Cayman Islands post #3 (July19-20)

On Tuesday, Sarah and John had a another scuba dive planned and Gary and Heidi and Charlie and I went on a snorkel excursion.  One of the most recognizable things to do on Grand Cayman is to visit "Sting Ray City".  Sting Ray City is a small sand-bar area off the shore where hundreds of Sting-rays hang out and wait to swim with the tourists and the free food that said tourists bring with them. Our excursion first brought us snorkeling to a coral reef about 20 minutes off the shore.  It was good to do the snorkeling first - it was decent snorkeling where you were fairly close to the fish.  And it made visiting the sting rays even more fun.  The pictures didn't turn out as well from that trip - but the highlight was when one of the tour guides played with an eel.

Then is was off to see the sting rays - the highlight of the trip.  The boat crew members gave a short lesson on sting rays and how they are misunderstood creatures.  Really they are quite docile and can be touched and fed.  Because Sting Ray City is located on a sand-bar, everyone can stand because the water is only a couple feet deep.

Charlie jumped right in because he had been there before...

...but Katie and Heidi were a little apprehensive of these large sting-rays coming right up to us.

Eventually, Charlie and the tour guide got Katie to hold the sting ray...

And everyone else got in the fun, too.

If you ever go - we would recommend Moby Dick Tours.  The 3 tour guides really know how to make the trip fun, and are very helpful.  The combination of snorkeling first and the knowledge they have, along with the best price we'd found - it's the best option.

After the snorkel trip, we went back to Rackham's - where we'd jumped off the dock the night before - but this time for lunch.  The guys at Moby Dick recommended the place, and we got 10% off for saying that's why we came.  Too bad we didn't find it for dinner the night before - the food was really good!  They are said to have the best fish and chips on the island, and we'd agree with that assessment.  Their fried grouper sandwich was also really good.  Retracing our steps, we went back to Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville after lunch for drinks and some more trips down the water slide.

Tuesday evening, we all made separate dinner plans to have a little time alone.  Sarah and John were celebrating their 3rd wedding anniversary.  Charlie and I made reservations at a local Italian place called Ristorante Pappagallo and as you can see from the pictures it was perfect for a romantic dinner and our meals were delicious.  This is another one we'd recommend - it's at the very North tip of 7-mile beach and requires a cab ride.  But it was worth it!

After dinner, we met up with Sarah and John at Calico Jack's, a tiki bar on the ocean just a few blocks down from our hotel.  It was "Jam Night", which is kinda like open mic night, with a band that acts as the host.  Some were better than others, but it was a lot of fun listening to some local talent.  There was one guy in particular that rocked the place - he looked like a shorter version of Manny Pacquiao and was incredible on the electric guitar.

We didn't get a very good picture of him...but here he is:

We walked along the beach back to the hotel and said good-bye to Sarah and John because they were heading home the next day.

Wednesday, we relaxed by the pool some more and then Gary and Heidi and Charlie and I took a sunset caterman cruise to Rum Point for dinner.  The views were amazing and we filled up on lots of food and drinks.

Thursday morning, we met Gary and Heidi for breakfast and then they had to catch their flight home.  Charlie and I decided to go visit the turtle farm and Hell, which are 2 of the popular tourist attractions on the island.  Hell is basically this small little section of the island with lots of black rocks where nothing grows.  It is has a small little gift shop where you can buy post-cards and have them post-marked from Hell.  We sent one to my parents and apparently the mail service is really slow coming from Hell...took about 15 days to arrive to Ohio.

(the guy that owns the property called Hell puts these little wooden figures of the devil in the rocks) 

We got to the turtle farm with only about an hour to look around before it closed, but it was enough time to pick up all the turtles we could.

After the turtle farm, we walked around some shops near our hotel and went to dinner at Hemingways, another great restaurant with nice sunset views.

Friday morning we squeezed in our last few hours at the pool and then packed up and headed to the airport.  We arrived back in Newark, New Jersey to record breaking heat on the East Coast.  It was a great trip with 2 really fun couples and we all agreed we would love to go back again.

Cayman Islands post #2 (July 17-18)

After getting settled in Cayman on Saturday, we were ready to indulge for our week-long vacation.  The big debate for Sunday was regarding breakfast / brunch.  Ferdinand's the restaurant located on the hotel grounds, has a highly-recommended (but highly expensive) brunch buffet.  Considering most of our dinners cost about $125 American (or more), spending $60 American on a mid-day meal was a bit much to ask.  John and Charlie were the only 2 who decided to go for it - and they decided to make the most of it by wrapping breakfast, lunch and some extras all into an hour-and-a-half sit-down.  Charlie's two plates below didn't count his middle plate - or his dessert!  If you're ever in Cayman - we'd recommend this (or at least Charlie would).  You may not be hungry the rest of the day - and they have free champagne/mimosas to add to the fun.

Afterwards, it was time for some relaxation in the pool because that's what vacation is for right?  John and Sarah went scuba diving that day.  When they got back we all headed to Coconut Joe's, a local restaurant/bar, for a cheaper dinner and drinks than the night before.

We also got a visit from some pirates - not sure what their deal was, but they walked into the bar and would talk to the patrons.

The bar had a special on some "jungle punch" that was a lot more punch than jungle, but we did go on a little bar crawl on the way home to get our daily dose of booze.  Sunday was in the books!

Monday was more R&R at the pool during the day.  We took a long walk down 7-mile beach to explore the area, and had lunch at the swim-up bar again.  The plan was to go visit Georgetown - which is south of 7-mile beach and is the capital of the island.  It's the tourist hub of the island where the cruise ships stop each day.  We thought would walk around some of the many shops and then stop and have dinner.  So we hopped one of the cayman "buses" which are basically large passenger vans that you can hop on and off of for only 2 cayman dollars - they'll take you anywhere on 7-mile beach.  The bus dropped us off right in the middle of Georgetown around 5pm.  As we started to walk around we noticed that every shop was closed - Georgetown was more like "Ghost-town".  We found out later that all of the shops close when the cruise ships leave.  The cruise ships dock in the Georgetown harbor during the day but all the passengers get back on their ship for dinner.

After walking a few blocks, we found a restaurant called "Paradise".  It was right on the water and had excellent views of the sunset.  It was quite a leisurely dinner - though it might be the one restaurant we wouldn't recommend.  It took a really long time even though it was far from crowded.  Most "sit-down" restaurants in Cayman are pretty expensive, and this one fit the bill - but it just wasn't worth it as much as others.   It did offer some great photo ops, though, with the sunset.

(Yep, this is a stick-your head in picture of Prince William and Kate...with Gary and Charlie as the new royal couple)

After dinner we walked through the empty streets to Jimmy Buffet's Margarita-ville.  Unfortunately it was getting ready to close (at 10pm...again because of the cruise ships) so we grabbed a road-soda and some of took a quick dip down the water slide and made a note to come back when it is open for longer.

We finally found a bar that wasn't closing, called Rackam's.  Apparently it is a right of passage to jump off the deck at Rackham's.  Charlie, John and Gary decided to take the plunge into the Bay and Heidi decided to represent for the girls.  There is a whole school of really large Tarpon fish, but they swim away at the first sight of someone jumping into their bay.  The only hard thing about the jump was the getting back up to the bar, because they basically had to climb up these rocks which wasn't easy...but that didn't stop them from jumping off the deck multiple times.