reallyjillytravels

Wednesday,January 25, 2023 Puerto Quetzal and Antigua, Guatemala Puerto Quetzal is Guatemala’s largest port. Bananas are one of their largest exports and one of the first things I saw as we entered the port was a large Chiquita container ship loading bananas. A few cruise ships also stop here. From the port we took a bus to Antigua, a UNESCO world heritage site surrounded by volcanos in the highlands. On the way, our air-conditioned bus passed many brightly-colored and elaborately-decorated school buses imported from the United States, called chicken buses by foreigners because their cargo often includes live chickens or other livestock. Very cheap transportation and the preferred way for locals to get from one city to another. Antigua was the colonial capital until an earthquake destroyed many of the buildings centuries ago. There are still ruins among restored buildings.  It’s easy to see the small bougainvillea-covered city on foot if you watch your step on the cobblestone si

Tuesday, January 24, 2023 Chiapas is the poorest state in Mexico, only about 8 miles from the Guatemala border.  Puerto Chiapas isn’t really a town—it's an attractive dock area with a couple of huge palapas containing shops for the cruise ship tourists. The tour booth by the cruise ship had only Spanish-speaking staff. Charlie managed to find a large van shuttling people to a nearby town so he bought tickets, and we got a couple of the last seats. Once on the van, we discovered it was headed to the city of Tapachula, Mexico. A young man on board was practicing his English by (mostly) reading from an official script enthusiastically promoting the area. There were a couple of Canadian women from the ship also on the van, and one of them was fluent in Spanish. We tagged along with them, which helped right away when it came to deciphering the confusing instructions on how to catch the shuttle back  to Puerto Chiapas. Tapachula is very crowded and lively, to put it in the best possible

 Yay! I figured out how to add photos from the ship. Friday, January 20 Manzanillo Here’s a photo of Charlie in Manzanillo. The blue sculpture on the shore behind him is a marlin—the symbol of Manzanillo We should have explored on our own, but instead took the ship's bus tour to the cities of Colima and Colama, both in the mountains east of Manzanillo. Visualize paying big bucks to ride through nice countryside with an unintelligible drone in the background (the bus had a horrible sound system—couldn’t understand much of what the guide was saying) and you get the picture.  On the way to Colima we stopped at a fruit stand that had these giant Jackfruit, and big squashes (on the bottom shelf). Colima has a pretty town square and a nice museum. Here’s a photo of a man from California getting his mariachi boots polished in the town square, and a picture of Charlie & Jill in the museum! We traveled on to Colama and had lunch at a restaurant on the town square. Excellent Mexican food

  Tuesday, January 17, 2023 San Francisco, California & Ensenada, Mexico The Bon Voyage party started Saturday when we arrived in San Francisco, meeting up with  friends Jeff and Bernadette. They had mapped out a tiki bar tour starting at the Fairmont Hotel’s Tonga Room. It has a large pool with a dock for the band, and apparently rain, thunder, and lightning every hour. It was SRO, so we didn’t stay long enough to witness the storm. However, the storm outside was for real. We took a taxi to a hole-in-the-wall restaurant on Geary Street with good Thai food. From there, between showers, we walked to the Zombie Room, whose only sign was a neon coco palm over the door with skulls for coconuts. Exotic tropical drinks, and great tiki decor! We ended the night at the Top of the Mark, with it’s incredible panoramic view of the city.  For breakfast on Sunday we met Jeff and Bernie at the Mark Hopkins Hotel, where our Chinatown tour guide extraordinaire—and dear friend—Albert Tou join

Jill and I are super excited that the final stages of leaving on our trip are here! Last week Jill checked us in via the internet.  These 4 suitcases are due to be picked up by Luggage Forward between noon and 3 p.m. tomorrow. We were careful not to pack any batteries, products containing alcohol, medications (even vitamins), electronics, pressurized containers, etc. which are strictly forbidden. Mostly clothing in these. The next time we see them will be on the ship.  One week from this Saturday we get a ride to SeaTac from a dear friend, along with two more suitcases and three carry-ons.  Just tonight, we met with our awesome house-sitter and went over some the quirks of our nearly-80-year-old house. One of our biggest challenges will be to say goodbye to our desktop computer. We'll have cell phones, laptop, and an I-Pad, but we're newbies on those last two. Also concerned that our last day at home will be Friday the 13th - did not realize that until tonight! We have a "