Punta Cana Trip

Headed for Toronto on Sunday afternoon. Arrived at the Courtyard Marriott where we had arranged reasonably priced park and fly. This also meant that we could get at least a few hours of sleep before having to be at the airport for 4 a.m. check-in. We had to wait a couple of hours before Julie and Mom & Dad joined us, so we treated the kids (read:Laura) to a bit of shopping at Sherway Gardens. She liked it...it contained 2 of her favorite brand stores that aren't available here. The late arrivals joined us & we all had dinner at Arizona's before an early bedtime.

Arrived at the airport & checked in with no problems. Discovered that our travel agent must have pre-assigned our seating, because we were all together. Uneventful flight & relatively fast flow thru the Punta Cana airport at the other end. Got on the bus that was waiting for us. Only one snag with the bus, they unloaded our suitcases to get other passengers' cases off at a stop before ours, in the same complex, but neglected to put all of them back on. We had to yell & dash for the front of the bus to get them to stop & retrieve our luggage. The three rooms on resort were all together which was nice & two of the three were ready on arrival so we took all our luggage right away & headed for the beach. Mix of sun and cloud, and then we headed for the bar before dinner. Lots of fun, altho I then skipped dinner & went directly to bed.

Julie and I tended to be the early risers, she walked on the beach every morning, while I did some stretching, some kenpo forms & sets and then a run. Jonathan joined me on 2 occasions. And Julie and I used the on site fitness gym to do some weights and I used the treadmill one rainy afternoon. We did get some sun every day, but the first few days were pretty rainy. I got soaked one morning on my run, because I was at the far end of the complex when the clouds unloaded. Probably a good thing, because the sun there is very strong, Dad got his legs badly sun burnt, sitting in the shade!!!!

Evening walks after dinner were usual as well. We walked around the 5 resort complex and on Wednesday evening, Jim & I along with Mom & Dad went to the casino for a bit. No big win, but we had fun. Mom thinks it was the first time that Dad played a slot machine.

Food was good & plentiful. We tended to use the main buffet for breakfast all together, lunch was usually at the open air restaurant, and then a return to the main buffet for dinner as a group. We only used the steakhouse a la carte, to celebrate Jim's birthday. The maid staff decorated our room on that day, they did the towel art to form numbers instead of swans, and there were bunches of balloons. Steakhouse was very good, much better than most a la cartes we've tried while travelling down south.

Mom & Dad took an excursion on Friday. They were gone for most of the day and saw what the country looked like away from the resort areas. They had their eyes opened as to how poor most of the population is, and how much the country depends on tourism. They really enjoyed the trip though.

Saturday we all trekked down the beach to the hut "mall" to give the local economy a shot in the arm. Bit of excitement...Laura picked out the necklaces she wanted to bring back for herself and her group of friends, and then wandered thru the shops with Julie, while we hunted with Jonathan. She was standing in the shade in one shop and fainted! The nice lady there got her some water. We thanked her afterwards and Julie bought an ankle bracelet from her. We think she wasn't drinking enough liquids for the heat & humidity.

Saturday and Sunday were the best beach days of the trip. We spent most of the day on the beach and all got tanned & sun burnt. Dad tried taking out a little sunfish late Saturday afternoon, but had wind problems getting off the beach. He tried again with Laura & Jonathan on Sunday afternoon with a catamaran, and they had a great trip. Jonathan described sailing as "awesome". They sailed all the way around the wreck.

We got spoiled Saturday and Sunday nights at the dinner buffet. Eddy and Antonio were watching for us, had a table all set up for 7 and saved just for us. They made sure we had everything that we needed...kept topping up wine glasses and clearing away dirty plates promptly. Saturday night all the tables were decorated with leaves & flowers, but Sunday we noticed that ours was one of just a few that were decorated. A second look determined that they were also reserved by the wait staff, just like ours. Buffet is always a good choice, lots of options and a chance to try new things. The stewed goat was yummy, lots of amazing seafood and the kids ate fresh pineapple with every meal.

The animacion staff was great. Mom laughed that there was a large group of people whose job entailed getting people up & out of their loungers. And then of course they also perform during the evening shows. We didn't use them much, I did water aerobics a time or two & danced once. Julie & Mom played horseshoes & Mom danced. We all watched one of the "silly games" one afternoon...an obstacle course around the pool involving some swimming, running, walking in swim fins, chugging beer & push ups. Jonathan played a game on the beach that basically amounted to "bowling for booze" and he won a small bottle of rum!

Bus was late on Monday morning, but we got to the airport in time. Seats were again together, and we had time for the kids to grab some Wendy's before the plane ride. The pilot advised us early in the flight that we would make better time than expected, because we were on a Boeing 757 instead of an Airbus 380. That meant we had a lighter load comparitively...larger plane. We also were on the first plane either just in their fleet or maybe even in Canada with these neat winglet additions to the plane wings. Lovely trip and a good time was had by all, but it's nice to be home.

Pictures can be found here: http://s31.photobucket.com/albums/c369/MrsNose/Punta%20Cana%20trip/

Balance

Just to make everything even, Jonathan was the last one in the pool this season. He & I went in after karate class on September 25...water temp was 76F.

May Activities

Pool was opened on Wednesday, May 16th. Water temp on opening was 56F.

Victoria Day weekend didn't have the greatest weather, but we got a lot done outside in the yard. Coolish weather, but ok. Went to the drive-in with the Tymos on Sunday night to see Shrek 3 & Blades of Glory. Shrek was good, the other just had a few moments. Very cold though, even with the back of the van loaded up with pillows, blankets & sleeping bags. Hard frost the next morning.

Jonathan was the first one in the pool this year. He entered on Thursday, May 24th...water temp 72F. Bit of a heat wave got the temp up nicely.


Add on: Just to note that for the 2nd year in a row, the pool temp was sufficiently warm to allow adults to enter the water in May. I was in last night with a temp of 77F!!! Jim was working, otherwise he would have gone in himself as well.

Updates

I guess I should try to remember this kind of stuff. :-)
Anyways, the pool became ice free this year on March 26th. That seems really early to me, I guess I should check back to see from last year if I can determine by pictures.

The important bit I guess is that people here were able to golf up until New Year's, we didn't get winter set in really, until mid-January. And then we had a really long, very cold stretch with temps in the -20s.