February 26, 2023 – Cozumel, Mexico – Mostly Sunny – 82F

An absolutely beautiful day on the Mexican island of Cozumel as these pre-dawn photos confirm. 

 

We usually dock at the International Terminal but today we are at Punta Langosta in the heart of San Miguel, the only city on Cozumel. 

The day is made more complicated by the fact that soon after I got up, I got some nasty back spasms.  Now medicated, I had breakfast up in Windows Café. Today, I am having the pancake combo as there is sour cream available. Everything was good except the scrambled eggs. They have become watery and there is something off on the taste.  They were the food of the gods – not anymore. 

There are two ships here today – TUI Cruises Marella Discovery 2 is keeping us company.  The ship arrived during breakfast.

In spite of the fact that I am smarting a bit, it was just too nice a day to stay on board.  We disembarked and headed down the wind tunnel formed by the two ships (even though Marella was twice our size) and were “directed” by signage to the Punta Langosta terminal shops.  It's not a trivial walk to the Terminal - I did get a nice shot of the two ships docked.

Just before you exit the pier there is a city sign.

There are two levels of shops seemingly selling all the same stuff – leather, tequila, vanilla.  We did look around for another fridge magnet but didn’t come away with anything.  After quite a while and confusing signs, we made it out of that shopping area and down to street level. 

Then a miracle happened – a Starbucks appeared.  We had been looking for a Starbucks since we left Miami 30 days ago and finally found on in Mexico.  Ellen purchased the “Been There” mug for $19 – mission accomplished. 

Near the Starbucks there is another city sign - this time as part of a swing.

We turned right out of the Starbucks, which I think is North and headed toward the heart of San Miguel staying on the Malecon.  The ships are across the street, and I trotted across the street to get a picture.  

While on the Malecon, I also got a picture of a statue of a man - i could not find out who this was on the internet and the plaque was worn clean.

I think the statue was pointing the way to "Senor Froggy's" where we couldn't resist taking a picture.

We are looking for a spa and a reasonable massage.  We didn’t walk very far when a group of therapists from Spa Palancar showed us their price lists.  The one hour no frills massage was $70 or higher than we are paying back home.  As soon as I said that the price because $110 for the two of us (or a $15 discount/pp).  I said OK, too quickly in retrospect, based on historical precedent on Cozumel.  If we had walked a bit further into town and away from the touristic area, the price would have been much lower.  Maybe, the back spasms were clouding my thinking.

The therapists – all decked out in pink uniforms - were very nice and the place was native but ok – we did the “couples massage”.  I don’t know if the session went an hour, and it was not very therapeutic (low pressure and did not make my back pain any better but we still tipped them because we always support local businesses).  Most likely, we won’t come back here next time. 

We walked a couple of more blocks and realized that it would be pretty much the same if we get going so, we turned around and headed back to the Cruise Terminal.  It turns out that there is a bypass that takes you directly to the ship without going through the shopping center.  That is news we can use the next time we dock at this terminal.

Back on board, even though we were grimy, greasy, and sweaty, we went to the Windows for lunch. I had tuna salad on a baguette and a small Cesar Salad.  I also had an Italian beer, whose name I can’t remember – I asked our waiter to surprise me, and he brought me this beer (they were out of Stella). 

We spent the afternoon on Deck 5.  When we got out there, a lot of the loungers were stacked against the wall and out of commission.  We couldn’t find any open loungers, so Ellen went to Guest Relations and five minutes later, two crew members were setting up the loungers on the deck.  Ellen’s Superpower.  We got two seats but about 15 other guests also got prime seats facing the city. 

We stayed out there – again, it was just too nice not to – until 6:45 PM and then took showers and found nice seats on the Sunset Veranda for dinner.  It was "Taste of Italy" night, and I had a nice freshly made Marinara Spaghetti with veggies.  I also had a salad with Ranch Dressing and balsamic vinegar.  Along with focaccia, this was a very good Italian meal. 

We stayed on the veranda and enjoyed the views of the city, the other ship, and Jupiter and Venus (visible just about every night of the cruise).  We watched the sail away from there and got some nice nighttime pictures including the one below of Jupiter and Venus,

the Marellla cruise ship,

and Cozumel.

We passed on Guitarist Nestor Santurio and went from Veranda to stateroom.