And just a few more Bird shots before you go.

 Coming back to the port you will need to walk through the atrium again. Just watching all the birds and monkeys is so much fun, I think  that I could actually spend the whole day here. 

Cartagena Colombia

 Once we haggle with the taxi driver (Side Note- They want to upsell you tours for the day so it may be challenging to say "No, we just want the taxi ride to town"), we are on our way for the ride of our life. There are 4 of us in one small taxi for $20 ride to Old Town. I think we almost crashed, hit someone, or someone hit us every few minutes.  A lot of gasps, laughs, and just close your eyes moments. When we were at a stoplight the police will get out of the car and halt traffic just so they can get through the intersection. After our Mr. Toad wild ride to Old town, we pay our driver the $20 bucks, and my sister generously tips him $10 dollars because he told us he had 10 kids. He was so excited about his tip he said, "what time do you want me to pick you back up?" And yes he was waiting for us when we were done with our day. We were let off about a block away and strolled to the entrance of the most colorful, dizzying, sensory driven area like I just took a step back in time. 

We enter through the clock tower and get bombarded with street vendors. We were told there were many and will follow you until you buy something. As I'm trying to take in the sights, someone is talking into my ear and asking me if he can be our tour guide for the hour or two @ $5 bucks a person. What a deal. There are 6 of us because we meet my sister and brother-in-law who came in another taxi. He plays his flute to keep us together instead of holding up a tour guide number or scarf. 

Just a few photos walking through the town and the colorful sights we see. 

And my favorite Pics were these. For $2.00 you can get some fun photos. 

#Cartagena #Colombia #Old_Town

Cartagena

Our excursion is Murcia and Shire of Fuensanta. The description sounded way better than what actually happened. It was described as going to the Fuensanta Monastery in the Old City where we can browse the shops and explore on our own .  We would glide along the graceful sun-drenched coastline and arrive back in Caratagena. So my imagination led me to believe something quiet idyllic and different from what I saw. Yes the highlight for me was the Fuensanta Monastery which was closed from 1:00 to 4:00 on Sunday (when we would be there) and all the stores were also closed. Our guide had a such a thick accent it was really difficult to understand what she was saying and I think I'm pretty good at understanding most accents. So as she spent only a short time in front of this beautiful monastery we let them go ahead of us so we could  enjoy this amazing photo oppurtunity with no one around and take pictures. This was our favorite part of the whole tour and we got some beautiful photos with no people in the background. I think it would of been a shame to travel this far and only spend a quick 5 - 10 minutes there to see and explore when  something like that deserves more time to admire and photgraph. We weren't sure where they went to next and she was going to let us explore on our own so we went down the narrow streets of closed up shops and passed a few pan handlers along the way making our way back to the bus.

The next stop was the  Salzillo Museum which I swear was 1 block  away. When she told us to get off the bus no one did because we weren't sure this was really it. She had to come back on the bus to tell everyone  to get off. The Museum is very small with some miniature figures in glass cases but we couldn't hear her because she didn't get everyone to move down into one area. We didn't mind because it was too hard to understand her so we just read the descriptions on our own to better understand what we were looking at. Then onto the church area where his statues are of biblical scenes. We all sat in the pews instead of going to each area to see the statues, so if some were blocked views I just got up on my own to get a close view but made sure to be behind the columns so as not to block the view of anyone else. Between the echoes and her accent again I found it better to read the inscriptions. Then off to one last stop to see the church on the hill with a great view of the city. We let everyone go into the church and we separated to go to the front and take photos and as they came out we went into the church to take photos and that seemed to work better for us as it was less crowded and my teens were having the same problem as we were and getting a little frustrated. The drive was not as scenic as we had expected but looked a little like flat desert drive to Bakersfield instead of a long winding seaside drive I envisioned. Maybe our expectations were high but we were a little dissappointed things were closed and not as we thought but at the end of the day  just kind of laughed everything off trying to make the best of it with our good humor and talked  about the fun time  basically having the place to ourselves in front of the monastery to take as many photos as we could as if we were in our own little  world. I bet that never happens to anyone. We thought we might have an hour to explore Cartagena but only had about 30 minutes left and didn't want to run 10 minutes into the city to see it and rush back so we just headed back to the ship. We decided on Alfredos ( freshly made pizza)  which is a great alternative to the dining room. If you order a Sangria it comes in al little cute pottery vase looking thing. I'm sure there is a name for it but I will call it a mini pitcher. Headed over to the theatre for the Soul Sounds to hear 60's and motown with the dancers who really have a tough job. They really put on a great show and I admire all the costumes and dancing. A few laps of walking around the track and time for bed. Tomorrow is "Gibraltor".