Trip Report Cayman Brac trip report 28 July - 4 August 2018

[divezonescuba]

We recently made our third trip to Cayman Brac, 28 July - August 2018. The weather was great in contrast to our last December 2017 trip which apparently had the worst weather in 20 years.

Most of us flew directly from Miami on the 737 to Cayman Brac. Unfortunately, on the way back, we had to get off in grand cayman, walk around half of the airport, go through security again, and then reboard the same plane and sit in the same seat for the trip back to Miami. Possibly one of the stupidest things I have ever had to do traveling. Maybe one day that will get fixed.

We stayed at a vrbo house as in previous trips. In contrast to previous trips we dove exclusively with the Brac Scuba Shack, which is much more flexible and caters more to non-resort divers. We rented vehicles for 4-Ds. We brought two large coolers with steaks, chicken, bacon, sausage, and ground beef. We ate out a few times, including the jerk fish at the island restaurant and of course Barrys golden jerk.

Our dive package included a free arrival day tank, unlimited diving the first full day, and then four morning 2 tank boat dives with unlimited shore diving each of those afternoons. We found the owners and crew members to be quite accommodating. One of the crew members, which we knew from previous trips, said that her name was Caz if we had a good time and Liesel (the owner) if we did not. Ha ha. At the end, Liesel saved us some money as she gave us the lower price for individual tanks when a few of the divers did not take advantage of the unlimited shore diving on the first full day.

We were able to provide input on the boat dive locations and were able to see all of the diveable wrecks on the island. We were also able to go to Little Cayman and dove the bus stop site. In general, we dove our tanks and computers without a set time limit.

For shore diving, we did Buccaneer reef, radar reef, scott’s dock / cemetery wall, and handcuff reef for both day and night dives. The tibbets wreck off of Buckner reef is always great when you do not have to worry about having to get back on the boat. We saw multiple sharks off of handcuff reef.

A great trip. Five stars to the Brac Scuba Shack. We cant wait to go back again, maybe in May.

 

[KathyV]

Thanks for the great report, so glad that you had good weather and an excellent trip! Could you tell us more about shore diving Brac, did the dive op provide information and/or a copy of the Brac shore diving guidebook? Are the new road signs posted at popular shore diving spots helpful?

Did you dive the Atlantis site at Radar Reef and what was it like? We haven't gotten there yet but we are heading back to Brac in the fall so maybe this year!

 

[divezonescuba]

There are a couple of books for shore diving including the out of print adventurers guide and the cita booklet. There is also the Lawson wood guide. The brown road signs are all quite visible.

We did Atlantis the previous trip. It is a fairly long swim. Well worth doing once. Foots the artist has not finished putting in the statues. We heard he got bent, so he may never finish.

One thing we did this trip was to emplace a diver down float flag on the reef marking buoys so that we would not get busted by the police like we did on our first trip.

The government also appears to have installed a divers down flag at scott’s dock, so we did not use it there.

 

[KathyV]

There are a couple of books for shore diving including the out of print adventurers guide and the cita booklet. There is also the Lawson wood guide. The brown road signs are all quite visible.

We did Atlantis the previous trip. It is a fairly long swim. Well worth doing once. Foots the artist has not finished putting in the statues. We heard he got bent, so he may never finish.

One thing we did this trip was to emplace a diver down float flag on the reef marking buoys so that we would not get busted by the police like we did on our first trip.

The government also appears to have installed a divers down flag at scott’s dock, so we did not use it there.

The Brac artist known as Foots has been busy lately being arrested and fighting a court battle against charges of displaying obscene images, see the link below.

I think that a lot of people would be surprised to learn that the country of Cayman has a rather conservative culture. There's no nude or topless bathing, gambling is illegal, many businesses are closed on Sunday, and liquor isn't sold until Sunday afternoon - which means that Saturday night frivolities end promptly at midnight. Friday is the big night out in Cayman. Last year Christmas and New Year's Eve were on Saturdays but that didn't matter - all the fun stopped at midnight.

And recently some folks on Brac were offended by artworks displayed by Foots on his property but in public view and they vandalized his work and lodged complaints that led to his arrest.

Anyway, the article below says that his next project will be characters from the Lord of the Rings, so it sounds like he has finished with Atlantis.

Foots found not guilty of obscene publication | Cayman Compass