We thought we had seen beautiful, clear sea water in Grand Cayman, and of course we had. But when we arrived at Cozumel, we were astonished by the turquoise water, and the gradations of color, from deep cerulean blue to light aquamarine.
Cozumel has been a cruise ship port for 20 years, and there’s a major concentration of tourist shops at Punta Langosta where we docked. After toodling about for a quick hour, we caught our excursion bus to Chankanaab National Park, about 15 minutes away.
At Chankanaab, the 100 or so of us who had signed on for the dolphin excursion were broken into small groups of 12. Each group donned life vests and filed out on the docks that formed a square enclosure, cordoning off a 2,000 x 3,000 yard portion of the azure water with underwater hurricane fences. We could see the dolphins sticking their heads up, leaping and swimming around groups of tourists already in the water.
Our group assembled in the water, standing on a platform about 4 feet deep. One at a time, we did various activities with Romulo, a 15-year-old male dolphin with scars on his forehead, from skirmishes with other males fighting over the females we were told. We kissed and hugged Romulo. We got rides holding onto his dorsal fins while he swam upside down. We held onto a boogie board while Romulo pushed us from behind, positioning his round snout right on the sole of one of our feet—trust me, you can get going plenty fast this way.
At the end, we moved over for our “free time,” our “tiempo libre,” with two female dolphins, including one named Ixcel (sp?). They swam down the line of people, letting us run our hands along their sleek sides. They leaped high in the air. They splashed us with water.
Finally, it was over and we were led in our dripping suits into small TV viewing rooms where we watched video presentations of our group’s experience, miraculously edited in record time so that we could view it immediately, complete with slow motion sequences of our dolphin rides.
Finally, it was time to return to Conquest, and we joined the great throng walking out on the piers to the two ships. Inspiration was docked alongside Conquest. The Royal Caribbean ship Liberty of the Seas had also come to Cozumel, but was at a separate dock five miles away. No tender boats this time. The embarkation staff inserted our sea and sail ID cards one at a time as we boarded, each one making a loud “ding,” indicating one more passenger had returned to the floating city. Was anyone ever left behind? It happens infrequently, we were told—those who fail to reboard in time are aided by Carnival staff on land, and typically fly back to their port of origin, after paying a significant fine.
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