Merry Christmas!
Today, we stop in the port city of Cozumel, Mexico.
We slept fairly well last night, but we did experience a few rough sea patches where we could hear and feel the bow of the ship shudder from some of the large waves.
We were awoken by the vibration of the thrusters as we were tying up to the pier in Cozumel at about 6:45 AM. Our plan for this morning was to head out at about 9:00 AM to walk to the Catholic Church called Corpus Christi for Christmas Day Mass.
We leisurely slept in until about 8:00 AM, and then got up to get ready to go to the buffet for breakfast. I went ahead and showered, and we both were ready for breakfast at 8:20 AM, so we headed up to Deck 7 to the World Cafe Buffet. We both enjoyed some scrambled eggs, sausage and a few other sides, not wanting to eat a lot knowing we would shortly be doing a 22-minute walk to the church from the pier, in the heat of Cozumel.
We had not really thought about what we needed to do to get ready for our first port stop, we needed to put on sunscreen before we left as well as pack the backpack with water bottles and some other gear. There was a chance of showers this afternoon in the forecast, so we grabbed our umbrellas and packed them as well. I needed a hat to protect my head from the sun, especially in the area where I just recently had scalp surgery, and I did not want to wear my hat until after we went to Mass, it would be hot and make my head and hair all sweaty.
We did make sure we grabbed a wallet and a credit card, we wanted to go to a store to try and purchase some AA batteries for our Christmas Tree lights, the rechargeable batteries we had brought we not lasting very long, maybe they are old. We also wanted some new Command Strips to hang up some of our Christmas decorations. We did not know the ones we brought were dried up and did not work well any longer. Plus we needed to purchase our lunch at Pancho’s Backyard, where we planned to go to after church.
By the time we got everything ready, it was about 9:05 AM, a few minutes late, but not bad. We gathered up everything and headed to the Disembarkation Gangway on Deck 1. There was a group getting off for a tour and we had to wait a few minutes for one man to get down the ramp, he was having a lot of difficulty with the steps.
Once we were on the pier, we headed toward the end of the pier and used the directions from our offline Google Maps for directions to the church. The only issue was that the exit of the “cruise terminal” was via an escalator that ascended to an elevated walkway that crossed over the main street but also routed us into a large shopping area full of stores. There were only limited exits to get you out of the shopping area we were being “routed” through without choice. We had to maneuver around a very slowly moving tour group from the ship and finally found an escalator to head downward to exit the elevated “forced” shopping area. By that time, we had used up about 15 minutes of what had originally shown as a 22-minute walk in Google Maps, and all we had done was walk in a big circle, we had not made any progress in getting to the church.
Now the map directions routed us away from the church for about a half block just to get us away from the shopping area. We started our walk, and it seemed longer than 22 minutes, probably because it had been with the extra time we were walking in circles in the mall. It was really hot and steamy outside, it was already in the low 80’s and there was hardly any breeze. I was so glad I had taken a shower this morning before we left the ship!!
Eventually, after we walked down several streets following the Google Map directions, we could hear some church bells and eventually saw the twin bell towers of the church in the distance, at least we were heading the correct way. The sidewalks were very irregular and they were at many different elevations above the street from one sidewalk to the next. Did I say it was hot and steamy, and of course, we were sweating.
We finally made it to the church and went inside after seeing a sign on the outside confirming that there was indeed a Christmas Mass at 10:00 AM today. The church was quite large inside, but only cooled by natural ventilation and by quite a few large rotating pedestal fans. We found an open section of pews and found a plug for the fan that was placed right next to our pew, but had not yet been plugged in or turned on. It took us several minutes to cool down, even with the fan running.
We still had about 15 more minutes to wait before Mass started. Most of the people came into the church in the last ten minutes before Mass started, and it was pretty full by the start of Mass.
When the Mass started, there was a procession of children dressed up as shepherds and Wisemen, and then a little bit older teen couple who were portraying Mary and Joseph. They proceeded up to the front of the church behind the priest. There was also a large group of various-aged teens playing musical instruments and singing. Other than it all being in Spanish, of course, it was nice music
The Mass was good, and we were glad we had been able to attend for Christmas Day.
We were able to get some photos of the decorated church altar after Mass, and also use their restrooms out in a courtyard beside the Church, only accessible from the church itself. All of the men’s urinals were outside behind an uncovered wall, and the sink area was only partially covered, but generally outside. There were more separate rooms for the Women, but their sink was also just in an open area near their individually doored stalls.
We knew there was a more direct route to get back to the port terminal, all we needed to do was head straight on the road beside the church until it ended near the waterfront. On the way, almost to the end of that road was a large grocery/merchandise store, sort of like the Walmart of Cozumel. Unfortunately, all we could find inside of the items we needed were the AA batteries, no command strips. We purchased the batteries and then continued our walk back toward the port. We passed by another store that we have visited in the past, it is on the main road. We headed inside and we were successful in finding some command strips after having to look around most of the store until we found the correct area where they were located. It also was a multi-purpose store, having goods as well as groceries. After purchasing our items, we headed outside and continued toward the pier.
We passed by a decorated square and took a few photos of the Christmas and New Year decorations there. We finally made it back to the pier, but now we had to still walk several blocks past it on the main road to get to Pancho’s Backyard for our lunch. Now we were starting to get into some of the main shopping areas and there were vendors all trying to get us to come inside, it was sort of a pain to keep having to say no. We did check on Google Maps to make sure we were heading in the right direction. We were pretty sure, but both of us were now hot and leg-weary and just wanted to make sure we were going the correct way. It was still several more blocks to walk, but we finally made it to Poncho’s.
We first looked in the store and then headed to the far end to the restaurant. We headed inside and found that it was not very crowded. We were seated at a table near the Marimba Players, which have been here entertaining guests for years.
The menu was only available to look at on our phone after scanning a bar code, and there was free wi-fi here. We picked out a couple of entrees and also ordered a basket of chips with salsa. We both ordered a Tecate Beer in cans, which was all they had, there were no bottled or draft beers. There were several Mexican beers available, but not our favorite, Dos Equis Amber.
The beers were poured into cold glasses and really hit the spot. We ordered one chicken nacho plate and one shredded beef burrito plate. The salsa was more like a Pico de Galle, it was really just chopped tomatoes, onions and probably several other ingredients, more like a relish in consistency, and hard to get on a chip. It did have a good flavor, it was just hard to eat.
The chips and salsa were served first and then the entrees came out a short time later and they were great. We split each entree onto separate plates and enjoyed our meal with the music. Of course, we had to have another beer while finishing all of the food. It was another great experience at Pancho’s Backyard, and as is typical for eating Mexican food, we were stuffed.
Stephanie wanted to spend some more time in the store, and in the end, we purchased a small nativity scene with Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus inside a clay “stable”, really more like a cave. All of the Christmas items were 50% off, so it will be a nice addition to our travel ornaments.
After having sat for so long for lunch, our legs had gotten stiff, our tummies were full, and now we needed to make the fairly long walk back to the ship. It was not easy, but we finally made it back, but not before starting sweat session number two.
Once we were back on the ship, we got a couple of their bottled waters and a nice cool washcloth to wipe off some of the sweat from our faces, which was nice.
We headed back to the room and drank both of the waters as well as mixing a powdered Gatorade to drink to try and rehydrate. We just relaxed and called our mom’s to wish them a Merry Christmas using our Wi_Fi calling feature on our phones with the ship’s Wi-Fi.
We spent a couple of hours or more in the room just relaxing and enjoying the view of Cozumel, and mostly cooling off. I worked on this blog post, and it was good to get caught up t real time on the posts. Stephanie napped a bit, it had been tiring doing all of the walking earlier. We put in over 11,000 steps between walking to the church and then walking to Pancho’s and then back to the ship.
Eventually, we headed out of the room and enjoyed sitting in some chairs at the stern of the ship, waiting for us to cast off. It was fun to watch a couple of other ships leave from the piers to the south. It was about 4:45 PM and all aboard was at 5:00 PM. There were some thunderstorms and rain on the horizon, it had been in the forecast for this evening. At least it was a little cooler with the overcast skies and moderate breeze from the storms.
At around 5:30 PM, all of the lines were cast off and we departed the pier, heading south to Cartagena, Columbia. It had actually started to shower some as we were leaving, and all of the tables that had been set up for dinner outside on the stern were now getting cleared by the crew because of the rain. We found a table that was protected and stayed out a bit longer as we passed by the island of Cozumel, but eventually, it was not protected enough as the ship gained speed and the rain inceased.
We headed back to the cabin to get showers and dressed for dinner. We walked through the World Cafe buffet to see what was being served for Christmas dinner there. After the marathon dinner last night in The Restaurant, we had already decided that Christmas Day might even be worse, so we were not planning on going there tonight.
We headed out to dinner in the World Cafe Buffet, but first stopped at The Living Room Bar for a glass of pre-dinner wine and to listen the the music being played on the piano and violin in the Atrium. We met a nice couple at the bar that was doing the World Cruise and talked with them for a while about their planning and packing for that long of a duration cruise. After a bit, we headed up to the buffet for dinner.
There were a few good items on the buffet, and it was certainly nice not to have to take over two hours to eat.
After dinner, we headed back to The Living Room Bar and had a couple of drinks there, again enjoying a different piano player in the Atrium. We talked with the bar manager there who happened to make us our first drink, and we were surprised they had the Schweppes Ginger Ale, and we could really taste the difference. He thought they may have some Canada Dry Ginger Ale on board and made a couple of calls to try and find out.
Eventually, we moved up to the Explorer’s Lounge and enjoyed a drink there listening to the guitar player again tonight. Stephanie enjoyed a bowl of the split pea soup from Mamsens, only available after 10:15 PM. At about 10:30 PM, we headed back to the cabin to enjoy some Christmas Music there on our Spotify.
Eventually, we were just too tired to stay up any longer, it had been a good, but tiring day.
Merry Christmas to all and to all a Good Night!
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