Ensenada, Mexico (again)

Our second shore excursion was to Ensenada, Mexico (yes, again).


This time Patricia and I were Ensenada old hands so we were able to play at being tour guides for our new friends Marc and Lisa in the land of the little blue pill.



The four of us shopped as a team to negotiate improved discounts. Lisa and I became particularly good at tandem purchases and every time I shoulder my new purple backpack or wear my Ensenada T-shirt I will think of her. By the end of the day we all felt like we’d scored some cool stuff and done some good deals. After all, getting fleeced by the locals is all part of the fun and it’s somehow a pleasure to be ripped off by these friendly people with the big smiles and charming accents. The memories and shopping stories are worth far more than the premium pricing.

Marc is the most gregarious of men and, by the simple technique of referring to everyone he encountered as “amigo,” he quickly befriended a local who, along with his many cousins, was happy to direct us towards whatever we desired or, in some cases, to personally deliver it to our bar stools.

Souvenirs? “My cousin’s store. He will give you a discount.”

A cool drink? “My cousin’s bar. Best in Ensenada. Cheap.”

Farmacia? “Stay there and finish your beer. I bring for you. Best price. What you want?”

You’ll hear more about Marc and Lisa in a future posting but one of my favourite of many great moments with these guys was when a Mariachi came into the bar where we were hanging out. He wandered in with his guitar and Marc encouraged him to perform, applauded enthusiastically and tipped the guy. There’s nothing unusual about any of that. It was happening all over Ensenada. What made it a classically Marc moment is that he then borrowed the guy’s guitar and performed a song of his own composition in return.

I bought some clothes and a few more little trinkets for friends in Australia, but mostly I just enjoyed bonding with our new friends and getting into the tourist spirit. As in Disneyland, there came a time when I spotted my own silhouette and realised what I had become. This time, I had the presence of mind to capture the moment to share with my amigos.


Pretty scary, huh? The full view is even more frightening. “By day she is a mild mannered public servant, hiding her secret identity as TOURIST WOMAN!”

Mexico is a long way from Catalina in every way except geographically. Catalina brings out self-indulgent, but fairly wholesome urges to write poetry and hike around the hills. Ensenada seems inspire altogether different impulses. Some of these were on display that evening in bizarre alcoholic male bonding rituals. It has always been my view that any drinking game requiring purpose built equipment is probably best approached as a spectator. This opinion was significantly reinforced by watching a man of average size swallow 4 beers mixed with Tabasco sauce in a few continuous seconds. These guys were apparently born with abnormally large stomachs and no gag reflex.

Catalina - Shore Trip

Our first shore excursion was to Santa Catalina Island, a small island off the coast of California. With no harbour capable of accommodating the Paradise, we were shuttled on tender boats into the postcard town of Avalon.

Catalina in January is astonishingly clean, quiet and empty. Patricia and I spent the day swanning around picturesque streets and basking in the mild winter sunshine. Almost every house we passed was a holiday rental. The year round population of Avalon is plainly puny, but in the summer months the town must be packed to the rafters with thousands of tourists, diving by day and drinking by night.

My imagined vision of peak season Avalon made our day seem all the more languid. Even the 2,000 Paradise passengers who wandered through the town slipped naturally into a gentler rhythm: a patient, almost tidal drifting.

The predominance in local traffic of golf carts rather than cars contributes much to the quaintness, quietness and cleanness of Avalon. It’s also hard to hurry too much, or take yourself too seriously, driving a golf cart downtown. In this supermarket parking lot I suddenly understood that golf carts exist on a scale somehow more human and less industrial than anything in my normal environment. Although I am an urban animal, the casual intimacy of Avalon triggered a sudden longing for community, for a village. Fortunately we wandered out of the town itself before I started to compose an “Ode to a Golf Cart.”


We walked along this path towards this distinctive Catalina landmark. Known as “the Casino,” it was constructed by Mr William Wrigley, the chewing gum millionaire and prominent Catalina resident for the purpose of holding huge dance parties. People were ferried across from the mainland to attend big band extravaganzas. These proved so popular that the large Casino you see here today had to be built to replace the smaller original structure which proved inadequate for the crowds.

From here you can look down into water so clear that you can see the fish wave hello.

The sea birds pose for photographs on the rocks and the passive motion of the moored boats beckons.

Or you can look out towards the mainland, where the orange haze of the Los Angeles smog looms like an unwholesome mist pressing against a windowpane. It’s like peering out from inside a shady oasis into the shimmering glare of a desert. Catalina Island is a place you can dream of escaping to.

The peace and quiet tugged at my mind, whispering promises of comfort for a restless soul. I conceived a yearning to stay, to take a small room in one of the guest houses and sit in a sunny window for the winter months. I thought I could sleep soundly here. I thought I could write a great novel and paint bad pictures. It seemed that here perhaps I could trade overstimulation for genuine fulfilment.

It’s such an easy thing to say, but if I had a million dollars just lying around, I might well buy a house here, and a golf cart. I’d set aside a couple of modest rooms for myself, spend a few months each winter in Avalon and rent out the rest of the house in the tourist season while I return to my real life in whatever city I end up in. The lives we fantasise can sometimes be more telling and true than the ones we live. I’ll let you decide what this fantasy reveals about me.

Paradise Regained

Despite having Dad’s spirit hovering over us like the Ghost of Cruises Past, Patricia and I immediately set out to put the “fun” into “Funship”.

Before the ship had even left the terminal we were having a private mini-golf tournament on the sun deck. Note the look of intense concentration. This was serious business.


Despite the inferior putting skills on display in the shot below, I put in the least appalling performance on the day and triumphed with a score of only several over par. I am considering taking lessons from the 10 year old boy who was playing behind us.


As veterans of the Paradise, Patricia and I knew exactly what we wanted to do and where to find it. Indeed, the knowledge of where to find things caused some early conflict between us. We had agreed that it might be embarrassing to admit that we’d cruised on this ship less than a month before. So we’d decided in advance to be discreet about that little detail in our discussions with others.

However, once we were actually on the ship we started bumping into the 2000 other guests who were apparently all having difficulty locating the Lido Deck, or the Leonardo Lounge, or the Rotterdam Bar, or the Upper Deck (cruelly located in the middle of the ship). Partly because I’m a naturally helpful person, and partly because they were in my way, I started giving out directions.

Let me say at this point that I still don’t think this constituted a violation of our agreement. Although in Patricia’s version of the story she has me standing in central locations waving ping pong paddles to direct traffic, in fact, I was much less conspicuous about it than that. Michael, the guy who ended up catching me out, was really just amazingly perceptive. The bar I directed him to was only just around the corner from where we were sitting and there is no good reason why I shouldn’t have noticed it casually on a first walk past. Something must have tipped him off (possibly Patricia’s vigorous “shut-up” hand gestures) and he managed to pin me down to dates by relentless application of logic: “Wait a minute, you’re from Sydney, you got here a month ago and you’ve cruised on this ship before?”

Never give directions to a Canadian insurance salesman. They’re entirely too intelligent and it’s sure to backfire.

A couple of days later when we were clicking through photos of the compulsory life-boat drill Patricia and I were both astonished to discover that Michael, the directionally challenged but excessively clever Canadian, had been sitting right beside us (left). You’ll notice that he already looks lost.

I think Patricia is really just jealous because she wanted to give the directions. Look at her with the whistle and the air hostess smile! A frustrated traffic cop if ever I saw one. Someone give this woman a green cap.

Fun ship? Hel-lo!

Ghost of Cruises Past

Those of you who have been loyal readers of this blog may recall some fairly recent posts about the cruise that Dad, Patricia and I took earlier this month. I reported having immensely enjoyed the experience and expressed a desire to repeat it. Careful readers may also have noticed that when Patricia and I find something we like, such as Splash Mountain at Disneyland, we have no hesitation about doing it again more or less immediately.

Being armed with this intimate knowledge of my nature, dear reader, should somewhat temper your amazement that less than two weeks after our return from the first cruise Patricia and I decided to go on another one. The company emailed us a “special price” offer for a 4 day trip departing Monday 22 January and we jumped at it. Dad had some clients to meet in L.A., so he dropped us off at the Long Beach cruise terminal, then he went off to work and we went off to party.


Getting back on board the Paradise felt strange. Our previous trip had been recent enough that we both felt like we’d never really left. That feeling intensified when the first waitress I encountered came charging up to me and said “Hello! Where is Geoffrey?”

That’s right!

Not: “Hello! How are you?”

Not: “Hello! Welcome back!”

Not even: “Hello! What are you doing here?”

My presence was nothing more to this woman than an indicator of the possible proximity of my father. Feeling slightly unappreciated I explained that he had to work and that Patricia and I had come back to enjoy the last week of my vacation. Just then Patricia wandered back over with a drink and the waitress turned to her immediately. “Hello! Where is Geoffrey?”

I’m big enough to admit that I was small enough to feel slightly better.

Bizarrely, not 2 hours later almost the exact same routine was repeated with another waitress. I now wonder if perhaps the words “Where is Geoffrey?” are a common form of greeting in Indonesia. Possibly it is a phrase that means something like “I’m so glad you didn’t bring that boring, bearded man with you.”

My bruised feelings settled over the next few days as Patricia and I established our own connections with the waitresses. We did our best to be friendly and to tip appropriately. I thought we’d made considerable progress until we were just about to disembark and one of the same two waitresses parted from us with the words “Tell Mr Geoff to come back!”

If her English or my Indonesian could have supported it I would have said something like “Do you want me to bring him back or just deliver the message?”

Hotel California

We have stayed in an assortment of hotels during my time here. Some have been quite nice. Others have been absolutely terrifying.

Memorable experiences include the pink and green Grandma decor in Monterey, the marine traffic in Oakland and the outside toilets near Disneyland. Right now I'm lying on a bed in a hotel which advertises "continental breakfast and panoramic views of San Francisco". That must be the other side of the hotel because the view from my window would more accurately be described as "weatherboard wall".

First prize for the number one scary hotel goes to a nameless establishment in Long Beach. The first disappointment came when we discovered that the guy on reception had never heard of the wireless internet access advertised on the hotel's website. He had, as he cheerfully admitted, never actually looked at the website. No false advertising laws, no problem.

I was a whole lot more concerned when I left my room in the morning to find the stairwell blocked off with police tape and a van marked "Coroner" parked below my balcony.

The truck driver in one of the other rooms filled me in on the details. Apparently, a guest was climbing the stairs when he heard that there wasn't any internet access in the rooms, whereupon he had a heart attack and fell back down again to his untimely death.

It was a fairly gruesome sight to wake up to and an uninspiring start to Day 1 of Cruise 2. In fact, I was so perturbed that I skipped the continental breakfast entirely.

Here's hoping we all make it through tonight alive, because I've already lost out on the panoramic views.

Snow Play

Because it wasn’t quite cold enough in Fresno we took a short drive to the Yosemite foothills. It’s certainly chillier there and I was very tempted to stay in the car, crank up the heater and wave to Dad and Patricia as they huddled in their coats smoking their cigarettes. This has to be the number one reason not to smoke.


Eventually, briefly, I was lured outside by the photo opportunities and by the desire to prove to you all that in the interests of quality blogging I - yes I - had actually braved the snow and ice.


In winter, this part of the world seems frozen in time as well as ice. The air is still and sharp, cold and dry. Even my misty breath clung to itself in a huddled cloud, as if trying to conserve the last traces of body heat.

This is the land of Narnian witches, glaciers and hypothermia. It's also the land of alarmingly indifferent parenting. Check out this guy with his small son on an almost-but-not-nearly-enough-for-my-liking frozen lake. Obviously Father of the Year there isn’t too attached to junior because he let the kid run and jump way out towards the edge of the ice and didn't say a word.


We watched from the shore, stunned. Once we admitted that none of us was a big enough hero to jump in and save the kid if the ice broke it became too scary and we decided to move on.


I considered going over there, flashing some obscure Australian ID and introducing myself as a Child Protection Services agent. Just in time I remembered that this is America. Here, a man who lets his little boy frolic on thin ice is a man with a concealed weapon.

Record Low Temperatures!

Those of you who know me well, will know that I don't do cold. I would be perfectly happy to hibernate from early Autumn (Fall) to late Spring. Actually, I think I'm part reptile. I need to lie on a rock in the sun for an hour every morning just to get my heart started.

So you can imagine how impressed I am at having the opportunity to enjoy an extra winter. To rub salt into the wounds (and the highways) California has laid on a record cold snap in my honour. The allegedly mild valley climate has given way to positively arctic nights and ice on the streets that never melts. I took the photographs below during my daily walks around Fresno. I never leave the house before noon, so what you see here is the least freezing part of the day. This is as warm as it gets folks.

Brrr!

Disney Characters

One of the compulsory and surprisingly enjoyable parts of my Disney visit was posing for photographs with Disney employees dressed in silly costumes. You can’t visit Disneyland without meeting Mickey. Somehow I imagined that he’d be bigger.

And how could I leave the Magical Kingdom without a photograph of myself hugging a giant Woody?

Just as we were on our way out of the park I spotted the back of another instantly recognisable figure reaching out a casual hand to mess up an orderly product display as he passed. Even from behind, I couldn’t have missed him swaggering along ahead with another two Pirates.

I grabbed Patricia’s arm. “Look! Look! It’s Captain Jack Sparrow! Wow, what a great likeness!” Patricia looked in the direction that I had gestured, but her eyes missed Jack in the crowd and locked on an enormous, dark-skinned pirate with a huge orange feather in his hat. Helen Keller couldn’t have confused this guy with Johnny Depp. Patricia gave me a baffled look as I dragged her up the street after them.

“Hey Jack!” I called.

The figure turned with a familiar bow. “Captain Jack” he rasped in a startlingly good rendition of the character’s famous slur. He chatted with me for a minute or so, in character, and posed for this photograph while swaying distinctively through the crowd. This guy probably has the most fun job in the park, goofing off and posing with his arm around breathless women, but he earned it with a lot of long hours practicing in front of the mirror.

My favourite Disney character of all was the one that we created for ourselves after we left the park. Dad might have missed out on Disneyland, but he still had a taste of the Disney spirit.

Disneyland

Patricia and I seized the opportunity to visit the Magical Kingdom of Disneyland while Dad went off to work. I have to admit that I entered the gates a cynic. I was quietly excited, but expected to be disappointed.

By the time we left I had been totally brainwashed into a brightly coloured euphoric daze. I danced out the big gates with a hundred photos, singing Disney songs and wearing Mickey Mouse ears. For one strange moment I caught sight of my silhouette, with camera bag and mouse ears, and realised that I had been entirely consumed by the tourist spirit.

I am now a Disney convert. Worse, I am a Disney evangelist! You must all go to Disneyland as soon as possible, and you should take me with you when you go. To all who come to this happy place – welcome!

We started our journey with a walk through the 50 Years of Disney museum. The attendant was a gentle and dignified font of Disneylore. We also saw a brief documentary about the park and its history. It was a good way to begin.

Next, we walked along a street of a thousand retail outlets, a shrine to the spirit of Disney commercialism. Almost immediately and entirely bizarrely we came upon a massive socialist style mural in Tommorowland. In the capital of capitalism the future is apparently Das Kapital. If only Diego Rivera could have seen this.

I obviously made my socialist observations a little too loudly in Tomorrowland, because the man caught up with me in Toontown. Fortunately, prisons in Toontown aren’t all that constraining.

It was still Christmas in Disneyland, with decorations still up all over the park. The “It’s a Small World After All” boat ride was particularly festive. Dolls representing all the nations of the world got into the Christmas spirit in an extraordinary display of cultural imperialism. Apparently, there will be universal tolerance and acceptance among the peoples of the earth when the rest of them join in the observance of Christian religious holidays. Nice message for the kiddies.

The other great disappointment of my Disney experience is that I missed the last chance to ride on the Mark Twain paddle steamer around Tom Sawyer Island. For a longstanding Twainophile this was almost too much to bear. With tears in my eyes I begged the security guards to let me jump the ropes and chase the disappearing memory with my camera. In true Disney spirit, security helpfully raised the barrier and I captured the dream, if not the experience.

But, that small logistical glitch aside, the Disney hospitality was faultless.

We went on all the rides.

This one twice.

That’s Patricia hiding behind me. She obviously knew something I didn’t.

It was hard to go from the Happiest Kingdom back to the Dodgiest Hotel. Dad warned me that they didn’t have indoor toilets, but I wasn’t expecting this.

Friends from the Cruise

I’d like to introduce my loyal blog readers to my two new friends from the Paradise. These guys are the most fun people I met on the cruise, and two of the most fun people you could ever hope to meet anywhere. Here is a photograph of them “playing” in the America Bar.


Lance (left) is one of the two stand-up comics onboard. Exhausted by his rigorous performance schedule of an hour and half spread over the three day cruise, Lance fills his copious leisure time with part-time entrepreneurship and special guest vocals in the bar. He is captured here giving a moving rendition of Eric Clapton’s song “Wonderful Tonight” with slightly modified, “R” rated lyrics. I won’t reproduce the words out of respect for sensitive readers, but many among you will have the opportunity to hear me singing this version at late night parties. The innovative adaptation of a possibly familiar tune to create a new song titled “The Girl from Hiroshima” was also explosively funny.

He now lives in Los Angeles, but Lance’s hometown, and the source of his steady stream of Creole jokes, is New Orleans. He’s a keen observer of people and a lot of his humour is a kind of comical cultural commentary, like describing NASCAR as 300,000 rednecks in a circle. He suggested on stage that the name “NASCAR” is not really an acronym of National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, but is actually a product of the southern accent - as in “That’s a NASCAR (nice car).” I’d love to tell you more, but Lance gets paid to do it much better than I ever could. I don’t want to steal his material for my massive international blog audience, or risk diminishing the experience if you should ever be fortunate enough to see him perform. If you are so lucky, go up and say hello. He’s a sweetheart.

One of the most delightful things about Lance’s company is the joy and enthusiasm that seeps out of his pores and forms a puddle around his feet. Although his humorous output is prodigious and machinelike - so many laughs per second – it’s the way he squirms with pleasure that is most charming. It’s impossible not to like Lance.

Tim plays the piano and saxophone (not simultaneously) and sings in the America Bar on the ship, but I think of him as another onboard comedian who just prefers to sit down. As lord of the piano bar Tim is a warm and entertaining host. His unusual, but winning combination of anarchic humour and cheesy charm combines with total mastery of his domain - “I hear everything that happens in my bar” - to create the best hang-out space on the ship. The anecdote that captures the essence of Tim for me is a story that Lance told me. Before each cruise departs there is a compulsory life-boat drill. All the guests are required to take their life jackets, find their emergency meeting point and rehearse while they’re more or less sober what we all hope they will never have to duplicate once they’ve really started drinking. During the rehearsal, and presumably the real thing, the crew wear little green caps. Tim got a bit bored during one particularly prolonged life-boat drill and started tossing his cap up into the air. A self-important official with limited English aggressively challenged him for his misbehaviour: “Why you flip? Why you flip?” Tim looked him right in the eye and exclaimed “Fun ship? Hel-lo!”

As we would expect from the piano man in the America Bar, Tim is a Canadian. He’s had an immensely varied career as a chemical engineer, wine-maker, teacher, musician and any number of other things before he found his way to the Paradise. Depending on your perspective this suggests that he’s extremely versatile and interesting, or possibly just that he can’t hold a job. I don’t see why they can’t both be true.

One of the most charming things about Tim is his determination to get the most out of every moment. The reason he is such fun to be with is because he’s genuinely having fun, and he’s committed to fun as a lifestyle choice. Tim told me over coffee that since the 80s his income has dropped by about 20% per decade, but his enjoyment has increased by a far greater proportion. To Tim’s way of thinking, that’s a substantial profit and I can’t bring myself to disagree. For me, meeting Tim was an inspiring and timely reminder of the way life should be lived: joyful and fearless.


Here the three of us strike an unnatural pose with my trophy from the "Name That Tune" competition that Tim runs in the bar. I didn't really deserve to win, but music trivia king Lance was my secret weapon, whispering obscure song titles in my ear. Tim, as competition arbitrator, generously elected to ignore this blatant coaching and awarded me with this little plastic piece of ship. I will treasure it always, as soon as I remember where I left it.


Dad really got into the America Bar mood, finally finding the spiritual home of the only lighter he could buy in Monterey. So natural did it seem there, and so keen was he to get rid of it, that Dad presented the lighter as a gift to one of the waitresses in the bar.

Warmest regards from Dad, Patricia and I to both Lance and Tim. I thank them for the pleasure of their company and I sincerely hope that we will meet again. Keep in touch and be sure to look us up if you’re ever in Fresno or Sydney.

Ensenada, Mexico

Our shore excursion on Day 2 of the cruise was to the Mexican port of Ensenada, which offers all the exotic attractions of foreign travel without any of the inconvenience of having to change currency or meaningfully negotiate the local language. Even the street vendors deal primarily in US dollars and speak passable transactional English.

Despite the third world ambiance, Ensenada is a thriving tribute to the spirit of capitalism. From the tiny children hawking Chiclets (chewing gum) and slingshots, to the relentless wandering Mariachi bands who won’t even busk until they get paid, everyone is in the tourism industry. This energetic enterprise has reached the point where tourists have to actively resist the industry. Despite my determination to acquire mountains of Mexican souvenirs for friends, I still had to refuse a lot more commercial approaches than I could ever have accepted.

Admittedly, some of the products on offer were a little scary. I was sorely tempted by the business advertised below, but had some reservations about possible long term side-effects from the familiar-yet-somehow-different active ingredient.

Perhaps the most impressive evidence of Mexican willingness to serve the special needs of visitors is their obvious national commitment to meeting the pharmaceutical demands of their northern neighbours.

The accessibility of Viagra is so universal that my new friend Tim referred to our journey as being to “the land of the little blue pill.” Even forewarned, I was still surprised, not just by the omnipresence of the advertising, but by its considerable descriptive detail. Note particularly the helpful inclusion of instructions for use on this sign on the street OUTSIDE THE STORE! Note also the little kid in the background. Sensitive readers should not zoom in on this image.

Carnival Cruise - Paradise

The best ever birthday present was a three day trip aboard this Carnival Cruise Funship.

I’d never been on a cruise before, so I didn’t know what to expect. My experience on this ship, optimistically christened “Paradise,” went a surprisingly long way towards fulfilling the promise of the name. I really knew I’d enjoyed myself when it came time to get off the ship and I didn’t want to go, even before I saw the queue at immigration.

The cruise departed from Long Beach on Friday and headed down the coast that night. We spent Saturday on a shore trip in Ensenada, Mexico, then Sunday at sea, meandering back up the coast. Time “at sea” has important implications on a cruise because different laws apply once you are a certain distance from the shore. Escape from taxation and gaming laws are of particular relevance to a ship of this type, with its casino, auctions and many opportunities to make duty free purchases. Relaxed laws combined with a stop in Mexico means that this cruise offered almost unlimited potential to indulge in common human vices.

The ship itself offers a variety of entertainment options. I skipped about three quarters of the available range in my three days and limited myself to shows by hilarious onboard comedians Lance Montalto and Seth Buchwald, a lecture on collecting art, a “Name That Tune” contest, the gym, the deck, an art auction, four meals a day, a variety of bars with and without live music and a towel folding class.

The towel folding class is a product of the popular Carnival tradition of staff creating origami animal shapes from towels in the staterooms. Photographs of two samples left in my room are below.

The towel origami class instructed a group of guests in how to make an elephant and a dog. Applying considerable personal creativity, I adapted this demonstration to invent original designs for a lopsided elephant and a dog with a broken nose.

The Cruise Director cheerfully announced at the start of the cruise that guests from over 100 countries were among the 2,500 passengers, but the overwhelming majority that I encountered were US citizens. The real multicultural presence was among the staff. We were served by people from Brazil, Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines, and that’s just the ones I got talking to. The Cruise Director and art auctioneer were British, another art dealer was South African and their assistant was an Aussie. For all the US passengers, I only met one among the service staff and even he was new to the ship.

One of the best parts of my cruise was the very last thing I would have predicted. Those of you who know me well will be as amazed as I was that I slept better onboard the ship than I have slept anywhere for many, many years. As the Fijian Flu steadily receded I finally eased into holiday mode. This relaxed state combined with the influence of the choppy winter seas on my bed in a surprising and deeply soothing way.

So impressed am I with the pleasures of sound sleep that I’ve decided to abandon my San Francisco dream house in favour of something more nautical. I’ll have to either get a job on a cruise ship or find someone with a houseboat who is looking for a roommate. In the absence of any skills that would pay well on a cruise ship, I am now putting the word out. People with houseboats, apply here. Will work for sleep.

Overall enjoyment rating for the cruise: 5 thumbs up. Special thanks to the two and a half people who lent me their thumbs.