Waking up
with an alarm was hard…and moving our clocks forward last night just made it
worse. It was still dark outside, and the bed felt so good.
We were just
docking as we arrived at the Lido buffet. I tried the French toast this morning
but there was no syrup available at the station. When I asked about getting a fruit
topping, the guy took my plate and ran around to the other side of the
restaurant where the waffles were being made to get me some warm blueberries.
Not sure why they wouldn’t have the fruit toppings by the French toast. I felt
a little guilty that he had to go out of his way to take care of my request,
but I will say the French toast was very good.
The ship was
a little late getting cleared, but around 8:40 we walked off and found the line
for our ship-sponsored tour…”Banana Plantation & Rural Communities.” The
tour had been full and we were on a waiting list but a few days ago the tickets
were delivered to our cabin. Usually it is rare for us to book any shore
excursions through the ship, but this time we had an abundance of on board
credit to use up. I will admit it was so much easier this way! Two full size
coach buses were filled (which makes me think they opened up a second tour) and
we were with a guide named Angel.
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| I took this photo just for reference. Taking the shuttle to Tapachula might be an option if you didn't do a tour. |
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| What a great sign! "Topes" or speed bumps are quite common in Mexico. |
Our first
destination was the Juan N. Alverez “escuela primaria rural”…a rural elementary
school. The drive was a little over an hour and Angel provided commentary on
what we were seeing. He also gave some background on the school and community
where we were to visit. Angel passed out candy and school supplies to each of
us on the bus that the tour agency had purchased for the school children.
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| The classrooms all opened up into an outdoor courtyard. |
At the
school we spent some time in a first-grade classroom and also a 5th
grade class. The younger children were in a room without air conditioning and
it brought back memories of my years of teaching in a 100-year-old building. It
was so hard to keep my students engaged when everyone was hot and sticky and
not able to concentrate because of the heat. The students here were all nicely
dressed in their uniforms and some had towels tucked in their waistband to wipe their
sweaty faces.
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| This cute little girl showed us the test that they were taking in class. |
In the
classroom, there was a time for questions…from the children to the adults and
then vice versa. Some of the children had colored pictures which they gave to
us. The school supplies were given to the teacher and then each of us handed
out the candy to the children. After stopping at the 5th grade classroom,
we were seated in the outdoor courtyard/basketball court. I think Bob surprised
all of the students when instead of sitting in one of the chairs, he walked
over and sat on the concrete floor in the middle of one of the younger groups
of students. The boys all crowded around him pushing to see who could sit the
closest.
Pairs of
students from each grade dressed in traditional Mexican clothing and performed
folk dances for our group. It was apparent that having visitors was a big deal
and their faces were beaming! After they had finished, more students brought us
their original art work. I was sitting in the front and ended up with probably
a dozen different pictures!
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| Younger students in front...older in the back. |
I don’t
think the tour description mentioned it, but once we were back on the bus Angel
announced that it was time to get something to eat! We drove a short distance
to a little open-air church. Plastic tables had been set with colorful
tablecloths and we were served homemade tamales wrapped in banana leaves and
topped with molé sauce. I was sorry we hadn’t gotten any tamales in
Antigua so was tickled to death that I was getting a chance to sample them here.
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| The local Catholic church where we stopped to eat. The women of the church had prepared tamales from scratch. |
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| Tamales with mole sauce. |
At the edge
of the small community was the banana plantation we came to visit…a coop owned
by the people from the town.
We started with Angel showing us the banana plants
and then moved inside to the processing facility. We watched as the large
bunches of bananas were brought in, washed, cut apart, sorted, weighed and
packed into 40-pound boxes. After watching the procedure, I will never look at
a banana without thinking of what I saw!
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| The stump from a banana plant. Each plant produces one bunch of bananas and then is cut down. Another plant will then begin to grow from this stump to produce another bunch of bananas. |
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| After washing, this girl cuts the large bunches into smaller bunches. All of the stems and defective bananas are loaded into the truck in the background and used as cattle feed. |
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| Did you ever wonder how those stickers get on the bananas? I was impressed at the speed they worked and also that the stickers would adhere to the wet bananas! |
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| Sorting the bananas into 40 pound batches. |
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| Boxing up the bananas. These guys are paid by how many boxes they fill...they work VERY fast! |
I dozed on
the drive back to the ship…tired form the early morning wake up and also
drained form the heat and humidity. Bob on the other hand wanted to “get his
steps in” so walked for about an hour on the promenade deck. I opted to go to
the lido for an ice cream cone (one scoop of chocolate and one scoop of coffee
ice cream.) I sat in one of the promenade deck loungers overlooking the
perfectly manicured lawn of the terminal area and enjoyed my cone. Being in
Mexico meant I had unlimited data, texting AND calls so I called and visited with my
sister for a while.
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| Window cleaners. |
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| This pool is available for passengers to use. |
It felt good
to shower and be rid of the sticky sweat from the day. Once again, in my
opinion, the highlight of the dinner menu was the soup…seafood chowder to be
exact. Our table was one of the last to leave the dining room…but the table of
8 that we sit next to was still having dessert as we left. From overhearing
conversations, I have gathered that they did not know each other prior to the
cruise but in just a little over a week they seem to be becoming great friends.
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| Seafood Chowder |
We weighed
the options for the evening and decided to skip the comedian in the theater.
Back in the cabin Bob finished watching a DVD movie while I worked on the blog...and normally that would be the end of our day. But not tonight! The Indonesian Crew Show was scheduled for 11 pm. It was the latest that we stayed up during the whole cruise, but we wanted to see the show and especially our waiter, Yazzir! A good show and worth losing a little sleep to see!
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