After leaving San Diego we sailed for three days before reaching the small port of Puerta Vallarta.

The MS Balmoral is a much smaller ship than we have been on before and has 1100 passengers and 500 crew. Our cabin is great, larger than anything we had on the Cunard ships and we have our own balcony. The meals have been very good and there is a full range of activities should you wish to participate. E even has a watercolour workshop a couple of days each week.

We arrived at Puerta Vallarta at 8 am and boarded a bus for our tour to San Sebastion which is a small village in the mountains about 1 ½ hours drive from the port. San Sebastion many years ago was a thriving mining town with gold and silver mines and a population of around 300,000. Today its population is 600 and there are only 2 mines still working in the region.

The country side was quite spectacular on our drive with many deep ravines and steep mountains. We passed many small villages and heaps of restaurants and bars along the side of the road. Much of the road was cobblestones so we had to travel slowly.

San Sebastion was pretty. A Mexican town which demonstrated how life was in old Mexico. We toured on Sunday so the mass was underway in the pretty church with most of the village attending and a group of ladies cooking lunch outside the church. We also visited a museum in the house of a lady whose family had lived in this house for 300 years since arriving from Spain. There had been much intermarrying amongst the three families who only married within the family that lived there so someone's husband could also be her nephew and uncle!!! We were assured that there were no birth abnormalities over that time.

Many avocado trees in this area as it is the major avocado growing area for Mexico. We saw orchids growing out of the crevices in other trees

At one stage on our way to lunch we saw 5 cowboys, two horses, lassoos etc all to drive two sleepy cows.

A visit to a coffee plantation and then a Mexican lunch completed our visit.

On returning to the port we visited the Walmart opposite (for as Peter and I found out in the USA, you can't have too much Walmart), there we bought 12 cans of Tonic for $6 to go with our gin instead of paying one pound each for miniscule cans of tonic on board.

After another day at sea we arrived in Acapulco, a beautiful city visited by the beautiful people. Acapulco was inhabited by the Nahua Indians as early as 3000BC. Centuries later the Aztecs inhabited until the Spaniard Hernan Cortes conquered them in 1521. It was turned into a huge shipyard where Cortes built ships to conquer more territories.

Acapulco sits on two main bays, Santa Lucia and Purta Marques. Surrounded by steep hills it is very pretty.

The Hollywood set took to Acapulco with Johnny Weismuller spending much time here and also filming some of his Tarzan films here. John Wayne and more recently Sly Stallone have lived here. The film "African Queen" was shot here.

Our first visit on our tour was to see the cliff divers who dive 138 feet into a ravine with water only 14 feet deep. They must leap outwards for 9 feet as the cliff slopes out.

There were 8 divers who put on the show whilst we watched from the terraces of an adjacent hotel. Divers must be related to the original divers who started in 1921 and over the years whilst there have been broken bones there have been no fatalities. Really spectacular and we were so glad we saw it.

Every where in Acapulco there are taxis, most of which are ageing VW Beetles, all assembled in Mexico. Mostly white with blue mudguards it is funny to see large tourists trying to fold themselves into the cabs.

We then went to the Acapulco Princess Resort where we had a great lunch of Mexican food and relaxed on the beach for the afternoon. The resort has three large hotel buildings, the middle one shaped like a pyramid and many pools, bars and restaurants. It was rated as the best in the world in the late 1980,s

A great way to spend an afternoon.

Two golf courses and the Ochia golf academy completed the luxury.

We are now sailing towards Guatemala where we will dock tomorrow morning and it is a hot and steamy day with the sea as flat as a mill pond.