We really should have ordered room service breakfast today, but we didn’t, so G went off search of breakfast and I went to the World Fresh Marketplace to get a cappuccino but the machine was broken, so I had a Perrier and a roll instead, just something to keep all the supplements down that I swallow every morning. We met up and were in the Princess Theater even before our excursion meeting time of 7am. Go us!!
We’ve been wanting to spend time in port with next door table mates/new friends Ilya and Sofia and Antigua didn’t work out because I had a cold and stayed on the ship, so today was the day. They had never before been to Grand Cayman, and anything that gets me into the water with sea life is fine by me, so we booked the $95pp Stingray excursion through the ship. (This also served the dual purpose of using up the last of our on board credits).
We took a large port water shuttle to shore (we could have swam there faster), then boarded a bus for the short ride to the other side of the very skinny island. We had about 20 people on our excursion, which was great. I always dread ship excursions for being too big but this one definitely was not.
Grand Cayman water shuttle
Regal Princess at anchor
It’s quite a ride out to the stingray sandbar, and I was reminded of why, when we used to scuba dive, I always wanted to be the first one off the boat at the dive site and the last back on. Even though it was not a rough water day, the boat was bouncy, especially once it stopped at the sandbar.
The water at the sand bar is about waist deep
This is the catamaran that is used for the sailing excursion through the ship
We’ve swam with stingrays several times in several places, and, in fact, have probably done Grand Cayman stingrays at least three times, but we always enjoy it, and it was particularly fun to see Ilya and Sofia experience it for the first time. She was not a fan of holding the stingrays and when it was my turn the guide told me “ Don’t be scared“ and G said I vehemently responded, “I’m not scared!!”, as if someone thinking that anything in the water might scare me was a most insulting idea, and yes, that would be correct. The dive masters in Cozumel long ago named me Pescado Amarillo for a reason.
The water was so clear, so blue and the day was so sunny that, even if stingrays had scared me, it would have been worth doing this excursion just to experience the boat ride and the water. We eventually made our way back to shore and, about 10:30 or so, those of us who wanted to could be dropped off on Seven Mile Beach, and return back to the ship on our own. We chose to do that, and we were dropped at a not very developed part of the beach. It was simply perfect, and, frankly, this entire day made me fall back in love with the Caribbean a little after I had kind of burned out on it several years ago.
The reef surrounding Grand Cayman
Following are some other independent tour operators with booths on the tender pier:
We caught a public bus back to the ship (US$2.50pp), and it started to rain, heavily, but only for a few minutes while we walked to the bus stop. No matter, we were already soaked and it did serve to wash some salt off of us (this became important later on). Once back on the ship, we were immediately starved and went directly to the Lido Deck where I consumed my annual hamburger (the last one was on the Sapphire Princess in August 2023). Something about being in the water has always made me crave a burger like at no other time. We also had a couple of drinks, and it was about 3:15pm by the time we made it back to the cabin to get cleaned up for the evening. It had been a fantastic day.
And then, at 3:26pm while G was in the shower with a head full of shampoo, the Regal Princess lost power and water pressure (and elevators and AC and…). G waited a minute, as we kind of expected everything to come back on, but when it didn’t, he climbed out of the shower and we had to assess his options. A bridge officer finally made an announcement acknowledging the situation but didn’t imply it was going to be immediately resolved.
Fortunately, early in the cruise, 12 bottles of water had been delivered to every cabin that had purchased a beverage package, and most of ours were still on the desk. Using my phone flashlight, I poured bottle after bottle of water over his head as he leaned over the bathtub. Also fortunately, we never totally lost the toilet vacuum system (maybe there was some residual suction in the line?), and bottled water worked well for that too.
But, unfortunately, I was the one left without any shower at all, and was still salt and sweat covered at 4:15pm while G went off to see what was going on around the ship. Finally I heard the ventilation system come back on, but we still had no water. I ended up cleaning up best as I could with bottled water, and wore shorts and a T-shirt to go dinner in the dining room for the first time in my life. I figured it would be an “anything goes” kind of evening (it was). G had popped a baseball cap on his wet hair before he left the cabin and even kept it on during dinner. The horror!!
I wasn’t even certain if the elevators were working yet, and it appeared they might be. I was feeling lucky and started down in one. I remember being on the Pacific Princess when it lost power, and all the elevators were programmed to go to Deck 4 on that ship (Deck 5 on the Regal) and stay there with their doors open, so I wasn’t scared of that either! 😉
Peter our waiter was so funny. He delivered our menus and then started telling us what they didn’t have, and we finally just asked him to tell us what they did have available. But during the course of dinner, more and more items were ready, so dinner had a very strange order last night but it was all a lot of fun and very befitting the circumstances. By the time dinner was over, I think everything was restored though parts of the ship were still hellishly hot and humid.
Grilled seafood bowl
G chose to go to see the comedian performing in the Princess Theater, but I wanted nothing more than to get a shower, a real shower, not a bottled water shower, and get the salt and stingrays washed off of me. To add insult to injury, the clothes I had worn to dinner, as casual as they were, weren’t even clean. Laundry is suddenly taking a long time (four days and counting) to be returned, and I have no choice but to do a load of clothes on turnaround day early in the morning, while we also have to move cabins.
Thursday Night Football was being shown on MUTS tonight, and I took a chance that it would also be on our cabin TVs. It was. So, finally cleaned up, finally cool in the ACed cabin, I watched the game until I was joined by G. It had been an interesting evening
