Hopefully.
It was nice this morning to return to a more normal schedule and go to breakfast together in the DaVinci Dining Room. Our plans for the day were simple: to buy two Grand Cayman T-shirts (size Adult Small) and to take a long walk along the George Town, Grand Cayman waterfront in the opposite direction of Seven Mile Beach. It had been years since we'd been down that way, and even then it was by mini-speedboat on a Princess excursion.
I don't know how many times we've been on Grand Cayman over the years (certainly fewer than we've been on St. Thomas), but I bet it's somewhere between 15 and 20 times. Our first visits were spent doing the typical Grand Cayman excursions: swimming with stingrays at Stingray City, snorkeling Coral Gardens and a shipwreck, diving the Cayman wall and a shipwreck, shore diving on our own off of Eden Rock Dive Center, visiting the town of Hell, and riding mini speedboats around the southwestern side of this oddly shaped island. Like most islands we visit on these itineraries, spending a day on a beach didn't come until all other tourist options had been exhausted.
But today was not the beautiful beach day we'd had here just over a week ago (it feels like months ago). There was no sun to speak of until we were sailing away from the island (typical), it was windy and it was chilly. In fact, we heard later that all excursions to Stingray City had been cancelled due to the wind. However, those things made it a great day for a long walk.
We tendered into shore (only the 300 passengers Silversea Silver Wind was in port with us today...lucky us!) and first spent a little time looking for T-shirts. We were told by the taxi drivers trying to talk us into a ride to the beach that all the shops would be closed today due to a national holiday but were savvy enough to ignore them. It was a national holiday, National Heroes Day, but the shops were still open. And we were lucky enough to see a five minute parade complete with a marching band and participants marching in smart British-influenced uniforms.
Our shopping completed, we started walking south along either side of the road bordering the waterfront, whichever had a sidewalk, until we ran out of sidewalk altogether. We had picked up a map of the island and decided that a beach called Smith Barcadere on the very southwestern edge of Grand Cayman was our intended goal. It was probably close to a two mile walk from the tender pier in George Town and Smith Barcadere turned out to be a less crowded, though less picturesque alternative to Seven Mile Beach. I think it's where the locals go when they want a beach day. Another plus: it appeared to have some decent snorkeling, too.
We turned around and retraced our steps back to town. We stopped at a cigar bar and watched as a Cuban man hand rolled cigars. (It reminded us instantly of that Seinfeld episode). He was 77 years old and had been doing this for 60 years, using wooden forms and presses that are irreplaceable.
It was shortly after 2:30pm when we returned to the ship. We had lunch in the Horizon Court Buffet (what is that, now? Meal #4 since we've been on the Emerald Princess this season?). I made a huge salad from the salad bar and also brought back two pieces of a fluffy cake called strawberry shortcake. I figured I'd have one, and G could have the other. Well, by the time I finished my Big Salad (more Seinfeld memories). G had finished off both pieces of cake. I went back to the buffet for another, and they were gone; I took that as a certain sign that I was not supposed to have dessert at lunch. ;-)
We spent some time in the hot tub on the back of Deck 17, and I ran around in circles in the Splash Pool for awhile, and we watched as we sailed away from Grand Cayman around 4pm. Shortly afterward, Captain Forteeze made an announcement warning us about the Zika virus in Honduras, our port tomorrow, and its dangers especially for pregnant women or women planning to become pregnant (I guess that leaves me out). Hey, we faced down chikengunya in French Polynesia; we aren't scared (but will douse ourselves with DEET anyway).
We napped for a few minutes (me too!) before going to dinner about 5:30pm. I wasn't too hungry after that big salad just a few hours earlier, but had gazpacho and Szechuan shrimp followed by a Norman Love white chocolate cheesecake for dessert. That certainly was a nice payback for my stolen strawberry shortcake at lunch! We skipped all entertainment tonight, choosing instead to watch a Tom Cruise movie (probably Mission Impossible 22) and read in the cabin. The ship is nice and stable tonight, and I think I'll be asleep early, with visions of football dancing in my head.
Whoops, sorry! That was the last time. Promise!
An aside: I used a lot of Internet minutes yesterday texting friends during those...sporting events that I spent all day watching, and will have to seriously limit photo uploads for the rest of this cruise. I'll upload just one today, my Norman Love white chocolate cheesecake dessert. I mean, Grand Cayman was nice, but white chocolate cheesecake is even better. :-)
