Christmas Eve- Cienfuegos

Jose Marti

We sailed into Cienfuegos a little late and were docked by 1:00 instead of the announced 11:00. We all met for lunch at 11:30 in order to be able to go ashore for our tour. At the encouragement of Natalie, Will and Christopher, I took a wheel chair from the ship and could use it for the long walk the terminal and then on the tour. The first step getting on the bus was so high that I decided to just stay on the bus, but I couldn't do that since the tour was about 3 ½ hours in the downtown and the bus would move and couldn't be left running. Will and Christopher did a fantastic job of navigating the curbs and cracks and traffic. After about an hour I decided to just stay in the center of the square and people watch. The group went off to what was basically a TIME OF SHOPPING- never my favorite thing to do anyway. There were lots and lots of cute children playing in the square without a sign of adults around. Seemed strange to me but I guess it is a safe place.

The buildings around the square were lovely. We went into an art school and saw amazing mosaics. The building itself was sort of run down but still very interesting. There was a statue of Jose Marti, the liberator of Cuba. Kathryn, Ella and Will went to the top of the beautiful blue house.

Taxi on the Square

Cienfuegos is a town of 150,000 people and , as our guide kept saying, very clean and near the sea. The name means "100 fires" and is dubbed La Perla del Our (the Pearl of the South).

It was a long day of touring.

The tour ended with a beautiful concert at a music school where there were several concerts happening in various buildings. This is called a People to People Cultural Exchange and so it was!!!

We got back to the ship and reassembled in our cabin. We all headed to dinner at about 7:00 and then met back for a great game of Pictionary. Great day was had by all.