Plenty of room on top

Monday morning, early, and I'm on the beach as the sun's coming up, camera in hand. Where's that blooming Pelican? I pick my spot and sit down on the beach and wait. I can see one Pelican happily diving and feeding down the beach to the left of me. I can see two other Pelicans up the beach to the right of me. I walk in their direction but never seem to get any closer. I try down the beach. The same thing happens. They're taking the p**s! An hour later I'm back at the room and a sleepy eyed Jo (is that a song?) asks me how I went on. I've got 218 photos of bloody pelicans, hardly any space left on my memory card and I still haven't got the damn thing diving into the sea. Jo consoles me by suggesting we take the open top, hop on, hop off, bus that traverses one end of the Varadero peninsula to the other. 5 Pesos each and you can ride all day. After I get over my incredulity that it's not included in the all inclusive package, we do indeed hop on, then hop off, then hop on again and finally hop off back at our hotel. In between all that hopping, we saw all of the Varadero resort area including the new marina currently under construction, big markets, little markets and more stalls all selling exactly the same merchandise for exactly the same prices. There's a variety of carved wooden objects, there is every size of bongo or tom tom drums imagineable, various leather products and then the strangest things made out of old drinks tins. There are vehicles made out of these cans and I suppose they look alright but who on earth would want to wear a baseball cap made out of old tin cans? On the bus Jo had the window seat (as usual) except that on the top deck there are no windows. When the driver pulls into a bus stop or drives close to the kerb you are very close to the street's electric cables and of course, trees. If I'd only had the video of Jo getting thwacked on the right cheek by the frongs of a palm tree I'd have made £250 from you've been framed. Or if the camera had only been rolling when the disembarking Canadian woman's hat blew off and was sent tumbling down the middle of the road behind the bus. Or when the German woman in front of us just noticed in time to be just tickled by a few leaves rather than decapitated by the low branch but then unknowingly continued the rest of the journey with bits of foliage in her hair. Life is being sat atop an open top bus surrounded by loud Canadians all wearing green for St Patricks day. Not a drop of Guiness in sight. sigh :-( This evenings meal was interrupted by a special guest appearance of Michael Jackson and entourage. Yes we thought he was dead as well but apparently he's alive and well and playing that world renowned venue - The Blau Hotel, Varadero, Cuba. Well he is tonight anyway. All joking apart it did look very much like him, mmm I wonder?