Erick's Travelogue

I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to go on a Disney cruise with my family. I had never been on any kind of cruise up until recently so I wasn't sure what to expect, especially since it was a ship to Mexico, a country I had never visited. Plus my Español isn't very good. Still, you don't get to go on cruises every day.

The Disney Magic

Mickey looks good in a sou'wester!

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The ship itself was very nice. A bit tricky to navigate sometimes, but thankfully there were directories on every floor so you could find where your activity of choice was being held. And boy were there lots to choose from! How-to-draw sessions, trivia games, and live entertainment including magic shows, piano concerts, and Broadway-style plays just to name a few. 

The legendary Mickey Churro Waffles

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The food was amazing! Especially at the themed restaurants like the Animator's Palette, Lumiere's, or Rapunzel's Royal Table. I made an effort to eat healthy foods, especially at breakfast, but the ship had a whole slew of other things like pizza, french fries, ice cream, and all of the other indulgences that come with vacations. 

El Castillo, a Mayan pyramid

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One of my biggest highlights was the excursion on Progreso, an island off the coast of the Yucatán Peninsula. The area has a lot of history. For example, 66 million years ago, the asteroid that caused the extinction of all the nonavian dinosaurs landed where the island is today. Yucatán is also home to the famous Chichen Itza ruins, which is the best-preserved of all of the pre-Columbian Mayan settlements. It was an incredible sight!

I made a point of going to as many how-to-draw sessions as I could. Also, I love Spider-Man!

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Oh, right. I'm an artist and this is a blog about what I've been up to, art-wise. Actually, I made plenty of time to draw. To pass the time while waiting for activities to start, or even during quiet moments in my stateroom, I sketched one of my original characters in the Procreate Pocket app on my iPhone. One of our servers at the on-board restaurants saw me sketching and asked me to draw something for him. Since he was originally from Portugal, I decided to draw a ceratosaurus, a dinosaur who roamed what is now Portugal in the Jurassic period. I also wrote "thank you" in his native language for his excellent service and for being a really cool guy in general.

What I had been chipping away at.

My sketch for our awesome server!

Evidence of divergent evolution in the Disney universe

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I think I ended up catching some kind of upper respiratory bug on this trip, but when you're around this many people this sort of thing happens. All in all, it was a fun trip and if given the opportunity, I'd gladly do it again! In the meantime, I'm going to continue sketching and developing stories. And if you ever go to southern Mexico, be ready for high heat, humidity, and street vendors trying to sell you stuff.