Grand Cayman Report

[michaelkuznet]

hey all, not sure if my mom put up a trip report, but seeing how we dont celebrate christmas, and the only stuff on tv is pope john paul, and i've run out of good books to read.....
we went to grand cayman from the 16th-23rd, and yes, i know that december is not the best time for a cayman trip
it was sort of an impromptu trip, we just needed a break bad, so we didnt do any real research, but a vacation is a vacation
we stayed at Beach Club resort, all inclusive
a couple of things about that: Beach Club is a small resort, on 7mile beach, with a diveshop. although it has some 50-odd rooms, it is not as quiet and peaceful as i expected. Beach Club caters to the cruise ship industry, and we would get passengers from cruise ships eating in our restaurant and hanging out on the beach. i think cruise ships came in every day except for two or three. this was not the greatest, because there was a very small strip of beach reserved for actual beach club "dwellers." however, just to give an idea of size, there were only about ten "dwellers" who came out to the beach.
food was kinda not too great, but i am spoiled by the excellent food served on mexican resorts. because of the proximity of beach club to a couple of restaurants, we went out even though we had all inclusive. a great restaurant was about a quarter of a mile away, Havannah cigar lounge or sumthin, dont worry, not smoky enough in the dining spot to make allergies act up.
there are a lot of dive shops within walking distance and stores, if you need to buy some equipment
as for the resort dive shop: my most lasting impression is how nice everybody was. everybody was always happy whenever i came to visit the shop pet, an amazon parrot who spoke a lot, meowed a lot, and loved to laugh after she convinced you to put out your finger and bit it. (sorry for the broken english, i should make this flow better, but i'm singing along to the christmas carols on the radio)
the most annoying thing about the resort? listening to the tropical remixes of the same pop songs from exactly two years ago play over and over, only alternating to "White Christmas" tropical remixes.
our skipper and dive master was Carl, a really nice guy from south africa. (there were a lot of people from S Africa, by the way) a note about carl, although he is very nice, he has only been a dive instructor since june of this year. He was a commercial diver by trade, his job was to check teh bottoms of cruise ships for bombs after 9.11. Obviously, when one is looking for bombs, it doesnt really matter if you place a hand on some rock, or brush a coral with your fins.*sleigh bells jingling....lovely weather for a sleigh ride togetha with you.....dingalingaling ding dong ding* however, i found him to be a little to "touchy" with the sealife. other divers i spoke to didnt mind though, so i might be overreacting. also, because he was a commercial diver, he doesnt have much experience with like the names of fish and stuff, but his girlfriend is a marine biologist, so he's learning, and he'll tell you your next day if there was something that nobody knew.
equipment at the dive shop- good regulators, bc, etc. no wetsuit rentals. try to bargian enough to take off the equipment rental fee, we got that off after we signed up for a dive package.
do not be lured in by the promise of unlimited free shore diving by beach club. it is a long swim, and it is nothing you cant see with snorkeling (12 ft)
if you relly want some shore diving, go to the DIVE TECH dive shop, the father and son duo are very nice, extremely experienced, and are in a good spot for some shore diving. everybody we spoke to spoke highly of dive tech
unfortunately we were not able to dive with DIVE TECH because seas were rough on the north side of the islnd. wow my "a" key doesnt work half of the time i punch it
for those of us that get seasick- take along the dramamine, even with the large trimaran that we were on, there were two days when i didnt take the second dive even though i had taken dramamine.
important: those of you that have a dive skin, TAKE IT! there were a LOT LOT LOT LOT of jellyfish, the most any of the divermasters had seen. best jellyfish remedy if you dont have any access to all the sprays and stuff? ask the kitchen for some vinegar, and apply it liberally. i guarantee that if you go diving right now you will get stung a couple of times, but unless you have an allergic reaction, it is never worse than a rash which goes away over night. do expect to always have a stinging sensation during snorkeling and safety stops.
where ever you re on the caymns, make sure to check out the turtle farm (www.turtle.ky) , on the north side of the island. ooh, this is like 50 feet away from dive tech, so you can make a double trip, check out the turtle farm, and then sign up for some dives with dive tech
all transportation can be done by private run buses going down the street for a dollar and change, as the bartender at your resort, they tend to know best . oh, speaking of money, .80CI=1.00US$
i am forgetting stuff, i havent actually said anything about the diving itself...oops... but as i remember i will add on to this thread. once i pull in the pictures off mom's digital camera i'll post a link to them. my older brother just flew in town:fruit: , and i have to go do some dog walking, so i'm out!
peace
Mike

 

[Tim Ingersoll]

Do you type as fast as you think or the other way around? That was some serious stream of consciousness.

 

[michaelkuznet]

Tim-
Unfortunately, the problem is that I type and think at the same time, thus no time to actually refer to what i write! That report was a bit shoddy, sorry, i'll write a better one in a few days, and i'll actually talk about the dives. Heck, give me a break, i'm fourteen, isnt a guy allowed to be a bit disorganized?
Peace
MK

 

[Tim Ingersoll]

One break coming up. Seriously I'm 38 and pretty disorganized myself!

 

[Compressor]

Hey a decent report. You left out the girls!!!!

 

[dc4bs]

Hi Mike,

I have to agree on the Dive Tech reccomendation.

The last few trips down to the Caymans, my friends and I just stayed at Cobalt Coast and dove with Dive Tech. Cobalt may not be the cheapest place to stay, but for what you get (service etc) versus cost, we feel it's the best place to stay.

The all inclusive packages are the way to go:

3 meals a day. A prety good menu as long as you like seafood but a bit limited if you don't.

2 boat dives a day + unlimited shore dives (the wall is a long swim but well worth it).

If you want to do more than just dive like go out and party then you will want a rental car to get around. The busses are OK during the day but are limited when it gets late.

I can't say much about rentals from Dive Tech as we bring all our own gear except lead and tanks. I did rent a backplate and wings once to do a doubles dive off the wall but I have since gotten my own rig for doubles.

They have been very easy to work with and have gone out of their way to accomodate special requests for us on various trips.

 

[Bacchus]

Tim Ingersoll once bubbled...
One break coming up. Seriously I'm 38 and pretty disorganized myself!

Have no fear, at 44 it doesn't get any better!

Actually my first trip to Cayman was in 1974, when I was 16. Back then there really weren't any busses, major hotels, cruise ships, off shore banking, Bob Soto actually ran his shop, etc. Just great diving. We stayed at the Sunset House in dormatory style rooms with cot like beds. With that said, I had enough fun to come back for another 2 years in a row. Sad to say that 1976 was my last time there. We're planning to be back to the Sunset House with Natasha in April.

....I wonder if that nice young native girl that I met in 1975 is still there...... Oh well, she's probably just like me, thinner on top and fuller around the middle.

 

[michaelkuznet]

dc- just dont forget- for us americans they drive on the wrong side of the street over there, so you better be comfortable with your driving abilities. Jeez, just sitting in the front seat i've had a feeling that when turning left on a red light we were gonna hit an oncoming car.
finally.....about the diving
sorry it has taken so long, new years and such and i got caught up in all the things around me
I was really spoiled by the glowing sponges in St. Lucia, and it looked like some of the coral suffered from the last couple of hurricanes.
Just like all typical Carribean diving, (anything that isnt a wall, that is) the reefs grow in grooves and burrs, like fingers on a hand, so you go out on a finger, come back, and go up the next once, etc.
It seems like all of the fish in Grand Cayman were feeding-trained, some angelfish would literally peck at your hand looking for food. However, one plus is that all the angelfish we saw were HUGE!.
I'm pretty sure that i saw all of the different varieties of angelfish, I dont have a really nice fish/coral, etc identification book, but somebody recommended the Humann or something books, I'll get them when they're cheap on Amazon. My dad is a biologist though heehee (yes tim, i know, train of thought, train of though, choo-choo)
There were really really cool small creatures, so macro photographers take your cameras. What are those blue shrimp called? Somebody wrote an article about diving slow in one of the latest PADI diving magazines; this is definately the place to learn to stay near the rear of the pack, and look into *every* little nook.
Which reminds me.... (i can just hear tim's groans)
There is a great dive site for this, called Hammer Head's Hole;
Heres the story;
Some years ago, when Hammer Head's Hole was still a virgin dive site, a divemaster, pissed off that all his divers cared about were seeing sharks, told them that somewhere beneath this part of the reef, there was a huge cavern in which hammerhead sharks hid during the day. Nobody knew how they got in, but somewhere on the reef there is a small nook which is actually a tunnel that all the hammerheads squeeze through.
Obviously, this is a great mentality to take along for all your dives.
And dont become on of those people on the beach, when they see you coming back from a dive.....
*oooh, ooh, didja dive? didja dive? isnt it scaaary? isnt it scaary? didja see a shark? did{SLAP}*
they should make a train of thought emoction just for me.
Gorji, as for the :cuddle: ......my mom reads this board.:bonk:
I dont remember if i said this, but make sure to check out the snorkling wherever your resort is. After swimming out 100 yards or so (easy with fins, really, cause you're basically just floating, remember....salt water ) we saw a huge school of reefsquid (similar to cuttlefish (sp?) but smaller) there was like twelve, and they gathered around us in a semicircle, and like stared at us. It was amazing, i never knew they would colonize like that. When we started moving, they always stayed just out of reach. They're smarter than we give them credit for being. <---poorly formed sentence.
my mom also said that she saw a stingray with a 10 foot long tail. cool. Speaking of stingrays, we did not go to Stingray City, because there were literally 1000's of people there, yes, thousands, (divers and snorkelrs) and people that went said that you couldnt tell when you were brushing up against a human or a stingray. hmmmm,......
(tim is in cardiac arrest)
Speaking of arrest.........
save the LAPD the trouble, beat yourself up!
once again let me reiterate how awesome the Turtle Farm was. You can get really close to really big turtles, and pick up smaller ones. Plus, its kinda conservation, because even though all those turtles are killed, at least they aren't being taken from the wild. this seems to be the best solution for all. Some of the recent hurricanes wiped out a big part of the farm, so you might wanna check ahead at www.turtle.ky if they are doing construction....just a thought.
Anyways, land photos will be up within a week or two, sorry for the delay, cant seem to find a second when mom isnt using the digital camera to upload the pics. If anybody buys me a casing for a cannon g2 next time there will be underwater photos
gotta go check if i was given any homework over my month long break, you see, i'm going back to school monday.....oops.
:-D peace
MK

 

[MissAmberDiva]

Sounds like you had a lot of fun.

 

[Tim Ingersoll]

thanks for the fun read!