Manzanillo …

Our last port of call … Manzanillo. Never been there before. Read up to see what this place is famous for and here is what I found. “The beaches of Santiago Bay stretch for 5 miles. At the northernmost point, where the lagoon empties into the sea, is a popular local's beach, which is busy on weekends. “

We decided to stroll around the downtown, which is literally located at the end of the pier. There are a lot of small shops, restaurants and supermarkets around the downtown. But, nothing special … just another town …  Again nothing to write home about.

The fun started when we decided to join this bus ride to hit the beach. It was a last minute decision that we had. It didn't cost us that much, $10.00 per person round trip. At first we were worry about the timing of the return trip. It was a bit closer to the re-board time and we were worried that we couldn’t make it back on time. But, we went on anyway and turned out … (Just so you know, The same shore excursion from the cruise line for visiting downtown then the beach would cost you $46 per person. Speaking of over-priced.)

We arrived at the beach. It was so crowded, literally filled with both tourists and local people. (I realized that I am about to digress here but …) I chatted with one of my co-worker the other day. He mentioned that he has some reservation on cruises. He feels he doesn’t get enough exposure of the local culture even though he joined many of the shore excursions. I think the key here sometimes, we need to venture off and join the local crowd. We did that in Korean as well where we went to the restaurants where the local goes to and joined the crowd lining up buying some local delicacies.  Okay enough said.

Is that crowded or not?

 As you guessed it, we joined the crowd and found ourselves a table for four, but the girls decided to hit the sand. (Yes, again and making another tunnel or some sort :-)) So, the two parents decided to order some local food. Thinking back making me smile … I went over to my nearest neighbor (On the above photo, look over my right and that lady dressed in pink shirt. That was the one I was referring to :-) )and asked her the name of the food she ordered and of course … by the time I got back to my table, I totally have forgotten the name. :--) Me? No habla espanol So, when the waitress walked by, I just pointed to the food that he carried and ordered from there. 

Does it look de-li-ci-ous to you?

And this?

I totally think they were better than all of the cruise ship's food that we ate. Seriously!" Oh … I ought to mention this, after we drank the coconut juice, they took out the meat and mixed it with lime, salt and salsa.

The coconut meat with lime-salt-and salsa ... interesting but not to my taste

Look at how happy I was with the food .. Uh! I love that chip (in the plastic bag) too .. it was yummy ...

 I guess it goes without saying that we made it back to the ship just in time, otherwise I won't be sitting here writing this blog, instead .. I would be ... well .. what do you think I was going to say? I would be still on vacation and probably being fired for missing works :-)

Until next stop,
Journey of Life