We just got home from an incredible Mexican Riviera Cruise. It was to die for! I have so much to post about our seven day adventure but I thought I should start with our Dolphin Swim/Mexican Water slide day. I HAVE to post every detail about this day because I will forget and this is NOT a day that can be forgotten!
It all started when we got off the ship in Puerto Vallarta and Chris got on the phone to find a Dolphin Swim for me and Amy. We absolutely HAD to have the Dolphin swim where you ride on the dolphins, a dolphin encounter where you kiss the dolphin and touch it a few times simply would not do. We wanted the WHOLE SHEBANG! We got to the place and we were SOOOOO excited. We thought this place is SWEET! Blake and Chris bought us the ROYAL swim where you get to swim with the dolphins and two of them push your feet at the same time. Not gonna lie, we were a little nervous. So we walk to the other side of the park where we quickly realize that NOBODY has any idea what is going on or what they should be doing. It was literally like it was everybody's first day! They give us the most disgusting wet fish smelling life jackets to put on and tell us to watch the instructional video. So we are watching the video gagging over the smell of ourselves, cracking jokes cuz we are all so nervous, when the guy that signed us up comes running up completely out of breath, panting, hands on his knees, can barely talk, saying "UNA PROBLEMO, UNA PROBLEMO!!" And explaining in Spanish, this big long story about what the problem is. So everybody just thinks that Amy and I can speak Spanish cuz Blake and Chris are fluent. We have NO idea what is going on but the guys finally explain to us that the problemo was that the two dolphins we were supposed to swim with got in a fight and one was really hurt, so we would not be able to do the ROYAL swim but we could do the regular swim with one of the other dolphins. At this point we were fine with that so we joined the other group for the regular dolphin swim not thinking about the fact that the dolphins just attacked each other!
So we walk by the cage full of huge sea lions smashed up against their tiny cage roaring at us. (If they would have found away to get out we would have been attacked and killed for sure) And we join another group. I can't even explain how chaotic and unorganized everything was. The people had NO IDEA what to do with us or if they should speak in English or Spanish. It was a mess! Finally one of the dolphin trainers came up and told us to follow her and get in the other pool with Tritan, the alpha male dolphin who we would be swimming with. We all get in and stand on the ledge on the side of the pool and let me tell you, it was FREEZING! I had a mini panic attack, almost started crying. I think it was a combination of the huge fish we were in a pool with, nobody knew what they were doing and I was freezing! I don't know what I was expecting, a hot tub swim with the dolphins??? Anyway, we got to meet Tritan and touch him, rub his flippers, he gave us each a kiss and we gave him one back, then we swam two by two out to the middle of the pool and he took us each for a ride holding on to his fins while he was swimming on his back. Then he pushed us by our feet while we rode on a boogie board. It was a blast! We LOVED it!
So while our swim with Tritan is going on there are two other dolphins in the same pool working with two other trainers. There were a lot of random employees walking around. We didn't really think much of it, we were thoroughly distracted by our King Tritan. But all of a sudden our dolphin started freaking out smashing himself up against us and wouldn't listen to the trainer. The trainer started yelling "Hands up!! Stop touching him!!" And she got this HUGE dolphin under control or at least distracted him with some fish to eat for a moment.
We had just finished our boogie board swim and it was the next persons turn. So a little girl and her Dad are in the middle of the pool and the girl starts freaking out! All the trainers JUMP out of the pool so fast but tell us to stay in the pool up against the wall and hold still! We had no idea what was going on, all we knew was all of them had JUMPED out of the pool so fast and we were still chillin in there and SOMETHING was going down! Then all the trainers start running around the pool slamming their training sticks on the side of the pool, blowing their whistles and start screaming "GET OUT, GET OUT NOW!" We got out of that pool sooooo fast! Still none of us knew what was going on until the little girl gets out of the pool crying and says "It bit me, the dolphin bit me!" And she had a huge red swollen scratch on the bottom of her foot! The dolphin had attacked her! The trainers were trying to do anything and everything to distract us. The little girl kept saying "It bit me!" and they would quickly say "No it didn't!" They were NOT going to admit the attack! Finally our trainer came up with hands in prayer position, and calmly says "Now what you just witnessed is the Alpha Male dolphin wanting to play with the female dolphin, so we are going to let them have some private time together." The people had no clue what to do with us, they were not about to refund anybody's money. They didn't care about us getting attacked, all they cared about was the $99 they had collected from each of us!
So they take us over to the little pool that had the little 3 month old baby dolphin with his mommy dolphin and told us to get in but not to touch the baby, or the mom will attack! They hand us these STANKY goggles and tell us to put them on and stick our head in the under the water so we can see them better. Ok first if all lets talk about the absolutely disgusting water we were in....... full of dolphin poo, never been cleaned water. You wouldn't have been able to see anything under there! But Chris puts on the nasty goggles and dives right in! Ha Ha it was soooo funny! I must say though, the baby dolphin was the CUTEST thing I have EVER seen. It was just a 3 foot mini dolphin. At that point I was DONE! I was satisfied with my Dolphin swim and happy we weren't the ones to be attacked. The best part of the whole day was when the lady who had been the most scarred the whole time we were in the water with Tritan was like "Wait! What about my 30 min dolphin swim??!!" She wanted to get back in the water with the attacking dolphin! Can you believe it? We were DYING!! Oh and don't worry, the father of the little girl that the dolphin bit got back in the water with the same dolphin to do his boogie board swim! CRAZY!
At this point we just wanted to get our stinky life jackets off and to be warm. So they just had us throw them on the ground, there was no system in place of what to do, and Amy and I attempted to shower off all the Dolphin poo water in a disgusting Mexican shower that we had to get in with NO SHOES and it was also freezing! You should have heard us screaming in this filthy Mexican shower together with no shoes trying to decide if being covered in dolphin poo was better or getting a foot disease and hypothermia! The guys were outside hysterically laughing at us listening to us scream!
Oh dont worry, the day did not end there. Next were the Mexican Water slides!! Which by the way are AT YOUR OWN RISK!
At this point Amy and I were done but when we saw Blake and Chris fly down the first water slide on their tubes it looked like a blast. Plus we were dying to get in a pool of chlorine. So we all head up the this slide that looked just like a toilet bowl. Literally it was EXACTLY like a toilet bowl. You started in this little tube that spits you out in a huge bowl, you circle around until you loose momentum and then it spits you out the hole in the bottom into a pool of water. We got to the top and the only 3 people who worked in this whole place were just standing there and all they told us was to cross our legs and hold our head and neck. So Blake goes first and just shoots down the tube soooo fast. I mean sooooooo FAST. The whole thing is shaking and it spits him out into the bowl and he his just flying round and round looking like he is in a lounge chair with his legs crossed and his arms crossed behind his head. We were all dying laughing! Then Amy goes and shoots out so fast and when she loses momentum in the bowl she gracefully turns herself feet first, plugs her nose and falls through the hole. Then I go and shoot through the hole into the bowl, finding out why they tell you to hold your head cuz my head would have cracked open, you hit the bowl so hard. I'm shooting round and round the bowl but I cant control myself for the life of me and it spits me out the bottom hole like a rag doll. Blake and Amy were laughing so hard! Chris had the record of making it all the way around the bowl I think 4 times. There is absolutely no way this slide would be legal in the US. No way! I am soooo mad we didn't take a video of us on this slide, or even a pic!
The next slide we named the wedgie slide. I mean it was bad. I am pretty sure my bathing suit was in my throat! The other slides we went on had a height and weight limit that Blake was way too big for and when he asked the workers if he could still go down all they said was "Yeah sure you can go on it, but at your own risk!" Only in Mexico! They didn't care if we flew off, cracked our head open, broke the slide, died, they just wanted our money!
PS- there was absolutely no chlorine, bleach, nothing in this water and I am SURE it had not been changed or cleaned since they opened in 1992!
Anyway this was a day to remember and I had to write it down so we can all laugh about it in 20 years. I wish I could write every detail but this will have to do. I am so mad we didn't buy the video of our dolphin swim that they tried to sell us for $150. It would have been so worth it!
Two of the most important people in my life are my cousins Jesse and Lee. They are like brothers to me and almost all of my best childhood memories are with them and Jen. 
