Carnival Cruise - Day 0

We started our vacation one day earlier than the cruise. We traveled down to Florida on Saturday. It's much cheaper to drive than to fly 4 people. We headed out around 8am and stopped to get our most important food for our trip - Dunkin Donuts. I hope to use donuts as my bribing chips.

The drive was very pleasant and we made a really good time. We got into one hitch when we ignored the advice of our faithful friend -Miss Magellen. There was a big traffic backup in downtown due to contruction. So you can guess next time we will follow her direction faithfully. Mr. Rojo took up most of the drive on this trip. I took the driver seat for about 3 hours and Mr. Rojo took care of it the rest of the way. What a big change a couple years ago. :)

We got into Florida state line by 1pm so we should arrive at our destination by 6pm. Right in time for dinner. We have driven from Atlanta to Florida for several times but we never stopped at the Florida Visitor Center. I have to say I was impressed. It was nice, clean and well organized. There was even free juice for travelers. A little break helped the kids to be able to hold up on a drive fairly well.

One thing I know for sure was that we can't make it without our portable DVD player. It's the best invention for modern day travelers with kids. I think they watched about 5 movies in all and it helped with the fighting and boredom. I also packed a few snacks and drinks so that we didn't have to stop for drinks and snacks all the time. Food is always a good choice when they started to get fiesty. Also break time for them to spend their energy half way of the trip is always a good idea.

Once in Florida, we arranged to have dinner with a few friends. Florida was like a home away from home for us. We still have so many friends there. It was nice to meet them and catch. Maybe next cruise we can do it together with them. Dinner lasted a lot longer than we planned. We closed the restaurant at 11pm. We headed back to our friend's home where we stayed for the night. Tomorrow we had to wake up early to drive down to Miami at 7am.. Hope we could wake up!

Back from Paradise

We are back! Sorry if I haven't updated the blog for over the week. We were just so busy enjoying our cruise. Plus I'm too cheap to pay for internet access to update on the ship. :) There will be more posts in detail of our cruise. The kids absolutely loved it!! We survived 7 nights together so now we are starting to look at the next one.

Can you tell how much we love cruising?

Cruising on the Blogsphere

I want to post the Carnival Round up for this week that I have been honored to be part of.. It's fun to get to read other bloggers' posts and find new blogs. Come on.. kick off your shoes, get your coffee and enjoy reading!

Carnival of Travel Guide - Join Travel Hacker for another edition of Carnival of Travel Guide.

Carnival of Personal Finance - This edition is hosted at Money Under 30 with a lot of great posts.. You will learn a thing or two from this carnival.

Money Hack Carnival - This edition is hosted at Save and Conquer. Learn about personal finance ebbs and flows throughout our lives.

Mom's Blogging Carnival - This edition is hosted at Mrs Nespy's World. Read and learn from mommy bloggers from around the blogsphere.

Carnival of Family Life - Enjoy this edition at Write From Karen. With various topics ranging from Family Finance, Family Health to Family Humor.

Carnival of Cities - From the Bridge of San Francisco to the Shores of Mangalore at Leslie Carbone.

Carnival of Tips - Check out .. whatelse but a blog full of tips at Tip Diva and a whole caravan of the carnival..

Festival of Frugality - Join Four Pillars as we learn to save some money like the riches do.

Water Park in My Neck of the Wood

We are going to our vacation in a few days... Woo hoo!! One would ask why do we need to go to a water park. Truth is we want to test our new underwater camera and also our snorkeling masks. Well, we got to test our camera but they don't allow snorkel in the pool. So I guess we will test our masks in our tub then.

Since we are not officially in Summer yet, most of the pools are still closed. Fortunately, there are several in-door pool facilities (mostly in Gwinnett county) that have year round swimming pool. I have heard so much about Bogan Aquatic Center. This park is not too far from us. It's in Buford and has indoor water park. Of course, you can't compare with Disney Typhoon Lagoon but for $4 per child and $5 per adult I think it's one of the best park for the price.

There is a playground structure in the kiddie pool area. It was a really fun structure. There is a small slide, a tunnel and various wheels for them to turn on and turn off the water. The water also falls from the roof of the structure. I'm gonna tell you a big secret here.. It's the best massage in town. Just make sure you don't 'ohhhh... ahhh' too loud. Otherwise, the lifeguard might escort you out for imappropriate behavior..

Don't worry big kids, there is a big slide and lazy river for you to enjoy. Mr. Rojo is one of the big kid who isn't afraid to try it out. He enjoyed not once but twice on that ride.. His excuse was that he wanted to try out the video capturing during the ride. He sure did capture it.. I would show it if I can figure out how to post it here.. :)

We spent a couple hours there but I'm sure if I packed lunch and dinner.. we will be there all day. The nice thing about this park is that there is an outdoor picnic area that you can enjoy your break throughout the day. The facility is nice and clean.. Miss J and Mr. Z can't wait to go back. So I guess you can tell where we will be during hot Summer day...

Check out Gwinnett County website for more aquatic centers near you here.

The address for Bogan park is
2723 North Bogan Road, Buford 30519

Enjoy your swimming!!!

Pick Your Own Strawberries

Spring time means an abundant supply of Strawberries. My kids love strawberries and I love the idea of picking your own berries. There is a farm about 40 minutes from our house that has Pick-Your-Own strawberries. The Washington Farms are family owned farms. There are 2 locations for their farms. The one that we went to is in Loganville which is a smaller farm near Lawrenceville . Basically, it's just a strawberries farm for you to pick and that's it. No gimmick, no fancy other stuffs for you to do. So if you want something more then you might want to head to the one in Watkinsville.

It was a beautiful Saturday for us. Clear sky, not too hot and no rain.. We got there around 10:30am and the parking lot was already packed. I was worried that there won't be any strawberries left for us to pick. But I was relief to find that there were more than enough for us to enjoy. The process was rather simple. We headed to the booth and pick up our bucket. It costs $8 per bucket and if you have your own bucket to transfer the berries home then that's it. But if you don't then you can take the bucket with you for $1. Not bad..

Then we headed out and started picking. At first Miss J and Mr. Z weren't sure how to do this.. Soon they got a hang of what to pick and how to pick it.. They went to town with the strawberries. Note to self, bring diaper wipe since eating strawberries can be messy for kids (or adults). We did enjoy fresh from the stem strawberries. It was a fun day out indeed!!

If you plan to head out there, make sure to check their website ahead of time or call ahead. This is another one of great low-cost activity to do with your kids.. Get out there and enjoy fresh strawberries!!

Aloha Friday

I'm down to single digit before my cruise!!! 9 more days...


So I will take it easy today and join Kailani at An Island Life for her Aloha Friday question.

What is the one thing that you must pack for your vacation?

For me, I think I can't go on my vacation without my digital camera. I love to capture the moment.. sometimes Mr. Rojo probably feels like too much. But I love to look back at those pictures and remembered all those fun and crazy memories we had.

So what about you?

See other particants at Aloha Friday here.

13 Things I do to Save on Vacation

A late edition for Thursday Thirteen from me today..

I have been very lazy to blog and crazy getting ready for our cruise. So today I want to write about things I did to save for our vacation and things I plan to save during our vacation.

1. Plan vacation during off-peak - I know that not everyone can take their kids out during school year and I'm not at all promoting that. I'm sure my kids would like me to promote that ideas. :) But if your kids are still in Kindergarten like mine, one week before the school break will help a lot. We planned our cruise one week before the end of the school year and was able to save over $500 on the total cruise for a family of 4. The last week of school is pretty much all fun and party. So I don't think they will miss much. Unless you don't want to miss school party.

2. Research about your destination - With the current 21st century information-highway, it's easier than ever to find any information you need from the internet. Heck! You are reading my blog so I'm sure you can google about your destination. Find a forum dedicate to your specific destination. People is really kind out there and they are willing to share their information.

3. Think outside the box - Instead of booking hotel rooms wherever you plan, think about a timeshare rental, a house, or a cabin. Not only you will get a bigger space, you can also cook your own food. A lot of people might argue that they don't want to cook during their vacaion, but pouring cereal to a bowl with milk isn't that hard to do.

4. Power of a group - If you have a group of friends that you think can still be your friends after vacationing together, it might be a good idea to plan a vacation together and share the cost of renting a house.

5. Cruising with Guarantee room - This is a controversial one. So I will just base it on my own opinion. I like booking a cruise with Guarantee room. It's the cheapest room available but you will have a chance of getting upgrade. My first try I get Inside 4G instead of 4A. So even if I don't get a balcony room, I still get a room on the higher deck than if I would have gotten from booking a specific room.

6. Plan ahead and setup your budget - This is pretty new for me. I normally never thought about how much we will spend during our vacation till we saw the credit card statemet. But this time, I have planned everything. Setting up a budget helps me to find a way to save on the unnecessary expenses.

7. Comparison shopping - This goes without saying.. Like every other kinds of purchases, you must comparison shopping to find the best price. But do keep in mind that with traveling and vacations, you have to compare it Apple to Apple. The cheapest one might not be the best one that suit your family situation. So read all the fine prints!

8. Be a Traveler not a Tourist - The reason most of us travel is to see the world, to experience different cultures and people.. So don't be afraid to explore and venture out from the tourist trap. If you want to have American food then eat at home.. you don't need to fly a thousand miles away to eat in McD in Thailand!

9. Using Coupon - Huh? How is it related to vacation you might ask. Using coupon for my grocery shopping has helped me to save on my grocery budget and allow me to add those saving to my vacation fund.

10. Find free things to do - You don't need to do all the tourist stuff when you visit a city or country. With a little research, you will find that there are a lot of free stuffs you can do in each city. Go to the park, enjoy a picnic by the beach, check out the playground or museum and my favorite.. people watching!

11. Don't Procrastinate - This is a tough one for me to adapt to. I normally don't think far enough in advance. After live here long enough, I start to understand the power of advance planning. So if you know where and when you want to go, then put it in motion and start booking it. You normally will get discount for early booking. Unless you can drop everything in a pinch then last minute deal might be your take..

12. Check out your own backyard - Vacation doesn't have to always be about this expensive trip to Europe.. A day trip to a neighboring state or even city can be the best memory your family create. Check out events and make it a weekend trip.

13. Dig out those Mileages - We all have several mileages accumulating that you have never looked at. Well, now it's time to dig them out and see what can you redeem from those mileages. It might help pay for your airline tickets, your car rental or your hotel rooms. Don't let it go stale in your wallet.

So now you have it. My 13 tips to save on your next vacation. What are your tips?

Check out other Thursday Thirteen participants here.