Acapulco

On our way to Acapulco, we saw several sea turtles, with one so close he bumped right into our boat! We arrived at Acapulco (N16°50.876' W099°54.347') around 13:30 but when Jordan tried to set the anchor in 21 m, it appeared to be dragging. This bay is very deep and is written up in the guides as having a poor holding bottom so we enquired about a mooring ball and were told a higher price than staying at the Performance Marina so we fuelled up and then Med-moored to the dock.

Med-mooring is when the stern of a boat is tied directly to a dock and the bow is attached to a mooring ball. This way, a dock can hold more boats than when boats are tied side-on.

The marine staff seemed to have issues with tying up Sea Turtle! First, they would tighten the ropes, then they would loosen them, then someone else would tighten a rope, then they would swap cleats and on and on it would go until they were finally satisfied. I think even I could have done it quicker! But they were very happy when Jordan offered them an ice cold beer or pop for all their efforts!

We walked through the city's Zocalo (city square or meeting place) up to the old fort. This fort, Fuerte de San Diego, was built in 1616 and is very unusual in that it's in the shape of a pentagon.

Atop Fuerte de San Diego with Acapulco in the background

We then caught a taxi to the restaurant of the hotel that John Wayne and Johnny Weissmuller (former Tarzan star) once owned to watch the nightly show of the famous cliff divers. On 2 walls of the restaurant behind a large old movie camera were signatures of numerous Hollywood stars that we recognized.

Clint Eastwood, Eddie Arnold, even Roy Calhoun...

People have been diving from the cliffs here from as far back as the 1930s. With the spotlights on, we watched as several men climbed up the face of the cliff and then dove, individually and/or in a group from different heights of 25 to 35 m into the surging waters of the narrow basin below. Unfortunately, we couldn't get any photos of their spectacular dives as our camera takes poor shots in the evening.

It's been super hot with virtually no wind lately. So with all the windows open (and no screens on as we hadn't yet seen any bugs anywhere), we were pestered by mosquitoes throughout the night. (In the morning, I was covered with bites.) We finally put our mosquito net over the bed and were able to sleep. Sure glad we had one to put up!