Cruise Part Five: Progreso

To start off with, we left Marshel and Kellee at Camp Carnival for the day, so we could explore without worrying about them or listening to them complain when they got tired and hot and cranky.

Progreso has the longest pier in the world, I think about 5 miles. It was so long, but we could see down in the water and saw fish, eels and also the pelicans everywhere. We got off at the Free Market, which was fun with a lot of cool Aztec and Mayan stuff. There was a band playing and singing there as well. We bought a picture from a guy who painted with spray paint and his hands and used lacquer and a lighter to seal his pictures. It was pretty cool. All the kids bought some kind of souvenir.

We took a 20 minute tour of this little town, for a whole $2 per person (plus tip at the end). This is real Mexico right now, without all the tourist traps, yet. They are working on that. We saw their schools, church, city hall, lighthouse and security system (broken bottles set in the cement on the tops of the walls surrounding their homes and yards). It was fun getting to see how others live. I made sure to remind the kids how good they have it and how they should appreciate where they live and what they have.

We walked down to the public beach, about 3 or 4 blocks. We had to dodge or ignore all the pesky vendors on the way there, but the water felt so good and we liked just being somewhere without deadlines, work, school, phone service and stress. It was great. We headed back to the ship and took a little nap and watched a movie until dinner.