Pivotal lunch

At lunch, back on the ship, I sat next to some folks who had taken the Job's Tomb and Frankincense Trees tour. They loved it! Raved about what a special country it was, how beautiful it was etc. On the other side of me was a group that had battle wounds from trying to take a taxi into town. Apparently the taxis wanted $100 or more and only to take people on long tours, not just runs into town. They weren't metered so you had to negotiate. Also they had a very strong queue system, only having 4 taxis at a time in the gate while 50 or more waited just out of sight. The control people with the 4 taxis that were in sight weren't letting any go off cheap.

I had a decision to make. Go out and brave the taxi negotiations or stay on the ship and be disappointed with my tour. I decided to go brave the taxis.

I got off the ship and went to find the shuttle to the gate where the taxis waited. A van was headed that direction, potentially after dropping off a private tour, and offered to take me. After I climbed in he proposed a $140 four hour tour. I declined and after a few negotiations managed to extricate myself from the van at the gate. He indicated I should try get to the taxis beyond the gate as I would get a better rate there. There was no getting by the drivers in the gate though. I got it down to $70 for a tour to Mughsail Beach and Jobs Tomb. Luckily another passenger showed up just then who wanted to go into town. We compared notes and decided it was cheaper to split the fare and do both our itineraries for $80 or $40 pp. So off we went on a fabulous tour that made my day!