Stories

I was writing a letter to my pal, Nono, and realized there are some stories I haven't shared here...weird.  I feel like I'm talking all the time!

In San Salvador we had 15 free minutes before the bus left. Of course we ran for coffee.  We entered this great air conditioned place with my future photo in it.

People were trying to order coffee and having a tough time.  So I used my phone translator to get the words in Espanish for "coffee with ice and milk and sugar please".  I show the barista and he says "Oh, iced latte?" 

Duh.

Then a different barista starts to make this specialty and I ask "¿Cuanto Questa?" Or something close to that, and the barista tries to say it.  He can't, so he holds up 3 fingers. This would be $3, because for some reason El Salvador uses the American dollar for its currency. The barista tells the first guy I talked to, the price of the coffee.  He looks at me and tries to say the price in English.  He says, " Seven fr...en...k"

I clarify, "So, Seven Francs?".  The whole place and workers laughed out loud.  It was such a fun moment.

Turns out it was $6.50.

This is another thing that happens at every stop.  I wonder how many coats of paint and varnish are on this ship.

When we were in Antigua, Guatemala, I was waiting for Tony to finish a very cold beer.  We were in this really cool little hotel with a courtyard.

I went to the little gift shop and sat on a bench there and looked at the riot of color that is in everything you would buy there.

A man and maybe his mother in law sit down beside me and try to converse with me in Espanish.  It's a really nice gesture.  The Man says there are lots of tourists but they don't buy anything today.  I know enough Espanish to say "I am sorry, that's me" His mother in law laughs and he goes away. The mother and law and I sit. I tell her how beautiful all the items in her shop are.

If you saw my Antigua post, and if the pictures came through, you can see how gloriously colorful it is there, the clothes , the buildings, even the trucks arem painted up in bright colors.  A woman walks in to the store, and my new best friend smiles and says "Mi hija"  we all say hello, it's very hot, how are you.

And then I say " Grandbabies?"

And off we go.That was another sweet moment.

Here's what I bought there because they were so kind.

There was una tourista who compra something that Dia.

And mi esposo had un cerveza muy frio.

When this posts, we will be in Miami on Halloween (Day 21) after 20 days at sea. These days were fun, actually!  We may be getting used to this life.

The first of the two sea days after Cartegena we relaxed and watched Back to the Future in bed in the morning.  Then we went up to the observation deck and Tony wrote and I worked through the Espanish workbook I downloaded.

We split up and I went to the last Espanish class and he went to the last Art Auction.  We get a print every time we go to an event.  I am open to suggestions as to what we will do with these, but it is motivation to attend art events.  Also free champagne...

Ooooo!  We found out we do get the upgrade Tony was a genius to request!

We walked upstairs to level 10 and found our next room is a balcony on the portside aft!!  

Whoop!  We are looking forward to more space in  our next balcony suite!! 

One more:

Our other best friend, Hendrick,  the art gallery director, has gotten an infection in his face.  He is on antibiotics and it hurts him to laugh or smile.  He did a whole auction this morning.  We went in afterwards to settle up and get our 3 free works of art.

Yah.

So much winning!

I have won 4 raffles in my life.  Three were on this ship!

Another best friend, Mandi, from South Africa, was helping us sort it all out. Hendrick, also from South Africa,  peeked around the corner and said, " Sorry guys, I've been avoiding you because it hurts to laugh."

Hahaha!  We'll leave you with that.

We'll be in New York on Nov 3rd. We are planning our days according to having internet service! 😀 

We'll be in touch.

Thanks for checking in.

Surprises

Well, we need to chat a little more about this day long Panama Canal experience.

It is full of surprises. 

The locks are fascinating. We got up close and personal with them in our room.  It was disconcerting.

It was so creepy.

There are dead people in there.

I'm sure of it.

Then we spent two hours on a jungle cruise to the last lock that lets us out into the Atlantic .

Just so spectacular!

We were told that if you don't make an appointment to go through the canal, you can wait for as long as 5 days to get a chance to go through.

Thank goodness our Captain has a date book!

We have spent the day wandering back and forth and side to side trying to catch it all.

The ship has had a Panamanian guide who has given us history and daily life stories of living with the canal and building for the future of bigger cargo ships.

But for now, back to disconcerting:

Panama Canal

Day 17, 10/27/22

"The World's Greatest Shortcut" is the title of our daily agenda.

We are traversing the Panama Canal.  We just went through Lock#2 , Milleflores.  

We started the journey through at 7 AM, and will complete it at 3:30 PM - projected.

This is our 6:30 AM view

Here is the first lock waiting to let us in, close the back lock and fill up with water:

There is a giant container ship ahead of us:

Here are the locks closing behind us:

As per usual, these guys were out at 6 AM.  In case you need a shot to start your day.

The server in the Observation Deck told me she had to be there at 5 this morning.  I told her I would come and have a vodka tomorrow at 6 just so that she's not wasting her time...

Everyone is interested today:

There is not much wiggle room for the ships to pass through.

They have built new locks 50% wider to handle the traffic.  These locks also recycle the water used to raise the ships that pass through.

Oooo!  Everyone just ran to the right side of the ship to see a crocodillo.  I hope we don't tip over!  This guy will save us!

That effectively killed any desire I had to swim this thing.

It is another beautiful day.   We have been so fortunate to pass through Central America during the rainy season.  We have had warm, dry weather and overcast skies.  It has been perfect!

ReCap

Tony pointed out that I should write about the days "at Sea".

Maybe I should take pictures of the ship?

The last day at sea we were in the fitness center ( yay for us) ellipting and looking out the window and suddenly we passed a pod of dolphins swimming and jumping in the water.  Because of shows like "Flipper", ( raise your hand if you remember that show) and the old Sea World shows,  I assumed the dolphins were playing.  Maybe they were hunting.  I have no idea, but the jumping and splashing just looked like delight to us.

Tony also spends daily time planning our next trip.

Since we can't communicate by text on the ship, ( eerily similar to life on land, actually). We have to deduce where the other person might be .

Today I came back from an overpriced, but enjoyable mani/ pedi and Tony had left the room.  I see that his writing briefcase is still here.  His workout shirt is still here. All the fruit is gone, but he has left me a cup of coffee.

So I deduce he is eating breakfast on deck 11.  He will be back for his writing bag when he is finished....

Stay tuned...see if I am Sherlock or not.

Wrong.  Tony went to the writing space ( the Observation Deck) but he only brought a pen and a notebook. HOWEVER, he was impressed with all the brain power I put into finding him.

We have noticed that people seem to come on cruises to tell us all about themselves. We find that we are, by far, not the most interesting people on this ship! 😆 😂. 

I wonder if *we are all * retired, trying to be interesting like we

thought we were when we were still working.

We are taking our Spanish classes. Tony says we are going to be TRY lingual. 

Talk again soon.

Pura Vida

Day 15!

And we get to stop in the most beautiful place in the world.

Costa Rica. 

The King of Patience was here today...

We toured the Botanical Gardens.

But on the way our guide spotted this cute guy and stopped for a photo op.  He was so busy!

We were here in 2018, I think.  We were farther north in the Cloud Forest and Tamarindo.  Here it was very lush and green and humid.

The beauty does not stop.  Ever.

We got to see some wildlife in the gardens as well.

I don't know.   I think this is the caterpillar's behind. 

I remember when our neighbor kids thought we had a dinosaur in our garage when we had one of these magnificent iguanas.  The owner of the shop nearby is tired of them because there are too many and they eat all the store's mangoes.

This guy was Elvis.  He waited for all of us to take pictures of him. 

It was a beautiful  day.  I cried a little when we landed here, and I will cry a little when we leave.

 Yesterday we celebrated 2 weeks on the ship!

Still married.  We weigh about the same...we think....

Love ya mean it!

Guatamala

Day 12/41.

On our way from Puerto Quetzal, we passed by two volcanoes,  one on each side of the road.  One was called Water and one was called Fire.  As our guide was explaining about the volcanoes, she told us that Fire always was hot and you can see the lava bubbling at night. Suddenly she stopped her narration and said, "Ai!!  It's exploding!"  And sure enough, there was a dark, smoky mushroom cloud in the sky.  Reminiscent of Mt St Helens, however no damage like that. Just a little excitement.

We got to visit Antigua, one of Tony's wish list cities.  He even got to be the tour guide's assistant again!

There were vendors, notably, my best friend, Ruth:

There were convents and crowds. 

Fountains

No one explained this to me...

A Church of The Sisters of Mercy

And a jungle where we could have coffees.

We met some chickens,

very well behaved.

And wandered some interesting neighborhoods.

Can you read the sign?

We met some new friends for a show.  

All in all it was a great day!

Swim

OH MY GOSH!!!

A BEACH!

Hualtulco,  Mexico.

It was glorious!  Tony and I walked off the boat to explore the town and I didn't care anymore, I just wanted to swim!

We walked this pink beach and found treasure.

There were shells with holes already in them!  Boom!  A necklace is born!

I think one length to the buoys was comparable to 2 lengths in a lap pool.  

As per usual, I was the only one venturing out very far.  I thought, "Why is no one swimming?", assuming it was my natural talent showing itself.

After 3 full rounds I flopped on the beach and met a local ex-pat who told me the cruise ships stir up the JELLYFISH. She will wait a couple of days to swim this beach again.  There ya go. Slightly reminiscent of the crocodilos in Costa Rica.

So I sat and talked with her for a while and decided this is the newest place I want to move to.

Stay tuned. 

We now have a beach scene on our window sill.

And are ready to move on to Guatamala on Saturday.

We are content!

Acapulco

Hey!!  We are officially through the first half of the first half!

Day 10.

We were surprised by Acapulco.  We remember it as a getaway for the rich and famous from the 50's and early 70's.  And it looks like that was the last time anyone invested in it.  Except rich people in condoms on the hill.

Yes.  You read that right.  That's what our tour guide said every time she meant to say " million  dollar CONDOS"! 

Some Americans (who are not me) who speak some Spanish, corrected her when we finally stopped at a church up in the mountains.

We tourists are like goats.  We wander all over the place and bleat if not kept in check.  She lost us a lot yesterday. 

I see the staff "organizing" us 

every morning and it reminds me of teaching 8th grade PE.  The guy that supervises shore excursions has no hair left.

So high points of Alcapulco, literally.

Capilla de la Paz.  This was a lovely little open air chapel at the very TOP of the mountains in Acapulco. A family built this place to honor two sons who passed in a plane crash in the mountains you can see from the chapel.  The Bay views are fantastic.

Apparently all the money is at the top of these hills.  A place called Las Brisas. From what I understand, JLo and Elvis' ghost live here. 

The goats wandered off and started taking pictures and were reprimanded by the guards.

We also saw The Flamingos.  A Hollywood hideout from back in the glory days.

There was a lot of pink in this place considering all the macho guys that frequented the place. Trevor Howard, John Wayne, Johnny Weismuller to name a few.

It has seen better days and this guy knows it.

Then there are these crazy guys again.  I looked up God Bless You in Spanish and repeated it often as I held my breath.  We were high up, as you can see.  Tony did well!

Apparently,  there is an actual society for leaping to your death.

La Quebrada. Fathers, sons, cousins.   They are paid, trained, and they have a retirement plan. 

Also tips. Dios mio. 

When we got back on the boat we were treated to this ga-lorious show.  What a treat!  I wanted to be their costumer!

Ok.  On to Hualtulco.   Day 11.  October 21st.