Day 54 
Mexico was a whole new country for us. We love visiting new places and were looking forward to discovering interesting people, places and things in this fascinating town. To make it even better we were arriving late afternoon and over-nighting: leaving the following afternoon. We headed into town to experience some Mexican specialty foods and to Skype family using the restaurant’s free WiFi.
In the morning we were booked for a shore excursion. Expecting the usual busses, we were quite surprised when a fleet of people movers turned up to take us all off for the day. Our van had a large 13 in the window and our friendly driver, Fernando, greeted us with a cheery “I hope you are not superstitious”.
Weaving our way through the town our van headed to the Pink Flamingo Hotel overlooking the bay. It was a slice of the past: right from the halcyon days of early Hollywood movies like Sunset Boulevard and boasted that John Wayne had stayed there while filming. There were old movie posters everywhere and the décor, while a bit tired was certainly interesting and gave the place a lovely, quiet atmosphere that was sea-breeze cool in a morning which was already heating up. Enjoying a real orange juice while gazing about at the interesting décor and beautiful view, we returned at the appointed hour to get back in our van for the next stage,
Interestingly our driver had the hood of the van up and was intently examining something under the bonnet.
“Is it broken?”. I asked.
“No, no. Nothing to worry about, I just need to get a little start from my amigo”.
Amigo backed his van up to ours, attached jumper leads and our engine spluttered into life.
We drove on to La Quebrada where the famous cliff divers were to perform for us. It was a spectacular show and spectacular scenery. We were very impressed. And dutifully bought souvenirs and paid tips for the performance in the approved manner.
It came time to move on, and, yes you guessed it: driver was under the hood again. More jumper leads from another amigo and we spluttered back into life and proceeded on our way.
“I suppose you need a new battery”.
“No, it’s quite new. It’s just some connections a bit loose”.
Back through town, in fact right across town, we progressed and up into the hills on the other end of the bay. We arrived at a chapel: built as a memorial to their son by a local family. The building was lovely, the views breathtaking and we enjoyed exploring native flora and architecture before heading back to our van.
I didn’t like to comment this time as it was getting a wee bit embarrassing. However, a quick jumper lead exercise (getting quite good at this now) and we were off again back to the ship.
The driver was lovely. He talked about his family and about life in Acapulco. That was much more interesting than the impersonal list of facts often given by many tour guides. We arrived safely back at the quayside, embarked into familiar surroundings, were welcomed by our friendly crew and soon slipped our moorings heading out into the Pacific.
