Stingrays in Grand Cayman
 

We will be in Grand Cayman in March on Princess. Five years ago we did this port with Celebrity and I want to take the trip out to the sandbar to pet the stingrays. I really don't remember if we did the ships shore excursion or booked on our own. Do we save much $$ booking on our own? I think the cruise brochure was only $42. I do remember you have to tender at this port, does that make a difference in the decision to go on your own? Who do we contact if we want to book ourselves?

With an ALL day port stop, the independents are grossly superior. They include another snorkle stop. :) I go with Cpt. Marvin the most, but Nativeway is also excellent. BUT if you only have half a day here- leaving at 2pm then stay with a ship tour. Myself, I am always in the tender line an HOUR before posted, I have never failed to get out on the first tenders. If you wait any longer the lines get longer and longer since ship tours have priority. This is definately a port you do not want to sleep in.

I do the same thing as BudgetQueen, get to the tender station well in advance of the posted time that it is scheduled to begin. If not, you'll be in a long line and it could shorten your day in port by an hour or two.....

I just booked our excursion with Captain Marvin and because the printed port time is 9 - 4 we could only choose the 2 hour trip. We are on Celebrity and CM is $30 per person cheaper. Our check-in time for the excurstion isn't until 10:45 but we are still planning to be way up towards the front in the tender line. Also, you might want to check out how many ships are in port with you. We aren't cruising until November but I booked now because I know how popular CM is and we are one of 6 ships in port that day!

We recently returned and there happened to be 7 ships in port that day. Even if you get off the ship the pier is the problem. Getting off the tender unto the pier. They also let the people on a ship tour off the ship first. We were lucky as my husband was diving with the ship we were on so we got off. As said try and get off as soon as you can.

How do you find out how many ships are in port on certain day?

PaigeS, you can go to www.caymanport.com to find out how many ships and what times they will be in port on any given day.

I only knew because we were told by RC employees. They kept explaining and apologizing. It was quite obvious it was very slow getting off the ship. There may be a sight that will tell you for a specific day ahead of time.

We were on the Mercury. We did not go on the ships tour and are glad that we did not. We chose Captain Marvins. There were only eight of us on the boat. Differnces: SHip tour had 100 plus people on it. They took you form the ship, by water to Stingray City. Folks on the ship told me it was a 1/2 trip, one hour there and back. They only went to Stingray City. With Captain Marvins, you drive accross the island to the boat. You are at Stingray withing 1o minutes. You go there before or after the ship's tour, hence no one else was there (when we went). Capt. Marvins also took us snorkeling to 2 other places. We had much more time on the water. Three of our party, children, had never snorkeled. The Captain Marvin's operator was EXCELLENT-taught all the kid how to do it right. We compared notes that evening at dinner with others who had taken the ships tour-absolutely no comparison. My advice would be to go with Captain Marvins. As I recall it was cheaper as well. They have a web side. Prior to getting back to the ship, we got dropped off near he Westin and spent about two hours on the beach. Got the mini bus back to town. Don't waste your time shopping when you get off the ship...do it at the end of the day. Everyone else want to shop first thing and the stores are crowded.

I have done some checking. We dock at 12:00 and would need to be at Capt. Marvins by 1:15 for the 2 hour afternoon tour. I believe there are a total of 5 ships in Grand Cayman that day - none scheduled to arrive closer than 2 hours to our arrival time. Do you think we would have time to make it to Capt. Marvins with 1 hour 15 minutes?

The people who did this on the Star Princess, just returned 2/20/05- had a grand total of 25 minutes with the stingrays and never got to the snorkel spot they wanted at all. The only people who got to Marvins etc. and got equipment were off the boat by 8:20 am or so, on the very first tender. It was a mob scene between 10am to 1pm on the tender piers and they actually stopped the tenders for awhile because there was not a spot to stand. The tour groups all had to relocate and find each other. It was HORRIBLE. A woman from England with us with 2 small girls (7 & 4) returned immediately to the boat as her kids were getting separated from her and some were trying to touch her girls' hair etc. to braid it- as they do in Bahamas & Jamaica.

Also we did get to an outside and got to the semi-sub eventually, so we did see the reef itself. All the anemones, sea urchin etc. are all gone- the fish /coral are there but ripped apart and the color is totally altered. She (guide) said that it will be 50 to 60 years to get the life back as it was.

I am not a negative person, but I would leave very, very early or go else go on the Princess tour that puts you on the Catamaran to snorkel- because that one went very early directly from the tender to another boat to go out to Stingray- and thus avoided the pier. Those were the only people that were not irate about the time they got doing anything that day.

We traveled a total of 3 hours and got trammeled a couple of times in order to do a 25 to 35 minute semi-sub ride. It was not relaxing.

Didn't proofread, sorry. I meant trampled, of course. But believe me it was more like trammeled.

I'll do a whole report when I have time of this cruise. Some of it was very good. Cozumel was beyond fantastic. Grand Cayman was the day we looked forward to the most, and they changed our whole cruise schedule and only gave us 7 hours there total starting at 7am in the morning. It was total gridelock like you would see in a movie diaster sequence. Buses/ cars couldn't budge. They are not ready for what they are taking in. It was very fortunate that the people who were there did not lose their "cool" or become nasty- as you see with road rage in the USA cities. I considered us lucky to get out of there.
Princess also changed all the days around and ran the cruise back to front, so to speak. So if you made arrangements ahead they were all invalid, as it was not the proper day you arranged by date in advance.

Grand Cayman should not be taking these cruises yet and I am going to write to a whole lot of people about this issue.

We tooke the 7 day Western Caribbean Carnival/Kmart Cruise. The sea was too rough to tender off so we bi-passed this port. It turns out that they hadn't been able to tender off for over 3 months, yet it remained on the schedule as we (an others) purchased our tickets. We were left with Cozumel (fabulous) and Jamaica. Wasn't interested in Jamaica, but after such a long period on board, we disembarked the ship and arranged for a $100 taxi ride and had a great day speeding pass the tours and on to many points of interest. Hopefully, some day I will get to return to the Caymans and swim with the stingrays!

Just heard from the friend via email today that got caught on the pier with our group in G.Cayman last week (Feb.17th incident)as I posted above.

She has such deep bruises on one leg from being pushed within the crowd (she was on blood thinners anyway)that she needed to do a doctor's visit as soon as she arrived home. By the time she arrived there the blue/purple was all the way to her foot.

He says it isn't a clot, just deep contusions with broken blood vessel leaking. She will have to return to see him next week.

Be careful.

There were several posters that rather hinted that my cruise was not typical and had to be "from the twilight zone."
But believe me, we had quite a few of these deviations and that part of the world is altered.