Cruising Part Two - Costa Rica - Panama - Costa Rica - New Orleans - Key West - Miami - Duck Key

Having left the Panama Canal we cruised over night and arrived early the following morning at Puerto Limon,  Costa Rica.

It was hot and humid as we docked and prepared to disembark for a day ashore.

As always disembarkation was well organised and we headed to the coach that would take us to the Tortuguero canals for the first part of our trip.

The scenery was amazing and we were lucky enough to see a sloth, a bright green lizard (how the guide spotted it remains a mystery) and some vampire bats!

The second part of our trip was going to take us on a train through a banana plantation.  Have to confess to feeling a little nervous when we went under one of the railway bridges, not sure it would pass UK health and safety requirements:-).

The boat trip was over too soon and it was back to the coach before we boarded the train.

The train travelled through the plantation and then on to run in parallel with the coast.

The banana plantation is still run solely on human effort, whilst attempts have been made to mechanise elements of the process, they have not been successful, primarily as it is viewed as taking precious jobs away from people.

On the way we stopped as howler monkeys had been spotted in the trees.

Then it was the back on the coach to return to the ship.

It was only a brief insight into the beauty and challenges that Costa Rica has.  Whilst not viewed as a developed country they are immensely proud of the fact that all children in Costa Rica receive a state education and they have a health service for all.  Education is bringing new hi-tech companies like HP to Costa Rica.

We set sail early evening to head to New Orleans.

As we left we passed this small island just off Peurto Limon where Christopher Columbus landed, finding locals draped in gold (they were good traders) he thought the country to be wealthy hence the name Costa Rica - rich coast.

After such a lovely day there was nothing for it but cocktails before dinner, with Les and Lin.

This may have been the night that Les introduced Rodney to a new drink, the Godfather - whiskey and Amaretto, he liked it so much they had two!!  Fair to say Mr Brown slept well that night!

We then had three days at sea as we headed to the Mississippi, on one of the days we were able to take a tour of the ships bridge.

Whilst there is lots of high tech equipment, radar,  sonar etc, they still use old fashioned maps, and you can't beat a good old plumb line to know how much the ship is rocking!!

Oh and a good old fashioned human being with a pair of binoculars - the look out.  So as high tech as it gets some things are still done the old way - kind of reassuring.

We were spoilt with the most beautiful sunset.

That night we ate in one of the two speciality restaurants on board - Prime C.

Lin went for the Clam Chowder in a Sour Dough loaf - very tasty and very impressive.

At this stage it would be fair to say we were falling in love with cruising!

Part three to follow