Translation of retener

At noon the oldest soon came home. He was a doctor and gave me some salt and other Cuban medicine. I was reluctant to swallow that stuff but the pain and the doctor's smile persuaded me in the end.
Now I needed to decide where to go next and I decided to use the information that the girl gave me. I went back into town to the central station and booked a night bus to a place called Palenque.
On our last day we went to visit Stanley, a small town on Honk Kong island, actually on the other side of the mountain. The ride to the town was nice but the town itself was nothing special.