This experience was not up to par with another dolphin encounter we experienced. 2 1/2 stars for…read morethe following reasons. The excursion info says we need to bring our own towels - no, we don't. They provide them, and a locker at no extra cost, so that's a plus. Here come the cons. If you have long hair, they require you to take any hair ties out, even ones that are securely in place to tie back all your hair! My daughter and I had our hair tied in a high ponytail, and our heads never got submerged and I don't see how it's likely the hair tie will fall out. Then you are asked to shower off...before they do the photo of you before the encounter. Why not do the photo first when you're more "put together" instead of after with crazy wet hair?? No water shoes (or anything really) allowed in the water. There is also no bench or anything for little kids to be able to sit on while in the water waiting their turn. They constantly have to be kicking and wading and being pulled back away from the area we can't go into until it's their turn. We had another experience where they talk about dolphins and it was informative and interesting, but not this place. So it wasn't very engaging in comparison. After the experience was over, myself, husband, and three young kids were eager to go eat, as that was important for us to have enough time and enjoy a meal. However, we got split up due to me needing to take some of the kids to the bathroom. After I came out of the bathroom with my kids, I told a staff member we were looking for my husband and another kid. They said that they were right this way and they led me to the gift shop and photo gallery area. My husband and youngest were not in there. And then they're telling me to wait there, but my husband and youngest were back on the other side where we began the excursion where we would wait to get in the water. I had to go back over there with my daughter and son who are hobbling from getting blisters from their water shoes that just began forming. So once we're finally all together again, we're hungry and we're trying to go and eat and they stopped us from going over to eat to have us go back into the gift shop! I felt like they were being very pushy with that as if we are not allowed to go eat at all until we take a look at our photos first. Having lunch/food for the kids was more important and would take more time than the photos. Why not let one parent go with the kids to get food plated and begin eating, and one other parent to look at the photos? So that really just gave me a negative experience. And by the time I finally got to sit down to eat, there was only 10 minutes left, because then they said the last boat back to our cruise was leaving. And before the excursion started they were saying how we can relax and enjoy our time after the encounter. But no, we can't just enjoy our time, if it's limited as much as it was.

Years ago on a different Mexican Riviera Cruise, Diane and I swam with dolphins, including a short…read moreride on one. It was a fun activity. But on a just completed cruise on the Norwegian Bliss we opted to partake in a Sea Lion Encounter here instead. This entailed standing in a line with others in a swimming pool to have a female sea lion brush by us a few times; being hugged by the sea lion; and joining the sea lion in open mouth grimaces as it stood erect towering over us. This was also a unique enjoyable activity whereby we felt like we shared some warm connective moments with a sea mammal.

A member of our group developed fever and nausea the morning after using the showers. Given the…read moretiming, we wanted to flag this in case maintenance review is needed.

The dolphin experience was fantastic. I can't remember the names of the trainers we worked with but…read morethey were very friendly and put on a great show with the dolphins and sea lions. I immediately was concerned about bacteria in the water so I told my daughters to keep their mouths closed the entire time. As for the water park, I wouldn't go on any of the slides. A friend of ours (who works construction), was walking up the steps and could see through some of the support beams of the slides. If I was this park, I would close them down immediately because they are just asking for someone to get hurt.