Thanksgiving at sea part 2

Our second stop was in Grand Cayman. We did an island tour that took us around the island, stopping at a rum cake factory, a new shopping area that had a lookout tower where you could see the whole island and then we went to a place called Hell. Yes, you read that right, we went to Hell. I have to say, I was disappointed with Hell, it ended up being a dumpy tourist trap shop. Evidently, the area got its name from a dead coral reef that is there (it is all black and jagged looking).  That area looked pretty cool and was definitely Hell’s only redeeming quality; this was a stop we could have done without.


After getting out of Hell, we were dropped off at Tiki Beach which is located on 7 mile beach. We spent a few hours there, swimming in the water and watching para sails fly by. The beaches and water were beautiful, it is nice to be able to stand in the water and watch all kinds of fish swim by. We would definitely go back to Grand Cayman, possibly rent a condo or something and spend a week wandering around the island and snorkeling. The only problem that I had with GC is that everything is very expensive; that is mainly a function of the fact that they import everything, from gas to food to building supplies. It is hard to imagine that everything has to be shipped in, but that definitely explains why it is so expensive.

Our third cruise stop was in Cozumel, where we went on an off road adventure to the jade cavern. As you can imagine, I selected this excursion. The excursion description said to wear old shoes and clothes that could get dirty. Dirty was the understatement of the year. Once we got to their facility, we hopped into what they called an xrail, but I would just call it a dune buggy. They took us on a bumpy/muddy/rocky road about 50 minutes to the Jade cavern. Karen drove first, however the lack of power steering made it a bit of a handful for her. There were several times where she yelled for me to reach over and help her steer… and at one point she did run off the road and stuffed us into the bushes. The buggy took the abuse and, to her credit, several others in our group had similar adventures. We hit some mud puddles along the way and got a little dirty, but we both had a good time.

Once we got to the cavern, we were able to swim in jade green water that filled most of the cave while bats flew overhead. Karen opted to stay out of the water and she watched from the shore. The guides also offered the opportunity to do some cliff jumping and I ended up jumping off 15 and 30 foot high cliffs into the water. We also swam through a tunnel to a “hidden” cavern that was pitch black and full of bats. It was cool and kind of creepy at the same time. I don’t think Karen minded the fact that she missed out on the bats.

On the return trip, I was driving,  hitting every puddle that I could find. Then the guides took a turn that we didn’t take earlier and we ended up on a different road. We continued down that road and went flying around a corner to find a massive (probably 40’ long) mud pool directly in our path. I floored it (of course) and we hit the pool at a pretty high speed. That created a wave that went away from us, but then returned to coat both of us in mud. It was awesome… Karen had been holding onto the grab handle at the front of the buggy, which left her shirt sleeve hanging down. That provided an ideal route for mud to flow up her sleeve and into her shirt. That did not go over well with her, I just laughed. This was, by far, the most fun we have ever had on an excursion. Unfortunately, we left our camera in the locker at the start (because we didn’t want it to get wet) so we don't have any pictures of the adventure.  We did have the guide snap this photo before we started to wash off:

As you might imagine, the clothes and old shoes that we were wearing ended up in a garbage can. The description should have said "bring clothes that you will throw away."  Once we got back to the ship, it took two more showers to get all the mud off of us and out of our hair. That night was one of the “formal” nights, so we went from muddy to suit and tie/dress. We definitely went from one extreme to the other.

Friday was another day at sea, filled with eating, pool time and more eating. We woke up Saturday morning as the ship was docking back in New Orleans. We took a bus tour of the city that ended at the airport. We were able to catch the end of the Georgia game before flying back home. It definitely was a great trip and we can’t wait to go on another cruise. It definitely will not be another 5 years before we do it again.