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My Cayman Islands Trip!

If you missed the first two posts recapping my cruise, click here and here.

The second stop on our cruise was the Cayman Islands. Thankfully my sister was feeling better and was able to go with me on our excursion in Grand Cayman. Unlike in Cozumel where the ship was able to park by the dock (wait, do ships "park"?), we had to anchor a ways out and ride a smaller boat called a tender to the shore. Let's just say the ride on the tender wasn't as smooth as the main ship. Thankfully the ride wasn't that long.

I was super excited about our Grand Cayman excursion because I was finally going to get to fulfill my lifelong dream of swimming with a dolphin! As a kid I would watch reruns of the old TV show Flipper so I guess that's how my dream started.

We took about a thirty minute bus ride over to Dolphin Discovery. On the Cayman Islands they drive on the left side of the road, so it took me a little bit to get used to looking out and seeing cars on the "other" side of the road (I don't want to say "wrong" side of the road because it's not wrong to them. Lol). I thought it was funny that their "Yield" sign said "Give Way". Also, gas prices there were so high. EEK! Once we got to Dolphin Discovery, we were provided lockers to store our belongings and handed life jackets (no exceptions, everyone wore one). There were no personal cameras allowed in the area with the dolphins but there were photographers on hand to take our pictures throughout our swim and we had the option to buy copies at the end of our adventure (because of course they want to find another way to get money out of you, and of course I paid for it because I WAS SWIMMING WITH DOLPHINS AND WANTED PICTURES). Lol. We were divided into smaller groups of about 10-12 people. My dolphin's name was Richie and his human counterparts were Marco and Carlos. They gave us some pointers and quick dolphin 101 training before we actually got in the water. At first Richie was a little shy and didn't swim too close to us. Carlos told us if a dolphin doesn't feel like participating, they don't force them, and we could just wait for another group to be done and swim with that dolphin. But after a minute, Richie came over and warmed up to all of us. He even showed off a little by doing flips in the air. Richie came by and gave kisses to all of us (but he did want a kiss in return). We then got to dance with him and posed for a quick side by side picture. One by one we each swam to the other side of the body of water and when Richie got to us, we held on to his flippers and he pulled to back to the group. We also got to ride a boogie board and Richie came up behind us and pushed our feet. The whole adventure lasted maybe just over 90 minutes, but again, it was so worth it. Like I said, you had to pay if you wanted any pictures. There was an option to purchase a CD which had every picture they took of me and my sister with Richie, (there were 40 pictures total), so I got that. They also printed out two of the pictures with that option.

When the bus dropped us off at the port, we had two hours before we had to be back on the ship, so we walked around for a bit. We decided we wanted a light snack (because we missed lunch and still had three hours until dinner on the ship). We found a Hard Rock Cafe a few blocks from the port. I got this lemonade type drink (yes it was JUST lemonade) and it was amazing. On our way back to the ship, we LITERALLY saw a chicken cross the road. I ran after him yelling "I have questions for you!" but he didn't answer me. Lol. Thankfully we didn't have to wait too long for a tender to get back to the ship. Cayman Islands was beautiful. It's another place I want to visit when I can spend more than just half a day. And next time I hope to check out one of the beaches! I hope to get my Jamaica recap up tomorrow!! :) Rambled by Rachel at Monday, February 20, 2017 Labels: Cayman Islands, cruise, dolphins, Flipper, Rachel's Travels, Royal Caribbean, vacation
