“It never rains in Acapulco.” This is the first thing our tour guide says as we start our tour. So please just pay no attention to any umbrellas you might see in these pictures.

Despite an innate predisposition against organized tours, we have signed on for a tour arranged by an acquaintance of my cousins Steve and Henny.

Like us, Steve and Henny are on a cruise that is transiting the Panama Canal. But they are on a different cruise line (one, I might add, that unlike ours provides umbrellas for its guests), and they are traveling from west to east. Incredibly, we are both in Acapulco on the same day. We are in a van with a total of twelve passengers in addition to our driver/tour guide. Whatever we want, he will accommodate us.

We all want to see the cliff divers, who put on a breathtaking show. We huddle under umbrellas, but the divers don’t mind the weather. Hey, they’re going to get wet anyway.

Other than this, we all want different things. In a tour that lasts from about 10am till about 4pm, some of us want to stop for lunch. Others refuse to eat anywhere in Mexico but on their ship. We have been promised the crafts market, but most of the tour members don’t want to go there. A few do, one of us (guess who) very much. And so, in the end, we get the standard tour, minus lunch, and with an early return to the ship for the non-market-goers.

In addition to the divers, here’s what’s on the tour:

There’s a big, famous cross on a hill, which is not only wet but also cold and windswept.

There’s the sad, rundown Casablanca Hotel, which houses a gorgeous but rundown Diego Rivera mural as well as a view that is second to none.

(In this last picture, you can see our cruise ship, the Royal Caribbean Serenade of the Seas, and our cousins’ cruise ship, the Celebrity Mercury, back to back at the Marine Terminal.)

There’s the Los Flamingos Hotel, made famous by somebody famous—Johnny Weismuller, I think—and his movie-star cronies of the day. It too has a lovely view of the bay. It also has a lot of drenched semi-outdoor spaces.

Despite its gorgeous setting and the magnificent views, Acapulco on this wet tour seems reluctant to let go of a past long gone. The city seems to be weeping.

On the brighter side, there’s the Las Brisas Hotel, a fancy hotel all in pink and white, also with a stunning view. And gorgeous bathrooms.

And there’s a whimsical mosaic wall by Diego Rivera that just can’t be beat.

The tour van crisscrosses back and forth across the main downtown area, which is completely jammed with traffic. The—how shall I say this?—wetness in the air doesn’t help. Stopped at a traffic light, I catch sight of a strange structure inside a parking garage; the concrete columns appear to be coming to life.

If only they ever got any rain here, I could imagine this structure might leaf out.