Vacation Day 8 - Homecoming (or so we thought)

 The next day was Saturday.  It had been a wonderful vacation but I was really missing our kids so I was ready to come home.  We went to the buffet one last time for breakfast and then we packed up our stuff.  Our ride came to pick us up at 10 am to take us to the airport.  Our flight didn't leave until 1:00 pm but we were told we needed to be there early to make sure we made it through customs with enough time to spare.  When we got to the airport we waited in a long line to check our bag and then we wandered around, looking at the shops.  We decided to eat lunch there and were shocked at how expensive everything was.  A little bottle of water was 5 dollars!  So we both got a hamburger and that cost us $22 - sheesh!  Then we made our way to our terminal. 

Here is a picture of a plane:

Our tickets said our seats were 1A and 1B.  So as we boarded we saw that we were the first seats in 1st class.  We thought there had been a mistake so we kept going to see if there was also a 1A in the coach section but there wasn't.  So we went back and got settled into first class!  Here is a picture of Reed's legs - we had so much leg room!:

 We couldn't believe our good luck. 

 Then the plane taxied out to the run way.  We had just finished ordering our mid flight snack and decided which movie we were going to watch when the pilot came on and said that they were getting an abnormal reading from part of the plane so we were going to have to sit and wait for a few minutes.  My heart sank - I suspected it would be longer than a few minutes.  After a little bit the pilot came back on and said that one of the pilot's windows was malfunctioning so we would have to get off the airplane while they had someone try to figure out what the problem was.  So they loaded our plane onto two buses and drove us back to the airport.

Everyone coming off the plane and getting onto the bus:  

 When we got to the airport they left us locked on the bus for 15 minutes or so - we started to wonder what was going on.  Then they let us back into the airport and told us to go to another terminal for further instructions.  We made our way in that direction (with all the rest of the passengers) only to find that they had sent us to a very busy part of the terminal.  It was packed wall to wall so they told us to disperse and come back in an hour.  We only had a two hour layover in Denver this time before we had to catch our next flight.  So I called my parents to warn them that we might not make it in time.  Then we wandered around through the crowds:

 Finally we found out that they had discovered the problem (a sensor was broken in one of the windows) and that they were working to fix it but that it would take a couple of hours.  There went our hopes for making it home that day.  I was so disappointed!  We finally boarded the plane again at 5:30pm - about the time that we were supposed to be arriving in Denver.  The flight went smoothly and Reed and I still got to ride in 1st class, which was fun.  It was nice that they served dinner, because Reed and I didn't want to buy anymore food at the airport so we were hungry.  We got into Denver around 9:30 pm and were directed to a help desk.  They gave us a voucher to stay at a nearby hotel and a couple of food vouchers for the airport.  We got our luggage and got on a shuttle with a bunch of our fellow passengers and arrived at our hotel at about 10:45. 

Our room was pretty nice:

 After we checked in we were both hungry so we walked across the street to a diner and ordered some food.  It was delicious!  I think I caught Reed by surprise with the camera!:

Then we went back to the hotel and went to sleep.  Our flight left the next morning at 10:30 am. 

Vacation Day 7

The next day was Friday and our last official vacation day.  We decided that we wanted to try ordering room service for our breakfast so the night before we ordered what we wanted.  We asked them to come at 7:30 am because we wanted an early start on the day and we figured we would be up by then.  We were both in bed asleep when we heard a knock on the door.  Reed scrambled to get dressed and open the door to get our plates.  I guess that was our wake up call!  We both decided on one thing that we really wanted to do before we went home.  Reed wanted to go to a public beach to look for sea shells and I wanted to go sea kayaking.  So after we ate and got ready we walked down to the town to find a public beach.  We wanted to look for sea shells and the beach by our hotel was too rocky - all the shells got smashed. 

We enjoyed just meandering down the beach:

We saw a crab:

Reed found this cool looking bone:

We started to get hot and tired so we headed back.  It was actually sunny and warm on this day - so nice!  We walked back through the town and  stopped at the dolphin marina.  You could pay to spend an hour with some dolphins.  It was cool to see the dolphins but sad to see them stuck in these little pens.  While we were there a family was swimming with the dolphins:

Getting a ride:

Close to our hotel we saw some more iguanas:

Oh, I miss the flowers and bright colors that were all around:

When we got back we changed and rented a sea kayak.  It was fun.  We started off in the lagoon and then we paddled out to the open ocean.  I enjoyed paddling out and then letting the waves carry us back to shore.  We did that for a little bit but Reed said that the up and down of the waves was making him feel a little sick and my hands were getting blisters from paddling so we went back and turned in our kayak.

Then we grabbed a burger and some fries and snacks from the snack bar and found a couple of beach chairs to relax in.  I read for a while and Reed went back to the room to take a nap:

That afternoon we decided to go snorkeling one more time.  This time we swam out in the open ocean but stayed close to the shore.  We found a ton of fish in the area were you could swim between the lagoon and the ocean.

I wouldn't want to step on that:

We love snorkeling!

It started to rain hard while we were snorkeling so when we got out the beach was empty.  When we looked out across the ocean we saw this ship (the only big ship we saw while we were there).  It kind of reminded me of one of the pieces from the battleship game:

Then we went back to our room and showered and got dry and ready for dinner.  I forgot to mention earlier that the dress for the restaurants was supposed to be "casual elegance".  We interpreted that as women wear a skirt or dress and men wear nice pants and a collared shirt, but we saw a big variety in what people wore.  Anyway we were kind of late getting dressed so when we went up to the Mexican restaurant it was full.  We put our names down for later and went to visit the Creperie.  We ordered our favorite dessert - a crepe with peanut butter and fresh fruit.  I also tried tangerine ice cream with blueberry sauce.  It was so good!  I wish we could have tried all of the things on their menu.

After that we wandered around until it was our turn to eat.  The Mexican restaurant was our last restaurant to try.  Reed ordered enchiladas in a mole sauce.  It was different:

I can't remember what mine was called but it was really good:

After that Reed went to buy some souvenirs from the vendors that were set up in the middle of the hotel property.  I let him do that because I was terrible at asking for a lower price and he was really good at it. 

After that decided to try another show.  This time it was a Broadway show.  I got really excited thinking that we were going to see a Broadway show.  It started with this guy with long curly dark hair dressed in a long, shiny, grey tunic dancing on stage to some weird music.  Then the dancers started to perform one or two songs from different shows.  They did songs from Cats, Phantom of the Opera, Les Miserables, Wicked and a couple of ones that I didn't recognize.  In between each song the same guy in the grey tunic would come on stage, or run through the audience.  I really couldn't figure out his connection to the show.  Then they just started doing dances to some songs you hear on the radio.  Over all I thought the show was okay, but not great.