Here you go guys! So sorry that it's taken so long to get this next installment posted. Life has a way of getting in the way of the fun stuff sometimes.
Cast of Characters:
Ward thats me
Cheri the lovely wife
Sadie the lovely 13 year old daughter
Tuesday, May 23rd Day 4 Part 1: The Purple Pumbaa Paddle of Power and Soothing Chin Rubs
Today is Grand Cayman day!
I got out of bed at about 6am this morning (wow, sleeping in
) and went to Guest Services to check on our shipboard account total so far.
We learned last time that thing can add up quickly and surprise you in the end. All seemed well so far so I went up top to watch us approach Grand Cayman. This is a port where tendering is required and we pulled up right next to the Carnival Miracle just a ways from shore. We were booked for the Island Tour and Snorkeling with Stingrays Excursion with a tender time of 9:15am in Studio Sea. So at about 8am we went up to Topsiders for breakfast (still no toasted ham and cheese croissants
) and dined out on deck. We went back to the room to grab all of the days essentials and went to Studio Sea to meet for tendering.
Pikey from the cruise entertainment staff was there to help get people signed in and where they needed to be. When we were all present and accounted for, they handed out purple stickers with Pumbaa on them for us to wear (in case we got lost.) Then he raised the great Purple Pumbaa Paddle of Power (
) high into the air and we headed off to deck 1 forward. This was our first experience with tendering and it was a turbulent one. Wow. We really had no idea that it was going to be the way that it was with the lurching of the tender boats. It was pretty scary to tell you the truth. Getting off the ship and onto the tender is enough to give mild heart attacks seeing the way that they push that metallic gangplank out to the boat all the while it sways back and forth. And youre supposed to walk across that thing? It was a wild ride!
We were surprised by the port area of Grand Cayman once we arrived. The Purple Pumbaa Paddle of Power was handed off to another Cast Member once on shore and we made our way through a very nice shopping mall area to a parking lot where we were going to divide up into busses for the tour. We were loaded in groups of about 20 and then we were off. We drove by some of the residential houses of the island and the Governors house on our way to our first stop, the Cayman Turtle Farm. This place is SO COOL! We got to look at the breeding tank (which is huge) full of huge turtles, some up to 600lbs. Then the tanks with the smaller turtles that you could actually hold. So we all held turtles for awhile. The guide told us that is your turtle gets panicky that they just need to be rubbed underneath the chin (well yeah, doesnt that calm everyone?) So of course my turtle spazzed out on me when I got him so my wife stepped in to save the day and talk nice to him. Hey, I cant hold the thing and stroke his chin at the same time
it takes two! We were given some free time to use the restroom and get a snack or look in the store. Of course we opted to look in the store where we all bought something. Me a T-shirt (that turns out doesnt fit in the slightest even though it is a 2XX
), Cheri a pair of sandals (more shoes!) and Sadie some trinkets and a deck of cards. Then we got back on the bus for the next stop: Tortuga Rum Cake Factory.
This stop was literally one minute from the Turtle Farm. Its just a small place right there next to the ocean where they have a small selection of merchandise, tons of rum and tons of rum cake that you can sample. All kinds from banana rum cake to chocolate rum cake to pineapple rum cake
they were all great! Cheri went for the free samples of rum and liked the banana rum! Now, I regret not getting some boxes of rum cake for the folks back home but I feared that we had a good portion of our journey left and it was possible that the cakes wouldnt even make it back on board. Another bus load of people had just arrived when we were getting ready to leave and their driver ran inside and came back out with an entire tray of rum cake for their bus! How do you like that? So once we were all caked up, we boarded the bus and went straight to Hell.
Id heard about Hell and done a little research on Hell before this trip, but still didnt quite know what to expect. Its really a creepy sort of lava rock formation thats been there for thousands of years. There is now a bar on sight called the Inferno that you actually walk through to get to the viewing area. One thing that I can say for Hell
theres an awful lot of iguanas there. We took some pictures. There was an opportunity to send postcards from the Hell post office but we passed this up and then it was back on the bus for the boat to Stingray City!!
Up Next: Free Massages and An Anniversary Surprise