Grand Cayman recommendations

[Doctorfish]

There is plenty of peace and quiet at Cobalt Coast as well. It is a small dive lodge in the middle of nowhere.

IMO, the Kittiwake ain't much. There is very little coral or sponge growth on it and you will find more life on the Cayman reefs and walls then there. Unless you have some personal attachment I would pass and spend my time/money diving the walls. I know you can dive Sand Chute as part of the Kittiwake dive but north and east walls are arguably better than anything on the west. If you are going to stay at OF, any wall dive on the east side will be better than the Kittiwake dive. Besides, it takes a good hour by car to get from OF to west side.

 

[KathyV]

Kathy thanks for all your helpful imput. I am leaning towards Ocean Frontiers. I prefer peace and quiet. OF only offers a trip to the kittyhawk on Tuesdays and that is the day that I get in and I leave on Monday. Can you recommend a DO that I can do that trip with??

A lot of dive ops run trips to the Kittiwake on various days/time, but you will have to find an op that will be going there on a day/time that will work for you. And the Kittiwake site is on the other side of the island so you will have to get over to the West Side, probably to the West Bay Marina, to meet the boat - and that might mean missing wall dives.

Traffic driving to the west side can be very bad during rush hours. I would tell you to go during mid-day to avoid traffic, but there are a lot of snorkeling tours - frequently full of cruise ship passengers, that regularly go to the Kittiwake and the cruisers are usually in port from 10 am to 3 pm. If you could find an op running a Kittiwake trip on a Sunday, that might work - but you would have to figure in the "wait to fly" rules because you are leaving on Monday.

Ocean Frontiers at Compass Point and Red Sail Tortuga at Morritt's Resort are the 2 dive ops located on the East End - I doubt that they would run boat trips all the way out to the Kittiwake, but I am sure that they have methods in place to get divers over to the west side to do the KW dive - so you could ask them for advice. It they can't oblige your schedule, they will probably be able to recommend somebody.

Everyone has their favorite dive op, and there are many fine ops on GC, but on the West Side we like Cayman University Divers, see the link below. They have small boat and we had a great experience diving the Kittiwake with them. But again you will have to get over to the West side. But you could try contacting them and see what they suggest.
Dive the USS Kittiwake

This may sound like an off-the-wall idea, but to avoid rush hour traffic, you could drag your dive gear onto the ferry - and for $20 roundtrip - take the ferry from the Northside to Camana Bay on the West side.

You would have to drive from Compass Point on the East End to Kaibo or Rum Point on the Northside to catch the ferry, but it isn't a bad drive and there won't be much traffic. Then take the ferry to Camana Bay and catch a taxi for a fairly short ride to the West Bay Marina - or perhaps the dive op would pick you up at the ferry? Just an idea, see the ferry schedule below:
Grand Cayman Ferries to Kaibo | Camana Bay

To be truthful, we've dived the KW twice and enjoyed it, but I don't think that it is that great as a wreck dive. It is big and interesting, and it's wide open and easy to penetrate. The gigantic propeller makes a great photo op - but there's not much coral encrustation or sea life on it. My favorite Cayman wreck is the Russian Frigate (the Tibbett's) off Cayman Brac. What I'm saying is, if you don't get to dive the Kittiwake this trip, it's shouldn't be a huge disappointment.

 

[Doctorfish]

If you end up staying east end, Ocean Frontiers is an exceptional dive op. you will enjoy diving with them.

 

[tkaelin]

If arriving Tue and leaving Mon and staying at OF and you still want to dive the KW, look at doing it Sat afternoon. OF takes Sat PM off so you would be free. You will have a car as part of the package. Sat, being a weekend, you will have little traffic driving back and forth and should have no cruisers. There are a ton of ops to check out to arrange a PM 1 or 2 tank dive on the KW. My daughter and I did this exact same thing a couple years back. We booked with Off the Wall divers who took just the two of us out to the KW in the afternoon and was flexible enough to accommodate our schedule which permitted us to do a 2 tank AM with OF, get back, get lunch, get our gear and get out to the west side to OTW. Worked out very well.

When we took long weekend dive trips staying at OF, we would get our car at the airport and drive first out to Turtle Reef to get a shore dive in, eat lunch and then drive out to OF. You may be able to do something similar on your arrival day depending on when you arrive and try to link up with an OP doing a PM 1 tank on the KW.

 

[deaf diver]

If arriving Tue and leaving Mon and staying at OF and you still want to dive the KW, look at doing it Sat afternoon. OF takes Sat PM off so you would be free. You will have a car as part of the package. Sat, being a weekend, you will have little traffic driving back and forth and should have no cruisers. There are a ton of ops to check out to arrange a PM 1 or 2 tank dive on the KW. My daughter and I did this exact same thing a couple years back. We booked with Off the Wall divers who took just the two of us out to the KW in the afternoon and was flexible enough to accommodate our schedule which permitted us to do a 2 tank AM with OF, get back, get lunch, get our gear and get out to the west side to OTW. Worked out very well.

When we took long weekend dive trips staying at OF, we would get our car at the airport and drive first out to Turtle Reef to get a shore dive in, eat lunch and then drive out to OF. You may be able to do something similar on your arrival day depending on when you arrive and try to link up with an OP doing a PM 1 tank on the KW.

Great info!! Thanks so much!

 

[caydiver]

Generally moorings are first come first serve so if you really want to do the Kittiwake don’t leave until the very end. That said many ops do a 1T in the afternoon so if you go with someone who does a 2T its generally not a problem especially as a second dive. Did an Agressor trip in The Galapagos and it was awesome. Don’t know if it would be worth it for me personally to do it in Cayman. The walls and reefs are so close that unless you are desperate to stay on a boat or budget conscious it seems like overkill. We have her on the same dive sites we go to all the time. In fact recently we had a couple try to get on our boat instead of their back to them. Didn’t even realize our little six pack wasn’t the big liveaboard they came from. All kind of divers out there

 

[KathyV]

Generally moorings are first come first serve so if you really want to do the Kittiwake don’t leave until the very end. That said many ops do a 1T in the afternoon so if you go with someone who does a 2T its generally not a problem especially as a second dive. Did an Agressor trip in The Galapagos and it was awesome. Don’t know if it would be worth it for me personally to do it in Cayman. The walls and reefs are so close that unless you are desperate to stay on a boat or budget conscious it seems like overkill. We have her on the same dive sites we go to all the time. In fact recently we had a couple try to get on our boat instead of their back to them. Didn’t even realize our little six pack wasn’t the big liveaboard they came from. All kind of divers out there

I know that Cayman's reefs are close to shore, the advantage of the Cayman Aggressor trip is that you get to dive some of the best sites off of all 3 Cayman islands during one trip, Grand Cayman, Little Cayman, and Cayman Brac. Another advantage is that a single diver probably won't have any problem finding a dive buddy on a LOB.

Plus you get to do a whole lot of diving, if that is of interest, around 25 dives per week including specialty dives - like night dives and the Kittiwake and Stingray City are all included.

The Aggressor is a pricey venue, but if you can find a good price it may be worthwhile. We got a good deal on our Cayman Aggressor trip and we had perfect weather, so we got to do a lot of dives and the cost per dive was quite reasonable, considering that it included lodgings and meals.

The risk is that if the weather is bad (20 - 25% of the time?) they will not make the crossing to the sister islands and you will be stuck on a boat in bad weather diving offshore GC.

 

[caydiver]

Just for the OP there is no problem finding a buddy on any boat. If there isnt a one or two to join with you can pair up with the DM anyway. We have folks that do 3T in the morning followed by a night dive and some that do 2T am and 2T pm and sometimes follow up with a night dive so you won’t be restricted even if you are land based.

 

[KathyV]

Just for the OP there is no problem finding a buddy on any boat. If there isnt a one or two to join with you can pair up with the DM anyway. We have folks that do 3T in the morning followed by a night dive and some that do 2T am and 2T pm and sometimes follow up with a night dive so you won’t be restricted even if you are land based.

That's true of most dive boats and liveaboards, the only time it might be tricky finding a buddy would be a dive trip that includes shore diving, like Sunset House, Cobalt Coast, Lighthouse Point, and Coconut Bay. Shore diving is a great way to get more dives at a lower cost, but it isn't always the best option for a single diver.

 

[KathyV]

... if he can pair up with a buddy (or somehow rent a tank or two as an individual). Depends on how much the outgoing 'people person' one is, I suppose. Such a requirement would drive me to anguish, but some people don't seem to have a problem with it...

Richard, the idea of hooking up with a stranger as a dive buddy would drive me to anguish too; but I am curious about how you managed so many trips to Bonaire and shore dives as a single diver, did you mostly dive solo?