Cruisin' with a Monkey

Cozumel

This morning was a much more pleasant affair for Andre and I. We took our sweet time to eat breakfast and chat about yesterday's adventures, and had a pretty good laugh about all the drama. Soon enough, our talk turned to the topic of today's plans. The captain declared last night that we were going to:

Cozumel, Mexico

Andre and I both smiled and pretended that we knew all about it, and then we hurried back to our room to check out the brochures we'd been provided with.

To my delight, it turns out that Cozumel is famous for its diving possibilities! It might make up for missing out on Dry Tortuga yesterday... No Andre, I didn't just send you a dirty look, how could you possibly think that? Ahem, where was I? Oh yes, since Andre made us miss the Tortuga excursion ( Ouch, Andre, that hurt my head!), I was looking forward to a day of scuba diving in beautiful surroundings, maybe seeing the Palancar reef, the site Jacques Cousteau may or may not have popularized (more on that later). But this furry fella didn't like the idea of having his head under water, did you buddy?

After a heated discussion about the benefits versus dangers of underwater activities, we ended up discovering that we both love dolphins. One of our brochures had a dolphin encounter excursion, so we eagerly called the reception to book in advance. The rest of the evening we spent watching Flipper in preparation, which later turned out to be very fitting...

And so it was, that Andre and I found ourselves on a bus drive to a marine center this morning, singing...

"They call him Flipper, Flipper, faster than liiiightning. No one you seeee, is smarter than heee..."

If we were a nuisance to the other passengers, they didn't mention, in fact one after the other, they joined in. Who can be mad anyway on a nice, hot sunny day like this? By the time we arrived, I'm pretty sure the whole group were singing in unison.

Our guide heard us, and couldn’t stop laughing. Later, he told us that it was very fitting that we sang the Flipper theme tune, because the cinematographer who filmed that show also filmed
'Un Mundo Nuevo', the movie that made Cozumel's underwater beauty famous in the late 50s. The funny thing is that people often seem to get it mixed up with 'Le Monde du Silence', the documentary by Jacques Cousteau. Therefore, Cousteau tends to get the credit for showing the Palancar reef to the world. However, the Mexican movie was very much inspired by Cousteau, and he is often quoted on having called Cozumel the most spectacular diving site in the world. So perhaps the credit is not at all undue.

If you haven't guessed, our guide was a well of information about both water activities and Cozumel history. He also told us stories about the place's Mayan history, and Andre and I made a note of visiting the ruins next time we're here—which we definitely will be!

The dolphin excursion was nothing short of spectacular. We encountered dolphins, alright, at least a dozen of 'em We even got in the water and swam around with them. Would you believe Andre managed to hang on to a dorsal fin, and ride the dolphin around in circles? Believe it! He was so excited, he was whooping and hollering, he didn't even care if his head got dunked underwater sometimes!

We had a great time, and before we knew it, we were heading back to the ship with wet hair and big smiles on our faces.

We had time to stop by San Miguel, Cozumel's only city, before the departure. Inspired by our guide's stories about Cozumel's Mayan history, we bought clothes and accessories inspired by Mayan traditional wear. Well, Andre's bright red shorts May have been uniquely Andre-style, but I got a nice patterned dress, a matching shirt for Andre, and nifty stone-bead necklaces for both of us.

Now we're back on the ship, trying on our new outfits, feeling dapper. How do we look, guys? We're planning on wearing this for Formal Night. That's later, though. For now, Andre has insisted that we make time for margaritas on deck, and he's getting no fight from me on that one