Grand Cayman and Mahogany Bay

The plan for Thursday, after a couple of late nights and early mornings, was to sleep in. Grand Cayman is a tender stop and we were not too keen on trying to get Mom into a tender. Plus, we have all been there numerous times before, seen all there is too see and done all there is to do. But it was also pretty much the only shopping port, so the plan was for us to get up “whenever”,  have breakfast and take the tender in to see what we could see. Forgetting, of course, that Grand Cayman IS the only real shopping stop, meaning when we opened the curtains we discovered we had company; RCI’s Freedom of the Seas (4700 pax), Carnival Magic (2800 pax), Norwegian Pearl (2500 pax), Coral Princess (2300 pax) and us (2100 pax). If you’re keeping score at home, that is 14,400 cruise passengers all descending on Georgetown, all with one goal in mind………. CHARGE IT!!!!

 

There are certain perks that came with our Suite, and one of them was a $100.00 Diamonds International gift certificate, so we actually went ashore looking for a birthday present for Monica. Once we actually found the DI store we also discovered 90% of the other tourists had apparently been looking for it too. It looked like a cross between Black Friday and Boxing Day in that store, so we left. And went to Tanzanite International around the corner. Same company, same jewelry, only about 20 shoppers total. And yes, we were successful and found a very nice pendant for Monica. We had to wait for a minor adjustment to be made, so we took a short stroll around the off-shopping area of Georgetown. And look what we found:

We had seen something that from a distance looked like a cat running across the road up ahead. It was more likely this guy, so you can imagine just how big he was! And there was some British tourist trying to get him to come closer…It takes all kinds to make up 14,000 cruise passengers!

After picking up the pendant, we beat a hasty retreat to the sanity of the ship and some quality time around the adult pool. While all this was going on, the Ladies were having a leisurely day around the ship, sitting in the sun, dipping in the pool and generally taking it easy.

Thursday evening we went to Tamarind, the Asian restaurant, which together with its own bar, Silk Den, are hidden away on Deck 10. The evening began with fancy cocktails in Silk Den. None of us remembers what Mom and Monica’s drink was called, but it sure looked pretty.

 

 

We then moved over to the restaurant. Dinner is a four course affair, with appetizer, soup, main course and dessert. The menu is pretty extensive and we ordered what seemed like one of everything. All of which were very good. Check out Mom’s fortune cookie dessert!! While we were enjoying our coffee, the entire staff showed up with a birthday cake for Mom, followed by the Happy Birthday song in Indonesian!

 

 

Friday was our day in Mahogany Bay, Roatan, Honduras. Roatan is an island quite some distance off the coast, and Mahogany Bay is the cruise ship tourist area that has been developed there. It isn’t owned by any of the cruise lines, so there is nothing ‘included’ at the facility except any special accommodation that you may have pre-booked. Food and drinks are an extra cost.

We had pre-booked a private cabana for 4 people, and at the beginning of the day were wondering if we were going to get any value out of it. At 8:00 in the morning we were sailing in fog, but looking ahead we could see hints of actual clouds and a bit of blue sky. By the time we docked around 9:00, it had closed in again and was raining rather heavily. We sat on our verandah and wondered if we should even bother, since it looked like everything, even the beach, was a soaking wet mess. But as the rain showers started to peter out into drizzle, more and more people headed off to shore. We decided to join them around 10:00, dodging a few raindrops along the way.

 

Mahogany Bay is set up with a small shopping area near the pier that also includes a Fat Tuesday’s Bar and Restaurant, for anyone who needs some food but just can’t make it all the way back down to the ship. The beach is on a separate little island that you can reach via either a footbridge or the ‘Flying Carpet’ – a 4-person chair lift. The cabana rental included use of the Flying Carpet, so that’s what we did.

The private cabanas are also on a private stretch of beach, complete with security and our very own cabana steward to fill drink and food orders. The cabana includes a room with a couch and coffee table, air conditioning, a porch with 2 lounge chairs AND a hammock under a lattice covering and a 2 person lounge right on the beach. Some of it, like the A/C, was kind of lost on us given the weather, but we could imagine how handy it would be in the sunshine and heat. Here are a couple of photos:

Monica and Renate went snorkeling but since the sun wasn’t out the underwater colours were a little more drab than bright. Even though the area has the second largest barrier reef in the world, it is mostly outside of the marked swimming area. Monica got out towards it and saw some interesting fish – Parrot Fish and Wrasses, and an eel of some kind among the grasses on the ocean floor. Here’s one shot – find the fish hiding among the fronds of this bush:

We stayed on the beach until about 1:00 and then headed back to the ship as we were due to set sail at 2:30. Of course, just as we left the harbor pilot behind, the sun started to peek out from behind the clouds…

This was the second formal night of the cruise, and since we got an early look at the dinner menu every day, we decided to go to the Dining Room. Our timing was just perfect; we were about halfway through our main courses when the waiters began the Baked Alaska Parade for the first seating diners. We may not have mentioned that we had to switch to the ‘anytime dining’ option, so we weren’t tied to a particular time to arrive for dinner. So Renate got to see the parade and hear the traditional ‘Horse Guards Parade’ music that they play as the waiters come around the dining room. The Baked Alaska was pretty good, too!

We went to the early production show, stopped at the Crow’s Nest Bar for a nightcap and called it a night.