Fodor's Travel Talk Forums - Just back from GC

Just got back on Thursday morning. We had a wonderful time. The highlights - Captain Dexter and Stingray City - this was easily the best part of our vacation. Captain Dexter is wonderful, the catamaran is amazing, the snorkeling is great and even his fruit punch is good (it's made with real fruit). He has all the snorkeling equipment you on board. There are only 18 people on the boat, you can sit on the roof or on the tarps slung between the floats. On the way out to the sandbar he used the motor so if you sat on the tarps you got pretty wet. But after the 2nd snorkeling spot (where he feeds a moray eel - so cool!) he opened the sail. Everyone found their spot, stretched out and enjoyed the ride. Don't miss this - at $25 with coupon/person it was fantastic value. The inn is just like it appears on the website. We arrived at 10 p.m. The main hall doors were open front and back, allowing the breezes to sweep through. The pool was lit and the surf was pounding in the background. It was great. We stayed in apartment 8, 2 bedrooms and 3 balconies, all ocean view. There's even a window in the shower! We arrived starving so Marleine called Domino's (they were getting ready to close) and got them to hang on for our order. Alain and Marleine are great. They're there if you need them but never in your face. All of their restaurant suggestions were great and we got a 10% discount at two of them because we were guests at the Inn. Not only did we get the discount, but the restaurant staff asked us to give their best to Alain and Marleine. We ate at: Cafe Tortuga - great fettuccine and the nicest waiter we had (and that was difficult to choose) - discount here Blue Parrot - good food and the kids really enjoyed watching the basketball game projected on the storage tank DJ's Cantina - great salsa and chips, good TexMex, really nice Norwegian waitress, nice atmosphere, discount here Capt. Bryan's - right on the harbour with the cruise ships in the background - delicious fish (we were taken here by a local friend) Hook's - went for the breakfast buffet - just OK food, but kind of a fun setting We did eat the Indian dinner at the inn - it was delicious. It's a good opportunity to meet the other guests because most days we hardly saw anyone. My daughter, who likes to keep herself to herself never had to share the pool with anyone. We managed to hit 6 other beaches besides the Inn's. My husband thought that the snorkeling at the Inn was as good as anywhere else we went - but you do have to get out past the turtle grass. Cemetary Reef was nice, but we found for the kids that it was a pretty strenuous swim to the reef (and for us since we had to keep fussing around the kids). Smith's Cove is really nice but quite busy - we only went once at about 5p.m. Rum Point is packed with people - we didn't consider it worth the drive (it was wonderful 14 yrs ago but it is wall-to-wall people now). The public beaches along 7 mile are terrific and practically deserted. Grand Cayman was everything I remembered it to be - the local people are so friendly that my kids noticed! We always felt safe and comfortable. Prices are high but no worse than going to Disney and if you pick carefully, the food is better. We would go back tomorrow.