Grand Cayman was GRAND

        The Cayman Islands lie south of central Cuba and a day's sail northwest of Jamaica.  The island group is comprised of Grand Cayman, Cayman Brac, and Little Cayman.  During this cruising season, we only had time to explore Grand Cayman, the largest and most populated of the group, where the capital city of Georgetown is located.  We had flown there twice before to vacation and although we saw a remarkable increase in hotels and restaurants along its white sand beaches, were were not quite prepared to realize that even more had been erected since we last visited to satisfy their thirst for tourism dollars.  

        

     Our interest, of course, was to explore Grand Cayman's many dive sites.  There are 234 well marked and maintained buoyed dive sites.  Some popular sites along 7-Mile Beach have more than one buoy to accommodate more than one boat at a time.

      While diving you see the usual fish, sponges, and corals found in Caribbean waters, but the reef formations vary greatly from the sites we've dived in Bonaire and St. Croix.  There are tall reefs, tunnels, and a number of wrecks easily accessible in depths of 45-70 feet.  

        There is a Turtle Farm on Grand Cayman where green sea turtles are raised for food, and you will find at least one turtle dish offered on each menu.  However, the farm also releases a good percentage of the turtles into the sea when they are big enough to be more likely to survive predators.

       The only challenge to diving in Grand Cayman on your own was finding a dive shop that was accessible by dinghy and willing to refill your air tanks.  Luckily, after asking a lot of questions along the beach, we found one shop in Georgetown and another on the north coast of the island.

     

      Conch were plentiful and in season while we were on Grand Cayman.  They seemed more active, also, as we often saw them on the move and leaving a trail in the sand.