Hola Cabo!!!!

So this is Cabo San Lucas....
This is the most photographed oceanic scene along the pacific coast in Mexico. It's called Los Archos. Very picturesque indeed. I had to get up at 5:30am to get these shots! But it was worth it. Our boat pulled into port right around 6:00am and docked right in front of the rock formations. So cool.
After waking up to that amazing sunrise, we grabbed a bite of breakfast and ran down to deck 4 to disembark. Because the Sea of Cortes is so shallow, the cruise ships can't pull right up to the dock. So they have to use smaller boats, called tender boats, to transport 100 or so passengers at a time from the ship to the shore. It only took a few minutes of waiting and then we were off the ship and on our way to the dock.

We hired a water taxi (a small motor boat...reminds me of a little fishing boat) to take us out to the rock formations and to drop us off at the famous Lover's Beach. This was our first close up look at the cool rock formations. I think it's cool to see the pirate ship passing behind them....

This is a picture of Lover's beach. It was truly beautiful and you can see why it's a favorite for any tourist! We were able to spend several hours here just soaking in the beauty and a little sunshine.
As we made our way to the back of lover's beach, an entire new beach opened up in front of us. This beach was enormous. And we were the only people on it! It was great to have the entire beach to ourselves for a few minutes. Although this beach is beautiful, it has an ugly name. It has been named divorce beach. On this side of the rock formations is the Pacific Ocean. The rough, raw waves come tumbling in and pound the shores like thunder. The ocean is very deceiving because the big waves don't always come in every time. The ocean will bring in 2 or 3 small little hiccups and then all the sudden comes an enormous, frightening wall of water! It's because of the angry ocean that this beach gets it's name. It is the exact opposite of lover's beach, which still has waves, but very small, tranquil, and fun to swim in.

Despite the large waves, this beach was really fun to explore and look at. The backdrop of rock formations that formed this beach were very unique and worn by the salt and sea spray from the ocean. It was really fun to climb around on them and see the amazing shapes the ocean has carved into them.
As you can see from the photos above, the waves at "divorce beach" were extremely large and angry. It sounded like thunder every time the waves crashed. As scary as they seemed to me, apparently someone else thought it looked like nice frolicking water. We saw a girl crying on lover's beach and could not figure out what was wrong with her. She just kept sobbing and sobbing for 15 or 20 minutes. Her boyfriend or husband was trying his best to console her, but to no avail. Finally they hailed a water taxi and left the beach. I asked some people standing near her what she was crying about. They told me that she decided to go for a little swim out in those enormous waves! She obviously had no experience being around the ocean, and frankly no common sense. I guess a big 6 foot wave pounded her and she came tumbling onto the beach like a beach ball. If I had witnessed this event, I'm afraid I would have laughed my head off. Just picturing someone tumbling into shore sounds so funny. I realize there is nothing funny about it and it's a darn good thing she wasn't killed. People, please....don't swim in an ocean that sounds like thunder!!! Just don't do it!!!

The way the sun was cascading over the water and rock mountains made for such a breathtakingly beautiful beach! Such a shame it's too rough to swim in! It was still nice to sit and watch the waves come thundering in.
After spending a few hours at Lover's Beach, we took a water taxi back to town. Our goal was to get a great massage some time on this trip. The ship charges $200 per person and there's NO WAY we were going to pay that much! I also wanted to finish shopping and get the final souvenir's for our family and friends who graciously took care of our children while we were gone. As we walked around the beautiful bay, we found a nice spa that was running a special for massages. We only had about an hour or so left before we had to be back on the ship, so we decided to do a half hour massage. It was soooo relaxing. The 30 minutes zipped by so quickly!

So then it was time to pay. They told us before hand that they accepted credit cards, so we gave them our Visa to charge. They ran it through the machine....denied. Oh, dear I thought. I hope the card goes through. They ran it through 4 more times and it just would not work! What were we going to do now? Luckily, we brought all the cash we had off the ship with us and it worked out to be EXACTLY how much the massage costs. We would be left with only $3.00 left for the remainder of the trip!!! At this point we had 10 minutes left until the last tender boat left for the ship. So we gave them all the cash we had and left. I was sooo bummed. That meant no more shopping and no souvenir buying I so desperately wanted to do.

With some serious jogging, we made it back to the port, just exactly on time. When we got there we could not believe the line!!! It went for at least 3 blocks!!! I think all 2600 passengers were waiting to get back on!!! I told Matt since the line was so long, I could wait in line, while he looked for a pay phone to call the credit card company and find out what was going on. After searching for phones, and using ones that didn't work, Matt was finally able to get through to the credit card company. They said the card was just fine. It must have been the Spa's machine that was not working properly. That was a relief. But still didn't help the fact that we had $3.00 to our name!!!

So sorry Robyn and Teresa!!! You're Mexican souvenirs aren't going to be much!!! But we really did think about you!!!

Here's what the marina looks like in Cabo...it's quite a fun little touristy town...

Here's a picture I took from the water taxi out to Lover's beach. It was so cool seeing this pirate ship through the rocks!!!
Here's another shot of the pirate ship. I just thought I would throw this picture on too, since I love the way the water is sparkling.

So after finally making it back on the ship....we were able to relax a little more. Cabo is very beautiful. It's not because it's green and lush like Puerto Vallarta; but because the rock formations and the color of the sand are breathtaking. I would definitely love to visit Cabo San Lucas again someday. I really liked the cleanliness of the city and the shopping was so great!!! (Even though we didn't get to buy anything!! :) )
So I'm sure all of you are totally sick of the cruise details. I promise, this blog will go back to the same old random thoughts of daily life. I'm just glad I've been so blessed with a husband who loves to travel as much as I do and has been able to take me places I only dream about. One thing I've learned in life is not to take life for granted!