It’s reading stories like this that remind me just how much I’ll never travel to Mexico again, not even if it’s on a cruise ship. It wasn’t always that way: I remember our very first cruise back in 1988 when our ship was the first ship allowed to dock at Playa del Carmen following Hurricane Gilbert. It was like taking a step back in time – back then Playa del Carmen had just a few restaurants and a few storefront tourist shops. We walked all around the town after it got dark and I remember a few street lights and strands of brightly-colored party lights across a few intersections. Another cruise, had to be twenty years ago, we stopped in Cozumel. We rented a Jeep and drove all around the island, stopping at a bar on the beach where a thunderstorm was blowing up offshore, turning the sky an ominous deep blue-black against the gorgeous turquoise-colored water. We ended up getting lost but were still able to scramble our way back to the ship with a half hour to spare. On yet another cruise, working our way down Mexico’s Pacific coast, we took a school bus on a tour way up into the mountains on dirt roads into a village above Mazatlán. It was a great excursion, but even back then I couldn’t help wonder what would stop a gang of thugs from stopping the bus and ripping us all off. I guarantee you neither is anything I would try in this day and age!

Frank would be disappointed, but he was part of a by-gone era – one I’m grateful for having lived through. Nothing stays the same, it’s all going to hell.