Day 5 - Republic - Dominican Republic

Wednesday found us pulling into Amber Cove, Dominican Republic.

Amber Cove lies within the amber coast of the Dominican Republic, along the north shore.

The Dominican Republic is not an island, but rather the eastern side of the island known as Hispaniola.  Haiti makes up the western side of the island.

Today's adventure took us to Sosúa for a catamaran ride and snorkeling. Here are Arlona and I, ready for adventure.

Here are Nancy and Brian, rocking the snorkels and required floatation vests.

We saw a great number of fish, partly due to the bread the crew was tossing in the water.  Still, we snorkeled away from the group and saw more interesting and colorful fish.

Here I am feeding the hungry locals.

Here is Arlona, searching for the next interesting thing.

At one point, I spotted a couple of $5 bills on the bottom.  Since the floatation vest prevented diving, I alerted one of the guides who retrieved them. It turns out one of the guests had money in their pocket and it floated out and sank.  The money was eventually returned to the owner and all was good.

Here we are wrapping up the swim.

After the swim, we were served lunch on the catamaran and then took a scenic sail along the shore before returning to our bus for the ride back to the ship.

Traffic in the Dominican Republic is, in a word, nuts.  Heavy traffic, scooters everywhere, weaving in and out of the lanes, horns - nuts.  We spent a fair amount of time just sitting in traffic.  If you visit the Dominican Republic and take a trip from a ship, expect that.

We spent a little time in the shopping area at the port and then returned to the ship.  The Carnival Magic docked after the Mardi Gras and both ships were there as we returned.

Here is today's towel animal that greeted us in the cabin.

Speaking of the cabin, here is ours - excuse the mess.

The plus - nice closets on the right with configurable shelves for long hanging items or additional shelf storage.  The safe is also in there.  The minus, the hallway is very narrow between there and the bathroom on the left. More on the bathroom in a minute.

The room itself is nicely furnished with a decidedly modern look and nice lighting.  But, like the hallway, the room feels quite small.  Out of our room on Viking, Celebrity, and this one - all similar balcony cabins, this one feels much smaller.  They do provide a couple of large drawers under the desk on the right, and that's nice.

Back to the bathroom - this has also gotten smaller - much smaller.  There isn't much room to move about in there.

But a positive is that the shower has gotten larger.  You can actually turn around without banging your elbows. But, the water pressure is nothing to write home about, so it is a combo of good and bad.

After showers, we met up with Brian and Nancy for a pre-dinner beverage at the Alchemy Bar and then dinner in the Palm main dining room.  We saw a comedian was about to start as we wrapped up dinner, so we hoofed it over to the Punchliner comedy club and enjoyed a few yuks.

The combo of a long day, a lot of swimming, and a lot of sun found us all ready to turn in for the night.

Tomorrow is our last sea day and we have rescheduled our time on the Bolt roller coaster.  Watch this space tomorrow and an update!