Mexican Riviera Cruise/9th Anniversary

This year we decided to go on a cruise for our anniversary! We went on a 7-night Mexican Riviera cruise with Royal Caribbean aboard the "Mariner of the Seas". This was our first cruise we've taken.



We decided to go formal. :)







Zac especially loved the dining experience: Lamb shank, es cargo, shrimp, duck - you name it!

It felt Titanic-ish! :)



Because we happened to be sharing the ocean with Hurricane Jimena, we spent an extra day at sea before we arrived at a port. We traveled and extra 700 miles to get out of his way and didn't get any closer than 200 miles away. :( Yes, Zac and I wanted to get closer to the Hurricane!

We had one pretty rough day at see where there was more water out of the pools than in so they just emptied them. We didn't see too many people that day - everyone was sick in their rooms.

Zac fell asleep out by the pool for 4+ hours and got FRIED! He thought it'd been less than an hour. Needless to say, we didn't spend anymore time in the sun. :(

Anyway, we did our itinerary in reverse order. So, Puerto Vallarta was our first stop. First thing we see when we pull in to dock? Wal-Mart! It was extremely humid and uncomfortable! Puerto Vallarta had cobblestone streets. We had a blast shopping!



Senor Frogs was a highlight of Puerto Vallarta.



Our 2nd port was Mazatlan. Amazing boardwalk & beaches. Too bad Zac was fried and didn't feel like being in the sun. Instead, we found an AMAZING cab driver who ended up being our personal tour guide. He had air conditioning, spoke English well, and took us to some amazing views. He spent time doing what we wanted to see and telling us what we wanted to know about. Amazing. I personally think he's a Mormon.



It wasn't until I saw this view that I realized how gigantic our ship was!



Drinking coconut water. I never knew coconuts were full of water!



Our favorite place by far was Cabo San Lucas!
We got to hold & pet a baby tiger...





We also did an underwater sea helmet dive. We road a boat out to a diving platform and put on wetsuits. Then we put a 70 lb. helmet on our heads as we walked down a ladder about 20 ft. underwater. Underwater the helmet only felt about 15 lbs. The concept of the helmet is the same as an overturned glass of water on a solid surface -if the glass is level, the water stays in. So, we had to stay upright or we were in trouble. We also had an oxygen supply hooked up to the helmet. It was so much fun! I was the biggest one without weights so I had the most buoyancy and I had a lot of fun with it. It was kind pretty much a gravity free experience. There were thousands of fish and they had us feed them. One of the couples with us said they would e-mail us the pics they took with their underwater cameras but we are pretty doubtful after over 2 months.



Cabo San Lucas was also our favorite shopping experience. We had so much fun we had to spend every last dollar we'd brought. Our girls loved all of their fun gifts we bought them.

Despite Zac's awful sunburn that lasted 2 weeks, we had the time of our lives! I wish we could cruise the entire world (land & sea) on a cruise ship!

Zac has moved stores... again.

Zac is now running the Orem store on University Parkway instead of the store in American Fork.

Zac has had an amazing journey with that big blue box with a yellow tag!

It all started in St. George when Zac was a full time student at Dixie College for Auto Body. He was working part time at The Home Depot. He used his amazing talent to sell himself & interview skills and was hired as an Assistant Manager & helped open the store. One & a half years later he was promoted to General Manager in Logan. Another 1 & 1/2 years and he was asked to open a new store in American Fork. Now he's the GM in some amazing accomplishments and awards. He is on multiple committee's including one on the corporate level. He is on the Board of Directors for the Boys and Girls Club of Utah County.

Some of our favorite perks of Zac's job:

• Season tickets to the Jazz! His boss raffles off tickets they have and we've been able to purchase season tickets to the Jazz for a really good price 2 years now. Lower bowl too!
  
• Season tickets to BYU football!
• Free electronics! We've won 2 plasma TV's. He's been given a digital camera, laptop, portable DVD player, video camera, and too many other things to name.
  
• The people he meets! He knows Thurl Bailey & the Jazz Bear to name a couple. He's gotten to know people who have gotten us free tickets to concerts, football games, etc.
  
• Free vacations! He's won free vacations to Seattle & Orlando.
• Great discount at his store & some of their vendors!
• Golf Tournaments! Zac loves to golf! He's been involved in several golf tournaments including a marathon tournament at Thanksgiving Point where they did 3 different rounds of 18 holes in the same day!

Now of course with all this comes really long hours, lots of traveling, and a lot a stress... but I won't go there!

Go Broncos!

Zac is a Denver Broncos fan - in case you couldn't tell! He went to the Broncos game yesterday & texted me this picture of himself.  When he was a bigger guy he used to paint his belly & go with a pumpkin on his head. What a game!!!