Thursday, Jan 6, 2005
Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands:
We sailed into George Town, Grand Cayman at about 8 am on Thursday. Unfortunately, we were only given a short time on the island, and would have to be back on the boat by 4:30.
Grand Cayman really isn't much more than a large sand bar in the middle of the Carribean. In fact, from the boat you can see directly over the western part of the island to the ocean on the other side!
One of the drawbacks to such a small island is that when the hurricanes come, there's nothing to protect the buildings. What we could see of the island, pretty much everything was destroyed or damaged. All the trees were bent and leafless, all the smaller buildings were ruined, and most of the larger resorts and hotels all had at least roof damage.
Since the water is so shallow around the island, the cruise ship had to anchor off shore, and we took a ferry from the boat to the dock. Then we took a bus ride across the island to a smaller boat dock. We rode another ferry-style double decker boat out to "Stingray City" where we hit the water with masks and snorkles. There were like 100 to 200 people in the water there from the various cruise ships and just about as many stingrays. These alien looking fish thing were freaking the
hell out of all the little kids. I dunno what kind of parents bring their kids to these places, but they should *at least* prepare the kids for the stingrays, since they are *huge* and quite creepy. I have to admit I even freaked out a bit when a 3' ray would sneak up from behind you and rub across your legs!
So we swam (well, more like "waded") with the rays for a bit, then we climbed back in the boat and headed to deeper water along the reef. There we added flippers to our equipment and got some real snorkling on. Hampered by my float vest, I ditched it on the boat allowing me to more easily dive in the ~10 foot deep water. In fact the water's so salty that half a lungfull of air is all it takes to float on the surface comfortably. The reef was littered with debris from the hurricane, and there weren't many brightly colored fish in the water. But it was fun swimming nonetheless, since the water was soo clear and warm. Glen and I think we spotted a barracuda swimming with us, but in hindsight, we think the snout may have been a little too narrow for a 'cuda, so we're not sure that's what it was now.
The boat took us back to the bus, where we convinced the bus driver to take us to a beach instead of taking us all the way back to the pier. At the beach we had to pay a stupid $5/person entrance fee (we later found out it was $35 if you had signed up for it on the ship!) and we felt screwed by the $4.75/beer price for Red Stripes. 'Course most of that was because we ordered two buckets at once, which was like $60 for beer! So, we took our over-priced beers and stole some beach chairs and sat in the sun. Cooling off was a short walk down the talcum-like sand to the water.
We played with some beachballs and accidentally lost the eyeball (yes, a beach ball that looks like and eyeball) in the wind. In about 30 seconds the ball was out past the buoys... we're hoping it finds an oil-rig or something in the middle of the Carribean so some worker will be like "hey Jose, is that a giant floating eyeball out there, or am I working too hard?"
Sunburnt and faded, we hitched a bus ride back to the boat. We tried to grab some more alcohol from the duty free shop, but it was too close to depart-time to buy anything, so we just took pictures with the Big Black Dick Rum mascot.
Juno and I hopped the ferry back to the boat while Glen went to find his shoes at the beach and Dan, Ryan and Courtney went shopping for a bit longer. We eventually all made it back on board for a 5 pm sail. Just before we departed I took a bunch of pictures for a 360 deg. panorama image of Grand Cayman.
That night was supposed to be the 2nd formal dinner, but everyone agreed that if we were going to bother dressing up, we were gona hit "The Point" restaurant, which is the nicest formal-only restaurant on board. This restaurant is the only not included place on the ship, so dinner cost us a flat $25/each + drinks. Dan, being our resident wine expert picked a bottle of wine and champagne for the group. I had sushi for an appetizer, and a massive tenderloin steak. Juno and Dan also had the same. The other 3 got the surf-n-turf lobster and fillet. This was easily the best meal we had on board.
Day 6 Cliff notes:
Grand Cayman was hammered by the summer hurricanes. We went wading with stingrays, snorkeling off the reef, and drank expensive Jamaican beer on the beach. We met a pirate with a big black dick, and at at the nicest restaurant on board.