S.A.M.J.R.

 

 

Grand Cayman is a great place. I can totally understand why so many rich Europeans & Americans move there. No taxes AND a Caribbean paradise… sign me up!!

 

It is kind of an anomaly compared to the other three ports. Grand Cayman is famous for having the highest bank to resident ratio in the world. Almost 600 banks for a little over 50,000 citizens. I think there may be quite a bit of wire transfers happening. :-)

 

Grand Cayman also has the highest GDP per capita in the Caribbean and I think near the top 10 for the world. It is because of this that I give this friendly tip:

 

TIP: the Grand Cayman dollar is worth MORE than the US dollar. $1.25 USD is only worth $1.00 GCD. Be very aware of this when shopping and verify which currency the price tag is listed in.

 

That is after getting to the island. First you must get there, and this is also the Freedom’s only tender port. We didn’t have to be checked in for our tour until 9:30, but we still wanted to be on the first tender boat because I would rather hang out on the island as opposed to standing in line on Deck 1 waiting for the next boat (although I am fascinated with “behind the scenes” goings on, and you get a chance to see some of that when on Deck 1. I always try to linger near the “I-95” corridor for a few seconds to look each way and see people scurrying around (I-95 is the nickname given to the big hallway that runs the length of the ship on Deck 1 used mostly for moving things around out of site to the passengers). It reminds me of the utilidoors that run under the Magic Kingdom @ Disney World. I had a great “behind the scenes” experience on Day 7 that I will go into detail on later.

 

Anyway, we had a quick Windjammer breakfast and hopped on the aft elevators around 7:50 and headed down to Deck 1. We were easily on the first tender of the morning, which filled up and headed to GC at about 8:20. Here’s a photo of the sun rising up as we headed for shore.

 

Sunrise on the tender

 

 

For today’s tour, we also went with a non-ship tour. This time using Captain Marvins. In studying for the cruise last year, we read a lot of great things about them and had a great time. For this time, we decided to not mess with a good thing and booked them again. The tour we booked this time was the “Stingray City & 2 Stop Snorkel” tour. If you book with Captain Marvins, they require a credit card to hold your reservation, but do not charge it until the day of the tour. That way, if the ship has to skip the port due to weather they don’t charge it, so no worries about making sure you get a refund. On the flip side, if the ship does stop but you don’t show up, they will charge you for it.

 

TIP: If you book with them and pay in cash (they take USD), you will get a 10% discount

 

Checking in with them is very easy. When you get to port, there are tons of folks in the port area selling tours and there are huge tents for the ship tours. Captain Marvins’ office is across the street from the port next to Diamonds International.

 

They loaded us up in the shuttle and we had about a 5-10 minute drive to the dock where their boats park. It is there where we had the first iguana sighting of the trip. On the way we got a good overview of some Grand Cayman history & general information.

 

We got to the boat dock, loaded up and headed out. There were about 25 of us on the boat and about 4-5 crew members. The boat dock is in an area called Governors Harbor. There are some NICE houses here.

 

The first stop is Stingray City and then the two snorkel stops. Some photos of the way out:

 

 

Do all teens love mornings equally? :D

 

 

 

Heading out Governors Harbor

 

 

 

 

 

Yes, it does feel like you are on Magnum PI, sailing past Robin Masters' estate! :D

 

 

To be continued…

 

 

 

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We are also using Captain Marvins (combo stingray/snorkel & hell/turtle farm). GREATLY looking forward to this part of the review!

Go to the Caribbean Ports of Call Forum and then you can look up each island for recommendations on private tours.

+1

On Labadee, you have no choice but to use RC's excursions. There are no 3rd party vendors.

We booked our Dolphin Swim direct with Chakannaab park when were were first time cruisers on Oasis last year. We were on our own for transportation and that was (very) slightly confusing (finding the cab stand), but after that, it was great!

Yep, Sept 2014..... Interesting, I just went thru mock bookings on RCL's website and I agree with you. Re-checked my TA's website, still at the prices I quoted so what gives? Just checked a couple of other TA's websites and they're closer to RCL's price....

 

So maybe my TA has an incredible group rate available only to double occupancy bookings? Grasping at straws, I still don't get it if that's the case.

Any chance the TA's price doesn't include gratuities, taxes, or port fees? :confused:

Well, what if a homophobic guest unknowingly went into a non full chartered gay cruise?

Just how far are you willing to take that "What if"? :(

I'm willing to wager EVERY cruise has people that are offensive to other cruisers. Just because the OP's cruise was partially chartered by "Goth's" doesn't mean all goth's are rude or inappropriate.

The only time I think a cruise line owes passengers an explanation of charters is if that charter requires shutting down public areas of the ship. Just because a group of goths (or square dancers or preachers or Muppet lovers or bikers or poker players or <insert any group here) purchase a block of rooms shouldn't result in notification to everyone else that that group is on board.

You can google the name of your ship and your sailing date.

Unless it's a full ship charter, in which case you wouldn't be able to book, I don't think any line has a responsibility to let other customers know who else will be on board. The only exception would be if normally public areas would be closed for exclusive use by the "group".

No.

IIRC, they showed up on the interactive channel on the TV. The reservations are encoded on your seapass.

If Royal does decide to go back to checking them in and out can we at least have a station right inside security so I don't have to carry my sandy, wet towel to my cabin and then up to the pool deck to exchange? When we did not check them in and out they had a bin right inside the ship where you could leave your wet sandy towels. Now my cabin floor gets sandy and it is a pain to carry wet towels up to the pool deck if you have already changed into dry clothes.

On our Oasis cruise last year, they had a check in location on the ship, right after they scanned your seapass card.

It would also be nice if they had a clean exchange right before you leave the ship since in the evening I go to my cabin wet, the towel sits there wet all night or I have to make an extra trip up before dinner.

 

If they do those two things to make it easier I do not mind checking out towels.

 

Royal are you listening?

Then you're carrying a wet, dirty towel from your room to where you get off the ship. I don't know if that's any better. :p

We've booked with Capt. Marvins for a stingray/snorkel & turtle farm/hell combo. According to emails we've traded, we walk from where the tender lets off to their office, they transport us to the boat for the stingray/snorkel, when that's done, we don't go back to the office, but they transport us to the turtle farm/hell stops. Then back to the tender docks.

Of course, it sounds good on paper, and I can let you know how it goes when we get back the end of the July.

No, Oshawapilot DID NOT answer my question, which was why I repeated it AGAIN. And your complaining about it with false statements is rude. :rolleyes:

 

I was simply trying to ascertain if the relevant information was on a portion of the flyer that was not visible in the photograph, since the online version includes the information in a separate portion of the handout.

 

Oshawapilot never provided anything to show what ELSE might have been included on the flyer, nor did Oshawapilot ever indicate that there was absolutely no printing on the flyer beyond that which is shown in the photograph. If they had done so, I would not have had to repeat the comment.

So when faced with these two options...

1) OP posted all the information they had, and didn't knowingly leave anything out.

OR

2) OP's friend intentionally took a picture of only one side of a page, cropped the picture so there would be no other indication there is further information, saw there was writing on the reverse side, but didn't want to include that information, and is intentionally avoiding your question because it brings up a subject they don't want to talk about.

You think option 2 is what happened here? :confused:

If you are grabbing a single item and then leaving the line, I think that's acceptable.

If you are grabbing some fries, then staying in the line through the end of buffet, I think that is "cutting".

TIP #3: They have two-seat coaster cars, and the second person can ride free, so DD and I rode for the price of 1 ticket!

Did you book that on the island, on the ship, or before you embarked?

I just assume the items were inadvertently left behind, and I turn them in to lost-and-found. If the owner is not appreciative for having their lost items turned in, then it really makes them look bad.

I have some questions...

1) Do you watch certain chairs for a certain amount of time to make sure those items don't belong to someone who is actually using the pool or going to the bathroom?

2) How long do you wait to make sure they're "hogged" chairs?

3) What do you do for that time?

Honestly I can't imagine sitting somewhere and watching an unoccupied chair for 30 minutes to make sure someone didn't go into the pool or go to the bathroom.

If I see a chair is "claimed", I'm going to find another one and promptly forget that I wanted a "claimed" one.

I guess mankind would still have survived:rolleyes:

I'm not sure. Maybe the kid was "Patient 0" for a massive ebola outbreak, he infects everyone on the cruise, they leave the boat and fly home, infecting everyone in the airports & hotels, and it spreads like wildfire and it's the end of mankind.:D It's a good thing those fries got replaced!

Haha, we will get along fine on our June cruise! I am also a planner. I saw a review from a January sailing on Freedom, and she copied all four pages of the cruise compasses (3rd page had flowrider times). It's open on embarkation day from 1-3:30 and 4:30-6:30. Of course, times may change for our cruise, but at least it should be open. We also want to check it out.

Thanks! I figure if I can get the kids (at least) through the flowrider with little to no wait, that's a good thing!

That's cool. I am in the broadcast engineering group, but I do mostly IT project management (servers, SAN, storage, etc)...

Heck, that's half of broadcast now. :D

Sorry to bring the thread off topic. :p

I work for Turner Broadcasting, specifically on the "entertainment network" side (TNT, TBS, Cartoon Network, etc).

 

The windbreaker was a giveaway... :)

 

 

 

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Yup. I would have PM'd you the question, but PMs aren't allowed. :rolleyes: I'm a maintenance engineer at the local NBC affiliate and freelance for various sporting events.

duplicate post

For good measure, DD and I got a photo the night before with King Julian:

 

 

Sorry, being nosy... I noticed the CNN.com windbreaker. Do you work for them or just purchased/received it? ;)

I ended up booking with Carnival for 2 seniors, 2 adults and 1 kid and price came to around $355 or so...Captain Marvin is cheaper by a few dollars but I am thinking I will stick to Carnival...would carnival is crowded compared to Marvin?

I have no idea. I'm hoping Marvin's isn't crowded. :D

Doesn't sound like much furn for DD unless you're paying her time and a half.

That's easy. 1.5 * 0 = 0 :D

Be sure to presign the Onboard Activities Waivers before you board.

Just log into your "My Cruises" section after you log into the Royal website.

Go to where you fill out your set sail info.

There is a spot to print luggage tags and sign up for "Onboard Activities Waivers"

This will save you time!!

Got it! Thanks

Thanks all. I'm fine with things being thrown off. If we don't make the Welcome Aboard show, no big deal (we missed the one last year). The key is keeping the kids entertained. ;)

No, I won't stress if there's something we don't get to do. And I'd love to just wander the ship and explore (which is what DW & I did on Oasis last year), but when you have two active youngin's in tow, that's easier said than done.

If I can get them into the pool, DW & I can sit in lounge chairs and start soaking everything in.