tropicaltammy

We drove into the banana plantation from a back entry way and stopped along side the road. We all got out and walked into the rows of banana plants. We saw really cool spider webs, thus some small spiders. We got bit by mosquitos, so have your bug spray on in advance. There was a worker (apparently paid $10-$20/day) and we saw the cable system. We got great pictures and video. After about 10 minutes a pickup came down the road from the other way. We got back in the van. Our guide and the 2 men in the pickup spoke and we left. Don't know if our guide didn't have permission to be there, didn't have permission to be on that road, or what.

So it was not a structured, guided tour, but we were satisfied to see what we did as we were able to move along as continue with our adventure!

We learned about the growing process of bananas from a couple we had met earlier on the ship that booked the actual ship excursion.

My email is tssdvds@hotmail.com if you want to communicate that way!

Yes, I recommend you get off the ship as soon as possible. Don't know if you are aware, but passengers that do not book excursions thru the ship have to wait until all the "yellow ticket" people that did book thru NCL get off first.

We talked to the head honcho of the cab company (had "Izabel" in the cab company name on their white shirts). We were allowed to speak to Gerson Mendez (pronounced Jare - son) before we agreed that he would be our driver. I will say that he was way easier to understand than it was for him to understand us, but we just had to slow down and repeat our questions and were able to communicate very well.

These particular cabs were all the same small SUV type (gold-ish beige in color) and should seat the 7 of you. They were fairly new, clean, and air-conditioned.

For those of you looking for a way to spend your day without booking a ship excursion, here is some info on hiring an independent cab driver for the day.

We got off the ship and walked all the way through the "big building" surpassing all the tour offers being directed our way. Once outside we asked for an English speaking cab driver that could take us to a banana plantation and the waterfalls.

We hit the jackpot!!! for $150 for the four of us for the day, we had the most awesome cab driver and had an truly amazing day. Ask for Gerson Mendez. He treated up like family and we feel so blessed to have spent a day with him.

He pointed out things and took us places that were so interesting. We got a good look at "real" Guatemala life. He took us to a restaurant down the street from his home for an authentic rice & beans meal. We got to hold a monkey (Pancha, the "good" monkey), shop downtown Puerto Barrios (where coffee was $1.50/# and smells so good in your suitcase when you get home!), see the banana plantation, see the home of 35,000 iguanas, etc. I could go on and on about the amazing things we saw that day.

We also went to the waterfalls. We were behind the cruise crowds, which was nice. We saw a snake on the trail on our way up, and later reasearched it and found it was a parot snake, or a good luck snake. Waterfalls were gorgous and we had fun swimming in the natural pools. We had taken a bunch of Beanie Babies and handed them out to children we saw throughout the day. (I think they attend 1/2 day school). That was a lot of fun.

I totally recommend going off on your own in Santo Tomas. It was the highlight of our cruise.

I will check back to this thread to answer any questions.