Azamara Quest – Sea of Cortez Cruise/Panama Canal Cruise (Back to Back) – February 9 – March 10, 2017 – San Diego RT/San Diego to Miami

We are booked on a fantastic back to back itinerary on the Azamara Quest – Cruise 1 – Sea of Cortez sails along the Coast of Mexico and then into the Sea of Cortez stopping at some new ports for us.  Cruise 2 – Panama Canal – is a cruise we have taken before but never get tired of.  We’re hoping to dodge a lot of Winter weather with these cruises.

Wednesday, February 8, 2017 – Travel Day

We have an early flight this morning to San Diego so I scheduled the cab to pick us up at 6:45 AM.  The cab came right on time and we were at the airport in plenty of time (very lucky with rush hour traffic).  We are flying United today  and UA1590 is scheduled for an 8:30 AM Departure.  The plane is at the gate when we get there.

UA1590 Readying for Departure

UA1590 is a 737-900 and we are in the sardine seats, 26C and 26D.  We packed mini-bagels and lox so we are set for lunch on this flight.  This flight had no entertainment system – you had to download the United App to see movies.  I did have the app but the movies wouldn’t play (incompatible with the device per error message) so the only thing I could see was the flight tracker.  They are going to need to fix this if they aren’t going to have general entertainment.

We took off on time and the only turbulence we experienced were over the Rocky Mountains (maybe updrafts).  One of the passengers volunteered to take some pictures of the snow covered mountains from her window (how nice).

Rocky Mountains (about 90 minutes out)

We arrived pretty close to the scheduled time of 1:15 PM.  After getting our luggage

Fountain at Baggage Claim

I called the hotel to summon the complimentary shuttle to the hotel.  it took a while and a few follow-ups but the van finally showed up.

We are staying at the Best Western Yacht Harbor Hotel on a Hotels.com free night.  We have stayed there in the past – the hotel is in a great location across the street from the harbor area.  We don’t have a harbor view this time but that’s fine for one night (as long as it is quiet).

We had the whole afternoon so we decided to find a nearby spa - we both had good massages at a good price. We took Uber both ways – around $6 each trip.  we are getting the hang of this Uber thing.

We walked across the street to Pizza Nova for dinner – we shared Fettuccine w Salmon and Capers,  an Entrée Salad, and a Caprese Salad.  I decided to try the Happy Hour beer special – the Coconut Stout Beer was really good.  The dinner was excellent.

Harbor from Pizza Nova

We spent the rest of the evening reading in our hotel room, which appears to be quiet.