Puerto Chiapas

[kathy407]

What are some things to do in puero chiapas?

 

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[Turtles06]

Well, staying on the ship would be one option. ;p

 

Seriously, we had a port call there a little over a year ago. Here's what I wrote in my review thread on the NCL board:

 

The fourth port in our five ports in a row marathon was Puerto Chiapas, Mexico. During our pre-cruise research, we could not find much to do here, and, having now visited this port, we would both say that a sea day would have been far preferable, especially given how many ports we had on this cruise. (Plus we love sea days.)

 

I'm not a big fan of staying on board a ship in a port I've never been to, so before the cruise we kept reading the descriptions of the various NCL shore excursions, and finally booked "Chiapas Through the Ages," primarily because it would take us to the Mayan ruins at Izapa, about a half hour or so drive from the ship. At least we'd see Mayan ruins.

 

We sailed into Puerto Chiapas at dawn. [photo]

The dock area has a couple of pavilions with vendors, etc. (And containers of Chiquita bananas!) [photo]

The ruins at Izapa include plazas, temples, ballcourts, and stelae. We spent perhaps an hour there, the highpoint of our day.[photo]

After Izapa, we drove to the planetarium just outside Tapachula, the city nearest to the port (and about half an hour away from it).. Outside the planetarium, students studying Mayan culture performed a traditional Mayan dance for us. They were very talented, but this was a made-up-for-tourists thing on a sidewalk. I am not a big fan of these things. [photo]

Inside the planetarium, we watched a presentation in the planetarium dome that was supposed to explain the Mayan calendar to us. We came out scratching our heads over the explanation.

 

We then drove into Tapachula itself. Or rather, we then drove into horrible traffic,and spent pretty much the rest of the morning sitting in it. [photo]

We finally parked along the main square. We were supposed to have had time to walk around and explore, but we didn't. I did get a photo of the lovely church on the square, and we had a few minutes to walk inside. [photo]

There were police with rifles all around the square. (Did I say we should have skipped this port?) [photo]

I do want to give a shout out to our guide, because she was wonderful. It was not her fault that the tour was so lame. She had a great attitude, and, during our time on the bus, passed around and told us about local flowers, and all sorts of bananas and other fruits. She kept pulling these out of what seemed a bottomless bag. It was as though she had a whole produce section on the bus with her. We loved it. (But did I say we should have skipped this port?) [photo]

 

 

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2456255

[CruiserBruce]

Puerto Chiapas is in Mexico, and covered thoroughly on the Mexican Rivera board, here:

 

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=203

 

It is not in Panama. There are definitely some things to do there...Mayan ruins, for example. But not as many choices as many other ports.