Ariba Mexico

Life on board ship can be very busy.  Since Tuesday when we boarded, we have spent every day at sea except one & that was for just a few hours on shore at Carbo San Lucas.  How boring you may think but no, not at all.  We consult the daily programme, delivered the night before, work out what seminars and classes we will attend then work the food around that. Oh my god, the food is just overwhelming & so much of it.  Judging by a lot of the passenges they must live onboard for years at a time.  This has also affected their sense of shame as they seem to have lost that along with their sense of good dress.  I have previously written about life on board ship & it seems to be the same on this one so I won't repeat it all.  The characters are slightly different tho, both Jon & Malcolm have taken a dislike to the Zimbabwean cruise director who happens to be young & cute but as to his character I tend to be of the same opinion. He tries hard to prentend he likes people but for a fully focused customer job I don't think he is entirely suited.  The location guide however is a different kettle of fish and far better than the captains wife we had on the last cruise.  She is interesting & full of life & going to her lectures is always fun.

We sailed into the port of Carbo San Lucas on Friday 4th at 11am and it was beatuiful.  The sea was a deep blue, the bay curved around starting from the tall, white rock formations at the point, a bit like the 12 apostles in Victoria or the cliffs of Portugal then sweeping around with the sandy beaches and town built on the edge of the beach.  We anchored in the bay & lined up to take the tender into the main wharf where we were greeted by a band playing very Mexican music & dancers twirling around in their extremely colourful costums.  After we cleared the official part of the wharf we were descended upon by hawkers wanting to take us out in a boat, in a taxi or whatever they could sell us.  We beat them off with a stick and headed into a big building housing a market full of stalls selling cheap & trashy souvenirs & everything Mexican.  Out the other side took us back on the wharf where a big frame with a rope tied on was standing. Handing on the end of the rope was a yellowfin tuna with the catcher standing proudly beside her prize.  They then hung up a sail fish which looked equally impressive. We didn't get away however from the hawkers so we agreed to go with one to see Lands End and El Arco, or more commonly known as The Arch.  

Carbo San Lucas is right at the tip of the 1000 mile long Baja (pronounced Baha) peninsula which is that long thin peice of land you see on the pacific side of Mexico just under California.  Lands End is of course the very very tip of that peninsula where the sea of Cortez meets the Pacific Ocean.  It is know for it's great fishing which is what has made it popular & is now like a mini Acapulco.  The rich & famous come here to relax on the beaches, swim in the 30 deg ocean or frequent one of the many bars or resturantes.  Apparently Pink was in town when we were there but we didn't see her.  It wasn't quite like I thought it would be, like a town with narrow streets & a square with proper shops. Instead it was more like a beach resort, stalls more than shops and open air resturantes right on the beach or wharf side.  There was a lovely big air conditioned mall that had very high end exclusive shops, not the type we would shop in at all.

Anyway, so we went out on a glass bottom boat, just the 5 of us and Ruben who drove the boat.  He took us to a beach where everyone was swimming along with hundreds of colourful fish that we could see darting under the glass windows.  Then we went around the point & saw The Arch (very famous there) and other rock formations like Scooby Doo, the Witch, the drinking dragon, the pirates cave and other equally imaginative shapes you could think of.  Then we scooted back, passed our cruise ship which looked magnificant in the bay and he landed us on Medano Beach, the next beach along from the town.

We did the 'hot sand' dance up to the walkway and managed to get third degree burns on the base of our feet.  It was all a bit much as it was so hot & humid, not what we had got use to so we flopped into one of those inviting open air resturants, got a bucket of beer, 2 Margarita's for me and ordered platters of Mexican food.  It was a great meal & cheap at $15 p/h as well as the lively entertainment going on around us & not to mention the absolutly stunning, stunning views over the bay.  Picture postcard perfect can't describe it enough. It is truly beatuiful.

After that we had to make the long trek back to the wharf which was when we found the lovely Air conditioned mall. We were so hot & bothered it was difficult to recover. Eventually we had to leave the mall and make it past the stalls with the stall holders shouting out to entice us in to buy.  As if that ever works.  They do hassle you but at least they don't chase you up the street like in some countries.  

Jon had disappeared by now, doing his usual Dynamo invisible act & Malcolm had peeled off to buy some alchol leaving us 3 females to find our own way back.  It was all too hot so we sucummbed to another bar & sat down for some more cold drinks. We saw Malcolm bobbing along past the bar on the promenade so he came in for a drink too before we finally dragged our way back to the tenders where Jon was patiently waiting for us.  

After a swim in the warm pool on the top deck I felt revived enough to get dressed and go down for yet another 4 course dinner and watch the evening show before crawling into bed around 11.30pm.

The weather has got decidedly warmer and even in the middle of the night, standing out on the balcony, the wind is warm, humidty hangs in the air and the balmy evenings with the stars twinkling and the swish of the ocean as the boat cuts through the water is a very pleasant experience.