Ports of Call

Don't take this cruise if you are hoping to visit exotic Mexican ports of call with authentic culture and tours of ruins and antiquities.  We're talking Cabo San Lucas here, folks.  If you like Margaritas, shopping for t-shirts and silver jewelry, and haggling with locals for just about everything, well this is the cruise for you. The quality of the jewelry steadily improved as we moved south.  Puerto Vallarta had by far the best quality and selection of fine silver and Tanzanite jewelry.  The beaches were so so, nothing compared to Cancun, the Carribean or Tahiti, etc.

Mazatlan was definatley our least favorite port of call.  You have to take a 10 minute taxi ride from the ship to the shopping district, which consists of roughly four blocks of the same old souvener and jewelry stores. We took our only shore excursion in Mazatlan, which was the shopping and beach tour.  The shopping was avareage and the resort where we had lunch and spent the afternoon was definately a mid-to-low range property.  Lunch was pretty good, I have to admit.

We met a great couple, Chris and Nicki, at the Captain's Cocktail Hour.  We spent our days in Mazatlan and Puerto Vallarta together, and had a wonderful lunch at an authentic restaurant in Puerto Vallarta named  Los Arbolitos, which served excellent seafood and chicken fajitas.  The cold beers went down very smooth.