March 14, 2019:
Disaster struck this morning! As we were leaving the customs area in Acapulco, Charlotte missed her footing on some steps and fell into a metal handrail. Unbeknownst to Jim and me at the time, she broke two ribs. Charlotte was pretty certain she had broken the ribs, but kept mum and gamely insisted on continuing on to catch our excursion to see the famous cliff divers and tour around town.
Our first stop was in the old part of Acapulco known as La Quebrada (the “broken cliffs”) where the cliff divers perform daily, both every afternoon at 1:00 p.m., and every evening on the hour. It is known as this because back in the Spanish colonial period, the Spaniards broke a pass through the hills to the harbor so the sailing ships would have enough wind to sail into the harbor where we docked.
However, because our cruise got in early, the divers made a special arrangement to do a performance just for our cruise passengers. The divers perform at the Mirador Hotel, and to get into the viewing area, you have to walk down at least 70 steps into the hotel (basically, down the side of the cliff) and another 70 steps back up. Charlotte gamely insisted on doing this. She is one tough cookie!
We learned that the divers have a union, of which there are about 60 members, and the union provides a form of social security and disability for its members. Since diving from the heights of these cliffs causes permanent damage to the eyes and ears of the divers, most retire when they are about forty. The, the retired diver gets a pension in the form of a lump sum payment to start a business.
The show consisted of both watching several dives by a group of about seven divers, including several where they dove in pairs and one trio. Then we had a performance of ballet folklorico.
Then we returned to our bus, and by this time, it was pretty obvious Charlotte was in a lot of pain. Fortunately, the rest of this tour consisted of a driving tour around the three areas of Acapulco: old Acapulco, new Acapulco, and the new high end development known as Acapulco Diamante. Along the way we saw various touristic sights such as the main Cathedral of Acapulco, which looks out on Bay of Acapulco, and the Fort of San Diego built to protect the town from pirates. Both of the famous pirates, Sir Walter Raleigh and Sir Thomas Cavendish attacked the city.
During our drive, we also learned quite a bit about the history of the town, starting with the arrival of the Spaniards in 1521. Because the Philippines were also colonized by Spain at the same time, and there was a fair amount of travel by the conquistadores between the two colonies, the people of Acapulco started trading with the Far East for silk and spices. The Spaniards also imported several crops from the Philippines, and adapted many of those crops for production in Mexico, such as coconut and mango plantations.
Our tour then drove through the area of “new” Acapulco, along the beach known as La Condesa. The tour guide was fairly candid about the societal problems Mexico is experiencing because of the narco-traffickers. For example, he noted that 20 years ago, Acapulco got about 400 cruise ships per year into its port, but that today, they will get only 49 because of the violence.
Today, most of the tourists are Mexican citizens, and they come mostly from Mexico City, which is 260 miles away, or 3 hours by new toll road.
We then drove up into the hills looking down on the harbor. Our guide showed us “Las Brisas”, which is one of the most exclusive hotels in Acapulco. The area surrounding it is also called Las Brisas, and it is a very exclusive residential area. On one of the highest hills sits La Capilla de la Paz, a chapel built by the prominent Tourgette family as a memorial to their two sons who died in a plane crash.
Then we drove into Acapulco Diamanté, which our guide called “the future of Acapulco “. We made a photo stop at Linda Vista overlooking this area. It is now considered the most exclusive area for homes in the city. The harbor below is named Bahia de Puerto Marquez, and was named after Hernán Cortez, who was later named a Marquis for his service to the Crown in discovering the New World.
The end of our drive took us by the Acapulco Princess. Back in the day, Howard Hughes used to rent out top three floors so he could have his privacy. The main building was built to resemble the temples at Chichen Itza.
The tour over, we immediately hustled Charlotte into the medical center onboard the ship. The Explorer has a very complete and modern suite of medical offices on board. At the medical center, we were able to get Charlotte x-rayed. Although the x-rays were inconclusive, Dr. Jorge was pretty certain that Charlotte had fractured at least one rib. He prescribed some pretty heavy duty pain meds, and also gave her a shot for the pain, which made her much more comfortable.
We got Charlotte settled into her cabin and made her as comfortable as possible, while Jim and I basically explored options for her to choose what she wanted to do. Although we initially looked at trying to fly her home this afternoon from Acapulco, there were no direct flights, so we all decided to see how she felt tomorrow. We’re keeping our fingers crossed that she is feeling better and wants to stay onboard where we can look after her. Thankfully, tomorrow is a sea day, so we can do more research, and then she can decide what she wants to do.
Vaya con Gringos 