Our First Cruise: Day 6

Our last port was Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands.


This was one of our later ports so we had some time to kill in the morning. 


I finally played mini-golf with the kids like I had been promising for days. 

We also shot some hoops for a bit and played a little ping pong. The kids look happy to be together in this shot but really they spent most of the morning bickering. 



In Grand Cayman, the ship does not dock at a pier. Instead we had to take a tender boat to shore. 

Our excursion wasn't until the afternoon so we caught a cab to Seven Mile Beach. By "cab," I mean a large van that takes as many people as he can at a time to increase profits. There were probably four other people in the taxi with us. The driver, Eric, had all of us repeat a prayer after him before getting out of the vehicle. Odd. We did like Eric though and arranged for him to pick us up when our time was up. 




 The beach and water were absolutely beautiful; by far the best we'd seen on the trip. A true Caribbean Sea beach.


We all snorkeled. There wasn't a lot of fish to see but we did spy some. Josh even found a lion fish hiding in a rock. 

After spending 90 minutes at the beach, our taxi driver, Eric, drove us back into town to meet up with our tour. Our excursion was a 2-stop snorkeling tour with Captain Marvin's. 


After a tour bus ride to a boat, we took the boat across the North Sound to a sandbar called Stingray City. 

If you look at a map of Grand Cayman, the North Sound is the large bay cut into the north part of the island. There is a barrier reef that runs from point to point. The North Sound water is only, at most, 10 feet deep and the water is crystal clear. 

Grand Cayman is very flat; the highest elevation is 60 feet.  We could look back across the island from the North Sound and see our ship on the southwest side of the island. 


The stingray sandbar was only two to three feet deep. I was blown away at how clear the water was. 


I think Carley was very excited to get in the water with stingrays. She worked her way to the front of the pack and was first to jump in. 


At first there weren't too many stingrays in our area but more and more kept coming. I think they know they will get a snack when the humans show up. 






After awhile, we were given pieces of squid that we could feed the stingrays. We were shown how to hold the squid with our thumbs tucked in. Then we would hold it underwater and a stingray would sniff it out, swim over our hand and suck the squid into its mouth. So cool!




One of our tour guides helped us "hold" a stingray for a photo. 


And they made us kiss the stingray too. They say it gives you seven years good luck. It's worth a shot.

After Stingray City, we took the boat over to Coral Garden for some snorkeling. 




The water was only about 10 feet deep and there were fish and coral everywhere. And the water was so clear! I have never been in that clear of water in the ocean. I'm still stunned. Can you tell? 


We only spent about 30-40 minutes in the water there, which wasn't nearly long enough. I think my entire family would have loved to spend the whole day snorkeling in Coral Garden. 

Our snorkeling and stingray adventure was over and we headed back to George Town to catch our tender to the ship. The tour bus driver, Anju Priest (his stage name), was very entertaining with stories and jokes about the island. He also schooled us on saying "yah man" when answering "yes" to his questions. 


Do you see that in the picture? The cars drive on the other side of the road. It is the first time I have been in a country that drives on the opposite side. It was very odd. 

Another thing about Grand Cayman, everything is so expensive. We spent nearly twice as much on Grand Cayman as we did for similar items in Mexico or Honduras. Everything from the taxi, to fried conch, to a drink cost so much more. 


Friday night was our second "fancy dinner" night. The first was the day Josh was sick. 

By the time we got back to the ship, we only had 30 minutes to clean up and change for dinner. That was not nearly enough time to fight with my hair, which apparently does not like coastal air or salt water, so it was into a quick, wet, bun.


We also watched a show in the Amber Palace theater. 


To not waste a night when everyone was a little dressed up, which rarely happens, we got a family photo taken on the ship's staircase. (Please excuse the quality; it's a photo of the photo.)

Every port we stopped at was absolutely wonderful. I enjoyed each excursion we picked, even the back-up excursion in Costa Maya. If I had to pick my very favorite port and excursion I would pick Grand Caymen. The beach and water there was just so beautiful. I would go back there in a heartbeat.