October 04, 2006
Cruise - Day 4
Ensenada.... What can I say about Ensenada? Again, I woke up as soon as the light came through the window. Again, I snapped a picture of the first thing I saw when I peeked out the window.
We were entering Ensenada Harbor. I watched as we passed several small boats on their way out of the harbor. Most likely fishermen. Compared to the behemoth Los Angeles harbor, Ensenada harbor is dinky. This was it as far as cranes off loading ships.
However, the cruise ship terminal in Ensenada, while small, was much better looking than the one in Los Angeles. And newer too.
Visible from the terminal was a large Mexican flag.
Even though I am taking this through the window of the ship, it was that gloomy outside. And, I think that that is smog that is obscuring the mountains in the background.
We looked down at the terminal and watched as the tour buses, shuttles and cabs lined up outside. The buses were for the people who paid extra to go on tours. The shuttles and cabs were there to take passengers to the downtown area where the shopping is. Mike and I decided to walk.
The cruise ship provided us with a map of where they recommended we shop. Certain shops were certified by Royal Caribbean. In other words, if you were to buy anything from these shops, Royal Caribbean would guarantee your purchase.
Mike and I started out and walked a little more northwards than the path that was designated by the map. We wanted to cross at a signal. We got about halfway across, when it changed suddenly. We stood on the center island and watch the traffic whiz by. Got the green and completed our crossing. We walked up a side street by, what looked like, an elementary school. All the kids were wearing uniforms and it looked like it was a nutrition break for them. We ended up on the main street, with all the shops, but we were several blocks down. It was a little dingy here.
As we approached the main shopping area, we came across a street vendor with some unique souvenirs. He made scorpions, bugs and lizards out of wire and then would paint them. He was asking $8.00 for them, but told us that he would let us have one for $6.00, since we would be his first sale of the day. I wanted to buy one for Kelly, my employer, but I dind't want to carry it around all day. However, the $6.00 price was only good at that moment. I bought one. Black and red. I will have to take a a picture of it when I go to work tomorrow.
As we continued, we noticed that the buildings were getting cleaner, and better maintained. We were on the main drag. We started seeing Royal Caribbean approved signs all over the place, so we knew we were at our destination.
Unfortunately, this is where things went sort of bad. We weren't really impressed by most of the shops. There were a few, here and there, that were unique in the items they carried. But, most of the other stores seemed to be prescription drug stores and bars. The booze was cheap and so were the drugs. People were standing outside both places trying to get us to go inside.
Also, every 10-15 feet there was some sort of street vendor. They were selling bracelets, with ones name stitched in, or they would put your name on a grain od rice. They were selling myriads of other things, but we would walk by them rather quickly as they tried to block our path, so we would look at their wares. That got old pretty quick.
It wasn't that way in the actual shops, though. Mike needed a good pair of walking shoes. He had only brought his dressy cowboy boots with pointed toes. His toes were getting squished and they were very uncomfortable for a lot of walking. So, we saw a shop that sold nothing but sandals. We ducked into there. There was no hard sell. Mike tried on several sandals and walked around in them to see how they fit. This shop wasn't on the cruise ships recommended list, but we really didn't care. Mike bought a nice pair of huaraches for $18.00. He wore those out of the store and had the lady bag his cowboy boots.
We walked by a somewhat odd store with a ton of t-shirts in the window. It reminded me of the old "head shops" that one used to see. The ones where you could buy bongs and rolling papers. One of the t-shirts was of Jack Skellington and Sally from Tim Burton's
A gorgeous much, much larger kite hanging from the ceiling. Way too large to bring home. But nice to drool over. Along with the other kites that were displayed throughout the shop. These kites were made locally. We decided to come back later. I was going to get the small dragon for Teresa, but I didn't want to carry it around all day.
We got to the end of the main shopping drag and made our way back down. On the way down the other side of the street. Again, we had to dodge street vendors. Nothing much there to impress us. When we got to the end, we went to the head shop like place and bought the Nightmare Before Christmas t-shirt. Remember I said it seemed like a head shop? We think the owner may have been on something. He was acting somewhat strange.
We then made our way back up to the little courtyard, back to the kite shop. And I bought the small dragon kite for Teresa. We exited through a door in back and that put us on the street that ran paralleled the waterfront. We could see the ship from where we were. We crossed at a crosswalk, at a four way stop. Drivers here are more polite than the ones in Los Angeles. I didn't have this fear of being run down while in the crosswalk. Even here, we weren't safe from beggars or souvenir vendors. It was only when we passed the guard shack on the way to the cruise ship terminal were we finally safe.
Mike took this nice panoramic shot with his camera. I left my big Fuji behind. I didn't want to haul it around while we were walking through the city.
We really don't feel any urge to return to Ensenada soon.
We were back well before dinner. Since we had so much time, and since this would be our last full day we decided to really tour the ship and take some pictures.
This is a shot of the pool.
That tall thing at the back is called the Viking Crown. It's a fancy cocktail lounge. We went up inside there to enjoy the view. However, on the opposite side, they had installed one of those rock climbing walls which totally obscured the view for anyone who sat in front. Out on deck I took some pictures of the city. I really hated that haze. Wasn't much I could do though.
Interesting thing was this sunken boat that was within view of the ship. Some seals had made it their home and we could hear them barking. If you look closely to the right, you can just make them out.
The ships engines kicked on. It was time to go. Back to San Pedro, back to home. We passed by these guys on our way out of the harbor.
It would be our last dinner at Vince's. When the guy who took our drink orders came over, we told him we didn't feel like having anything. He said, "This always happens when people return from Ensenda. He was implying that we had been taking adavantage of the cheap beer that was flowing in the bars in the city. I didn't feel like explaining to him that it was because we were a little depressed about it being near the end of the cruise.
The head waiter went to the center of the restaurant and got everyone's attention. He then introduced the head chef and his assistants. The ones who worked so hard to make all those delicious meals. They walked amongst everyone to loud applause. Then, they introduced all the waiters and their assistants. I was actually getting emotional inside. We would miss Duncan, our waiter from Jamaica who waited on us for the past three nights. Dinner was over, and we stayed till they practically kicked us out. We were talking to the nice couple who were seated at our table.
Back to our room and to bed.
Tomorrow - San Pedro
Posted by Valkyre at October 4, 2006 10:45 PM