cancelled this morning due to fog.

Had a wonderful time seeing everyone but 7 days just isn't long enough. I never even saw BettyK!! Unfortunately I wasn't feeling well last night so I didn't get to the farewell party. Luckily I saw Don and Michele in the terminal this morning, Suzie and Marilyn while we were waiting for our ride to MIA, and Mark & Cheron checking in at the airport.

I have lots of pictures of our excursions to post and will hopefully get to it tomorrow since I will be hiding in the house avoiding the snow!!

YIPPEE!! The pictures will be coming! :banana:
Look forward to seeing everyones pictures.

We're at the Renaissance Hotel in Fort Lauderdale, biding time until our next embarkation on HAL tomorrow. Seven days just wasn't quite long enough for us so we extended it with a second cruise. The only problem is we'll be cruising without all our friends :mecry: . We had a great time on FUN2--it was wonderful to touch base with so many old friends and meet a few new ones in the process.

We are home, unpacked and wondering how seven days can go by so quickly! Wish we could have spent more time with the FUNsters - it was great seeing so many of you, and we're sorry we missed others but that means we have the next time to look forward to.

Hope all get home safe and sound!

Margo & Lars

We are home. Drive up I-95 not too bad this morning. It was sad to leave the Mariner and all our FUN friends. Now to get the stuff unpacked and put away. I frankly, would much rather be having another hot stone massage on the ship! :)

Andrea, I missed seeing you too. Don't even know how that happened. Hope you are feeling better.

Hope all the FUNers have a safe trip home.

We are home and unpacked! SW flight was perfect! Hope those heading north get home without too many problems. Have been to grocery store (ugh!)and now doing laundry - try to work on pixs - IF anyone knows answer to this question - I use Kodak and put pixs in my account any idea how to get them to the cruise@yahoo.com site (password cc) once I download to my acct?

We were back in our house by 3 pm. Only about 1-3 inches of snow is forecast for the DC area. But I'm glad we made it home before the storm.

It was a great cruise with a wonderful group of people. Now we have to wait until CANADA in October to see everyone again.

Tom and Mona.

We landed in Boston. Getting rerouted thru Detroit worked out great . we were lucky again getting the flight we did--- the two Detroit to Boston flights after the one we were on were cancelled. The snow is heading our way!!!!