Punta Cana, Dominican Republic

Our family spent a few days down in the Dominican Republic, celebrating our sons marriage. Here is a little pictorial review of the resort we stayed at.  It is called Dreams Palm Beach Resort .  You can click on the name to go see some fabulous pictures.

We stayed in a garden view/double room.  There was three of us in the room, so they provided us a twin bed.  The bed are only full size, but very comfortable.  The best part about this room was that it was air conditioned! They came in and turned down your bed each night and gave you the next days schedule of activities.   

All the rooms surrounded some very nice pools.  They had activities through out the day to keep people busy.  The water was very warm.

There was plenty of shade for you hide in from the strong Dominican sunshine. 

The pools had shelves so you could sit in

 the water and relax!

They had their own private beach.  You could borrow kayaks, snorkel gear, and sail boats.  We did some snorkeling right in the swimming area.  You can see some pics from that adventure HERE.

The best place to hide from the sun was under these grass huts.  The temperature was at least ten degrees cooler under here.  Did I mention it was HOT in the DR. 

 I thought I was going to melt.   

Another way to cool off was to drink smoothies from the bar.  You could swim right up and order a fruity drink.  Here I am double fisting some drinks to keep us cool.

That about wraps up our time at the hotel. Next time I will share some pictures about the wedding. 

 I didn't take too many pictures.  I wanted to be in the moment and not behind the lens.  

So I am patiently waiting 

for pictures from the photographer. 

Thanks for stopping by.

Have a blessed day.  

Anniversary Trip

Boy, it has been a long time since I have last blogged.  We have been busy with outside projects, enjoying our pool and going to see our son get married in the Dominican Republic.

For our 30th anniversary we took a quick trip to Ithaca, NY.  Yes, it is a vacation hotspot!  It is a gorgeous area near the finger lakes.

On the way to Ithaca we stopped at the Corning Museum of Glass. It has been on my bucket list for awhile now.  We spent a few hours exploring the galleries and exhibitions.  Then we took a turn trying to make our own glass.

I read about this activity online and thought it would be a once in a lifetime experience.  Michael 

was game for doing "crafts" on our vacation.  

So we both signed up to make something.

 Michael was going to do the most "glass making", so he had to suit up to protect himself from the 2300 degree heat. 

The workshop staff got all the glass from the ovens.  But they did let Michael pull and twist his flower. 

 

 Now it is my turn.  I am blowing an ornament.  She pulls out my glass and dips into the colors I have picked out.

My experience was not as hands on as Michaels.  All I did was blow into a pipe and the girl did all the work.  

Here are our projects that we made.  They are unique and something we will remember from our trip.

  The cost for a professionally made flower or ornament was 25 dollars.  We paid 29 dollars "to make it yourself", so you are only paying an extra 4 dollars to get a glimpse into the glass making process.  From that perspective it isn't a bad deal.

But the quality of the product is kind of, let's say amateur.  Yes, I know we are amateurs, but I thought mine would turn out better since the staff did all the work.   

I think I would have liked to just buy a professionally made ornament.  Michael's flower turned out really cool and he got more of a real feel for how to make something from a blob of glass.

Now a quick recap about the rest of the museum.

You walk through many galleries that display both modern and historical pieces of glass.  

This is a glass mosaic.  There are 1400 glass tiles in one square inch, totally amazing!

 This diorama depicts a glass blowing factory during the industrial revolution.
It is interesting to see how they etched glassware.  The details are so pretty.

 
We learned all about the history of glass light bulbs, windows, windshields, lighthouse lenses, eyeglasses, dishes and the list goes on......

Over all this was a very interesting place to visit.  If you are a homeschooling family, I would definitely make it part of your art and history lessons.

Thanks for stopping by and have a blessed day! 

My next post will be about our visit to the 

many waterfalls in the area.

Vancouver Day 3

Today was public transportation day.  We grabbed our city map, bought an all day transport pass and headed out to explore the city.

The library building reminded me of the Colosseum.

We went downtown and saw the cathedral and public library. 

Then we hopped on the bus to Granville Island Market. This market reminded me of Seattle’s Public Market.




 

We had to stop for a crepe.  I LOVE them!

Of course there were a bunch of different variety acts around the market.  This guy was taking so long to get out of his chains that we got bored and left. 

I loved all the colorful fruits and vegetables.

I love how they stacked the fruit!  I just wanted to go pick one from the bottom.  Just kidding;)

We found this guy carving a totem pole!  Very cool.

Then we took the little ferry over to the beach and park area.  We sat on a bench and watched people enjoy the beautiful sunny day. 

Then we hopped a bus, and then a train, and then another bus to get to the Queen Elizabeth Park.

It is located at the highest point in the city.  It had beautiful gardens and trails. 

A view of Vancouver and the mountains, beautiful!

We spent a few hours wandering the trails.  I, of course, spent most of the time taking pictures of flowers.  My hubby is so kind to let me take hundreds of flower pictures.  Thanks goodness for blackberry games, hee hee.... 

 

After the gardens we headed back to the hotel.  Then it was a long flight back home.  This was an amazing vacation!  Now it is time to plan our next adventure.  Hmmm, where should we go next?

Have a blessed day.

Vacouver Day 2

During our second day in Vancouver we hit the Sea to Sky Highway!  It is one of the most spectacular roads to drive.  First we hit Lighthouse Park. 

We walked multiple trails to get views of the lighthouse and sea.  We had beautiful weather for todays activities.

Next stop was Shannon Falls   

The falls were 1,015 feet high.  We took a couple of trails to get different perspectives of the falls.

We stopped driving the highway in the small mountain town of Whislter.  We ate lunch and did some people watching in the pedestrian area. 

We drove back down highway 99 and into the city area where we hit one more park, Lynn Canyon.  It was a local hidden treasure.  We hit the trails again and walked across this suspension bridge and hike to view a small waterfall. 

The day was filled with many trails and stairs!  All the parks we visited were FREE.

Tomorrow will be my last post from our Alaskan vacation.  Time to plan our next trip (wink)! 

Thanks for stopping by........