These time changes are killing us ...

These time changes are killing us … but we land in Guatemala tomorrow

Day 4 (Wednesday, February 19).  Yet again our coffee attendant woke us.  We’d lost another hour and this time it was more difficult.  He was pounding on the door with what sounded like a fist, hammering, hammering.  I groggily staggered out of bed to let him in.  And to think, we will soon be losing another hour … ooooohhhhhh.  How hard this is … sailing in gorgeous weather, waking to sunshine, having coffee brought to us.  We’re getting used to this treatment; it’s not at all difficult.  And we still have another week and a half of it.

There's a poster contest to make them to show the people of Panama when we arrive.  There are some beautiful and quite artistic posters ... artists on board.

This one's for Richard in New York City.  We love you and Kim, too.

Our Captain’s Log (on tv each day) let us know we again are having slight seas, 1.5-4-foot waves, compared to wavelets which is less.  The temperature is 76 degrees with 78 percent humidity.  That’s been the usual.  The sliding door to the balcony is open and we are enjoying the sound of the waves, the blue water, the blue sky with some haze and the slight roll of the ship.  It’s quite pleasant to sit here in bed and enjoy all of that at once.

 

It's nice to know we're eating local fruit.

Today we did more deck walking although Jaz hit the gym early, too.  I wanted to hang out at the room for a while.  Laziness is setting in … being waited on, doing nothing more but entertain ourselves.  While we were walking the deck someone pointed out there were sea turtles … and we saw two.  They appear quickly, and then disappear just as quickly in the white froth of the ship’s wake, with no opportunity to take a photo.  We aren’t walking quickly, but we came upon a couple with the lady using a walker.  We had to push to pass her.  Now there’s not only laziness, but slowness in our walking.

We huffed and puffed, but we did it ... a good pass.

The afternoon was taken up with a movie on the building of the Panama Canal, then a long dinner in the dining room followed by a “So You Wanna Dance” production show.  The show was filled with colorful costumes and dances from various parts of the world, including Ireland, Spain and the Orient.  It was well-done and we were glad we’d decided to attend.  What we will say is these old people go to things very early, and seats fill up.  We arrived quite early, too, but still not nearly as early as many of them.

We thoroughly enjoyed the production numbers.

Then it was time to sleep as we’d have a long day Thursday … look out, Guatemala, here we come.

Bacon for Rusty ...

Land ho!!

 

The gangway was ready for us.

Day 5 … February 20.  We landed in Puerto Quetzal, Guatemala, about 9 a.m., gliding smoothly past the breakwater and into the harbor.  Our captain made a smooth docking … and we met in our groups to disembark onto the floating walkway.  We set foot on land … never realizing we still had our sea legs on.  We made no sudden or stumbling moves and moved quickly through a welcome of music and colorful booths with goods of all sorts.  But we needed to get to our busses and then head off on our excursion, to the Filadelfia Coffee Estate. 

 

The band performing for us as we wandered off the ship.

 

Vendors at the harbor.  We didn't have time to stop.

The bus ride was 1-1/2 hours, passing through small villages and towns.  It’s quite noticeable how much trash there is along the roads and down in the ravines.  The countryside is beautiful but marred with bottles, paper, plastic, cardboard. 

There are some interesting electrical wire bird's nests, an electric company's nightmare.

 

Colorful with lots of horse drawn carriages.

The bright outfits are a standout.

The old and the new.

Beautiful buildings seem to be in many directions you turn.

Many of the buildings are quite colorful, although not all seem to be in a good state of repair.  Most people seem to ride small motorbikes or bicycles, women carry loads on their heads on occasion and many dress in traditional bright dresses, like rainbows walking around, some with babies in colorful pouches on their bellies.  There are also a lot of soldiers and security people.  It’s the first time I’ve been around that type of thing, with the exception of our U.S. airports after 9-11.

A soldier, and a photo that looked better in black and white.

The program is moving my photos around.  These are the coffee beans before being hulled, the red is the berry, and the white is the bean inside the hull.

We arrived at the coffee plantation that is located in the mountains, lying among the many volcanoes that are in the area, some of which are still active, and some ash is used to fertilize and help cultivate the plants.  Coffee growing is no easy task as it takes three years to become “coffee.”  It’s planted inside and then later moved outside to grow under large trees from Australia that act as umbrellas to the coffee plants.  We saw larger plants with white flowers and green and red berries.  We were allowed to pick a few berries.  We split them open to reveal light-green coffee beans.  They’re slimy, but you could chew them.  They certainly don’t taste like coffee at that point. 

The blossom.

The berry.

An old hand grinder, John Deere, would you believe?

An old huller

 

An interesting sign at the coffee estate parking lot.

We wandered through a flat concrete area where some beans are raked, then we were taken into the plant where they are sorted, hulled, washed, roasted, and put into bags.  We were treated to coffee which was excellent so I purchased a couple of small bags of beans.  It will be made sparingly.

Coffee bags, 150 pounds ... I can't lift it.

If you're looking for coffee, follow the website.

Their logo.

Some of the beans on the concrete that they rake ... not sure why.

 

A great sign at the little café where they served us coffee.

A jade carving at the jade factory.  Interesting, although not my cup of tea.

A tool supposedly used by the Mayans to carve jade.

From the coffee estate we went in to Antigua, once the capital of Guatemala, where we did a walking tour past many old buildings, churches, and official buildings, their Central Park with the fountain, the Jade Factory.  The architecture is often old and quite beautiful. 

The arches are part of many of the buildings and quite beautiful.

 

The fountain in Central Park.

As you walk along many people try to sell you things, blankets, jewelry, flutes, purses -- standing in front of you, walking along side of you, trying to hand you things.  Most of them are women in their colorful clothing trying to sell you oftentimes things that are eye-catching and so colorful you want it all.  The colors stand out like jewels and seem to shimmer in the sun.  But you cannot purchase everything and we were told it was not good to purchase from the street vendors.  There was a wave of them that seemed to follow us.  So many of the women are also quite beautiful with lovely complexions many of us would kill for.

Carne asada cooked over an outdoor barbeque, bean soup and handmade tortillas and awesome guacamole was the lunch during our outing and quite excellent.  Fried bananas with a sauce, but it wasn't something I'd have again.

Small motor bikes are everywhere.

We were taken to a market with vendors where we could purchase any trinkets we wanted.  While I purchased a few small things, when we were leaving, I also purchased a small trinket from one of the street vendors. 

While we were walking I was trying to take as many photos as possible, practicing my skills with the manual settings on my camera and working to capture the colorful scenery.  I was working on my homework assignment which was to photograph landscape and do portraits, all manually.  Many times I missed the photo, but I also got a few, so it was a successful trip.

On the bus ride back, it was nice to be off our feet.  We passed through a rain shower, the road was wet and it became even more humid than it had been.  Then as we came down out of the mountains the sky began to turn blue and it was sunny by the time we got back to the port, wending our way through the market by the port and boarding the ship.  It was a wonderful day spent on land, but we were off to our next destination, Costa Rica.

We’ve reached a point where we are trying to concentrate on more deck walking as well as hitting the gym to take the edge off the bad eating patterns we’ve acquired.  By the time we hit Florida and are on our own again, we won’t know how to forage for ourselves, and will be left waiting … waiting … until hell freezes over for our coffee to arrive.

 

Disclaimer:  The program sometimes puts them out of order and so do I.  Too many photos; not enough time and space.