Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Taking the car ferry to Cancun

What a long day yesterday! We had to catch the first car ferry to Cancun, which is at 6:30 in the morning! There are two ferries that run, going in each direction. Normally that is. Right now one of them is broken so there is only just this one. It has created a tremendous pile up of users trying to get on. We arrived at the terminal 45 minutes early and were still the 12th car in line! It was very cloudy and stormy yesterday morning and the sun never did break from the clouds while we were crossing. These pictures turned out really blue because of it.

They were packing them in tightly yesterday. Six across where normally there is four. I'm the little red car in this picture. Just behind the two pickups you can see one of the loaders directing he next row in. These guys are really good at what they do. You don't watch where you are driving, you watch them. They tell you how to drive, how to turn, everything. If you don't pay attention and try to park as you think you should, they start pounding on your hood and yelling at you to pay attention to them.



This is the view from the upper deck looking back down at the ticket office and parking lot.




Once your car is parked, you have the choice of sitting in it or going upstairs to the passenger deck. I NEVER sit in my car. What if we were to capsize or sink? I want to be able to make it to a life boat. Can you imagine being stuck in your car? Yuk. Of course, nothing like that has ever happened, but it could! Although they did have a car drive right off the front end into the water once. The driver thought he knew how to park his own car and didn't listen to them. They have since installed little walls to keep this from happening again.


They even have a vendor stand on board for drinks and snacks.



We run the length of the island to the north point before turning to cross the bay over to Punta Sam. This is where the dock is over there, just a few miles north of Cancun proper.


While crossing, you can see the Cancun hotel zone in the distance. Isn't it gross!



After 45 minutes or so, we pull into dock at Punta Sam and off load.
We were standing at the railing on the way back home (5:30 pm ferry!) when this landed on the rail. It is a locust. Last year there was a terrible locust invasion in the Yucatan Penisula. This must be one of this year's crop. Not sure how he got here. I would bet that he hitched a ride on one of the many trucks coming from there to deliver stuff to the island. Last year we had one in our yard. I killed it. My Mexican friends thought this was awful. They say it is bad luck to kill one. I say it is bad luck to let them eat all your crops! We didn't kill this one.


P.S. If you liked the video I posted, don't thank me. Thank Brenda from Brenda and Roy Going to Mexico. She had the patience of a saint as she talked me through the whole process of posting a video to my blog. I feel like giving her a big hug but not sure how Roy would respond to that!

1 comment:

Brenda Maas said...

No problem. Glad you got it figured out. Liked the video. We had a big chuckle over the hug part. LOL