The next day we had our first excursion.
We had to get off the bed fairly early and tender to Georgetown, Grand Cayman. The tendering was not the best part. It equaled a lot of waiting by the time we were done.
It was so funny because the cruise ship takes such good care of you. They have safety guidelines and are giving you hand sanitizer every time you turn around. Then they dump you off at these islands and it's every man for themselves.
Anyway, when I came out of the bathroom the tour guide was in the middle of a lecture about the do's and don'ts of stingrays. Trust me when I say there were a lot of don'ts.
Don't approach them from behind.
Don't lift your feet off the ground.
Don't touch the middle of their back because there is a row of sharp spikes.
Don't lift them out of the water.
Don't try to lift them period.
Don't get anywhere near their tail.
etc.
So we hear this list of don't and they explain to us that stingrays are dangerous and then we get to our destination, they throw us in the water and we get swarmed on all sides by stingrays. Not an exaggeration.
Kolton and I were some of the first off the boat and we were seriously swarmed by 20 stingrays. They were between our legs, brushing against our sides, and just everywhere.
It was at this point that I had a minor panic attack.
After all the rules we were given I was a tad nervous! Or more than just a tad.
Note the looks on our faces and how we are all clinging to each other.
Note the looks on our faces and how we are all clinging to each other.
At one point I let out a yelp and wrapped my arms around Kolton's neck (fight or flight. I'm more of a flight person) and one of the guides got so mad at me.
"Lady, Calm. Down."
Then I got real embarrassed so I tried to be tough the rest of the time. Once I had calmed down it actually was pretty cool and I really enjoyed it. They had a bucket full of squid and if you didn't think about it too much you could reach in the bucket, grab a squid, hold it under the stingrays and they would suck it right up like a vacuum.
They really were pretty neat. They were just huge and so soft and velvety. Towards the end I was actually trying to chase one down so I could touch them some more. So I went a long ways from where I started.
They say if you kiss a stingray you get seven years of good luck so bygosh we did it!
The boys crack me up in these two pictures.
After the stingrays we went to a reef to do a little snorkeling. Luckily I had taken some Dramamine because I learned from my experience in Mexico and so I didn't get super sea sick. We swam around for a little bit and did end up seeing some pretty neat fish. I am pretty sure I saw a puffer fish. It looked just like the one on Finding Nemo. I was trying to get close to it and disturb it so it would puff up, but that didn't happen. There was also some pretty neat coral. Not super colorful, but there were some neat patterns. One that I saw was shaped like a perfect ball and on the outside it was like a maze. It was really cool looking.
After snorkeling we went back to the boat which took us back to the shore in the longest amount of time possible. I am honestly pretty sure the boat could not have possibly moved any slower than it did on the way back. I don't know if our guides just had some time to kill or what, but it was extremely slow. The water and scenery were beautiful though! (Now that I'm home, I would give anything to be back on that slow moving boat that was driving me crazy at the time.)
When we finally got to the island we hopped on a bus which took us to a beach where we had lunch and relaxed for a bit. We had some pretty good food and it was super hot that day! We were sitting in the chairs and dying of heat. My Dramamine made me pretty sleepy once it wore off so I ended up falling asleep on my stomach and getting sunburned on my back. Unfortunately I didn't realize the ties to my swimsuit were in the way so I ended up with some pretty sweet tan lines in the exact shape of the ties on my swimsuit that I was never able to get rid of.
Then we got on the bus and the rest of the day was spent in lines. We actually started talking to a kid from China and it was really interesting hearing what he had to say and learning a little more about China. But we seriously stood in line for forever waiting to get on the tender boat. It was a good moving line but it wound all over the place.
We finally did make it back to the ship where we laid out for a minute and then went to get ready for dinner. That night we went to a little musical comedy show. It was really fun spending all day on the beach in the sun and then getting dressed up to go to shows every night. We thoroughly enjoyed that part.
Then I got real embarrassed so I tried to be tough the rest of the time. Once I had calmed down it actually was pretty cool and I really enjoyed it. They had a bucket full of squid and if you didn't think about it too much you could reach in the bucket, grab a squid, hold it under the stingrays and they would suck it right up like a vacuum.
They really were pretty neat. They were just huge and so soft and velvety. Towards the end I was actually trying to chase one down so I could touch them some more. So I went a long ways from where I started.
They say if you kiss a stingray you get seven years of good luck so bygosh we did it!
After the stingrays we went to a reef to do a little snorkeling. Luckily I had taken some Dramamine because I learned from my experience in Mexico and so I didn't get super sea sick. We swam around for a little bit and did end up seeing some pretty neat fish. I am pretty sure I saw a puffer fish. It looked just like the one on Finding Nemo. I was trying to get close to it and disturb it so it would puff up, but that didn't happen. There was also some pretty neat coral. Not super colorful, but there were some neat patterns. One that I saw was shaped like a perfect ball and on the outside it was like a maze. It was really cool looking.
After snorkeling we went back to the boat which took us back to the shore in the longest amount of time possible. I am honestly pretty sure the boat could not have possibly moved any slower than it did on the way back. I don't know if our guides just had some time to kill or what, but it was extremely slow. The water and scenery were beautiful though! (Now that I'm home, I would give anything to be back on that slow moving boat that was driving me crazy at the time.)
When we finally got to the island we hopped on a bus which took us to a beach where we had lunch and relaxed for a bit. We had some pretty good food and it was super hot that day! We were sitting in the chairs and dying of heat. My Dramamine made me pretty sleepy once it wore off so I ended up falling asleep on my stomach and getting sunburned on my back. Unfortunately I didn't realize the ties to my swimsuit were in the way so I ended up with some pretty sweet tan lines in the exact shape of the ties on my swimsuit that I was never able to get rid of.
Then we got on the bus and the rest of the day was spent in lines. We actually started talking to a kid from China and it was really interesting hearing what he had to say and learning a little more about China. But we seriously stood in line for forever waiting to get on the tender boat. It was a good moving line but it wound all over the place.
We finally did make it back to the ship where we laid out for a minute and then went to get ready for dinner. That night we went to a little musical comedy show. It was really fun spending all day on the beach in the sun and then getting dressed up to go to shows every night. We thoroughly enjoyed that part.
After the comedy show I was being super lame and just really wanted to go to bed. Kolton was wanting to go to a show called The Quest and I finally relented even though I was not happy about it. But I went anyway and actually started to enjoy myself after someone in the audience left and we had a front row seat instead of straddling on the stairs. It really was fun though and we had a nice time.
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