Grand Cayman 2023
Day 7: Invasion of the turtles
I actually got to sleep in today and both the hubby and I were up at 6:30am. Imagine that. We sat out on the patio getting caffeined up and Sakari was up at 8am and ready to start the day.
I decided to walk out to the dock to see what the "waves" were like today. It looked like it was going to be a beautiful day out.
Today I made...over easy eggs for the hubby and Sakari. So why am I telling you this? Because I have NEVER made them before. I'm one of those people that has to have everything I eat cooked COMPLETELY...whether is be meat, eggs or whatever. NO PINK! I see over easy eggs as being uncooked and I...just...can't. However, the fam likes them so I thought I would surprise them with my creation and they turned out perfect according to them. Score!
Everyone had their belly full and it was time to head out to our excursion I booked. Today we are headed to the TURTLE FARM! Even though we have swam with many turtles in the ocean, I still thought it would be a neat experience and it was something "different" to do while we were on the island. Also, there were no cruise ships in port so it would be the perfect day and not crowded. I had booked our tickets online and the cost was $45 US per person/adult and Sakari is a whole person now, so full price for her these days. We did get a 10% discount since we booked ahead online, so our total was $121.50 for some gosh darn turtle excitement today. :)
Along the way, we were watching gas prices at the pump to see the best place to go on the way back. I didn't want to get too low and we had been doing a lot of driving all over the island. The prices were just all over the place and we would find that the cheapest place was located right across from the airport entrance.
The Turtle Farm is located on the opposite side of the island in West Bay. They are open 7 days a week from 8-5pm. Parking is across the street.
We arrived just in time for an entire bus of school kids to get ahead of us. These were the same kids that was at one of the beaches we were at days before. This has to be an awesome summer program for the kids. That would be so cool to have a summer camp type of situation while living there. I bet the kids love it.
Once inside, someone at the desk did motion us over and around the school kids, so that was nice.
They tagged us up with a ring around our wrist, just like they do the turtles to keep track of them. Then we headed out to a rather large area that had super large turtles in it.
It was an area with Green Sea Turtles.
Green sea turtles are the largest of the hard-shelled turtles and weighing more than 500 pounds! The largest Green sea turtle was recorded at 870 pounds. Can you imagine that? They are born weighing only 1 ounce. Green sea turtles mature and start producing eggs between 15-30 years old. They return to the nesting beaches of their mothers and grandmothers. Breeding season runs from May to October.
After viewing the Green turtle nesting exhibit we continued walking toward the turtle lagoon. We were told that if we had planned on swimming there, we might want to head there first because they close at 2pm and if it rained, it would instantly close.
The lagoon was HUGE...like winding around everywhere. I guess I didn't expect it to be like this.
There was a booth that provided you with your snorkeling gear (even though we had brought our own) and snorkeling vests.
We geared up and it was time to head out into the lagoon.
We would see fish here and there: Snappers, Bermuda Chubs, Black Durgon Trigger fish and so on.
There was a sign saying that there was algae and this was normal and healthy. We did see 3 dead fish in the lagoon though. I did notice that they had someone scooping them up and taking them out.
I was taking my time, taking pictures and taking it all in, and I look up and the fam is gone. There's areas that Y off and I had no idea which way they went. As I did the eeny, meeny, miny, moe and picked the moe I looked to my left and seen a head bob up and it was Sakari...they picked the miny direction. Oops.
I finally caught up with them. There's one thing I have learned and that is that I have a lot of problems swimming without fins and you couldn't use fins here. I'm not sure why...I just do. Maybe it's the problem with my injury. It's annoying is all I can say.
Turtles everywhere swimming right along with us. They are definitely used to people being in there with them because they would come right up to you and get real close. They tell you not to touch the turtles but I think they forgot to tell the turtles not to touch you because they sure did.
Yep, the turtles were doing a lot of scrubbing algae off their backs for sure. They loved the rocks in the water.
We found where most of the turtles were hanging out. There was a viewing area to another tank, which I believe was their predator tank, with the shark and tarpon. I guess they wanted to see if the grass is greener on the other side or should I say algae.
There was a lot of algae in certain areas. Let this sweep up against your leg when you're not looking....you'll jump. LOL
We had a good time. It's definitely a different experience than being out in the ocean and swimming with turtles. It was relaxing, at your own pace, plenty of turtles to see and swim with so you have to do this if you've never swam with them before. Not to mention just how large this lagoon is, going in different directions and there's different depth's as well. The only thing I want to mention is that I thought the nurse sharks would be in there as well to swim with, but they weren't.
Why do I always end up with a massive dive mask mark around my face but the family doesn't? I think I need a new mask.
They did have an area with beach chairs under a covered area if you wanted to hang out there. Of course you can't escape the chickens here either. :D
We headed down a path that would lead us to the Butterfly House and the Aviary.
First up was the butterfly house and we went in only to find there really wasn't many butterlies to be seen. A few here and there but not what we had expected.
Then we headed over to the bird aviary. It was pretty cool and had different types of birds roaming around. There were several workers in there that were more than happy to answer questions or show you around and point out things and tell you about some of the birds history. They were very nice.
We headed out and around the corner where we would find an area you walk down to be able to view the predator tank from below.
Then we headed around to the pool area. Their pool is supposed to be the biggest on the island. It had different depths, a waterfall, a water slide and an underwater viewing of the predator tank...while you're under the water. The kids loved that!
We stayed at the pool area for quite some time. Sakari met some friends and they hung out at the underwater viewing area for a long time. It started to become a game. They would gasp a bunch of air and go under the rock by the window and blow it out. Before long, they had a huge air bubble across the top and they could go under and stay under for a long time and go to the air bubble and get air still. The things kids do...(you'll see Sakari demonstrate in the video at the end)
When Sakari was done playing, it was time to move on.
We went over to an area where they had smaller turtle pens (a lot of them) and you could pet the turtles. They were different ages in different pens.
We circled around the pens and then came to a larger enclosed pen and looked all over for Smiley the Croc. I didn't see him but as we walked away the hubby spotted him hiding in the water. Can you spot him in the water?
They do have a small playground here, but I can't imagine kids playing on it when it's so hot outside.
One last stop...we headed to a building that had the nursery hatchery. They had a room that you could watch a video of how turtles lay eggs, hatching and making it to the ocean. Very informative but truth be known I was there for the a/c...whew it was hot outside.
The incubator with eggs and the newly hatched baby turtles...so cute.
I would say we spent about 3-4 hours there, could have spent more time but Sakari was ready to leave, so we headed out.
We did stop by the gift shop and it was HUGE with everything you could possibly want as a souvenir.
Sakari found a necklace for her best friend (it had his name on it) and she also found a necklace she wanted as well.
Then we spotted a cute bracelet and once I took a longer look at it, I would discover that it was a "turtle tracker" and you could watch your very own turtle on its journey in the ocean. Cool concept and you get a cute little bracelet with the deal...so Sakari picked out one and she was now the proud owner of a turtle tracker for a turtle named Opal.
Opal looked like she had been traveling the world.
So a little information about the turtle transmitters...you get signals for around 1 year. It did say that the transmitter could skip a few days at times. But we knew were Opal was as of August 10th, so that was yesterday.
It also gives some neat stats on how many miles Opal had traveled, speed and about her. She was released from Costa Rico and had nested near Florida.
So...just a little update since we've been home. Opal didn't move shortly after we returned home. It went incognito for about a month. Then when we logged on, it ask if we wanted another turtle and we approved it and then had Kiki. She was our new turtle. I got on the other day to check where Kiki is and if it was updating and it now states that our turtle is Moana. What.the.heck?
So, my thoughts are there's definitely a "glitch" in this system and it's possible the trackers just don't work like they should. So, if you ever plan on buying on of these, do it because you like the bracelet and not because you think the tracker will actually work for a year. (We did also notice other places have every kind of animal you could think of tracking).
Moana's last tracking was September 29th...it's now October 11th. Just saying...
Here is my video from the day.
After leaving, we stopped for gas: $5.65/gallon. It cost us $40 US to fill up and we were good to go.
Now we were off to Eden Rock for some snorkeling. It was another place I had on my list of places to explore underwater.
They have a few big tunnels here with really large turbine jet engine fans in them. lol
We parked on the street and tried to figure out where it was at. (I had it marked on my MapsMe so knew I was somewhere near it.
We decided to walk down the street a bit because I had noticed a building there.
Only when we got there it was run down and closed. The building had deteriorated and I thought maybe people just use this area as a snorkeling place with no amenities.
We headed over to the stairs, but they were gone with a sign telling us not to enter. Hmm, I was super confused on how we were going to do this. It really did look like a weird place to be snorkeling.
We decided this just wasn't a place we wanted to snorkel at and headed back to the car.
There was a shopping area across the street from here. This was in Georgetown.
As we walked back to the car...we spotted a sign in the other direction...
It was Eden Rock Dive Shop. Oops...we had went in the wrong direction. Figures...that's just my luck and bad internal GPS installed by my mom I suppose. It comes with the territory when you're with me. hehe My hubby, I'm not sure what his excuse is because he's always been my personal GPS when we go somewhere. He.just.knows!
As we walked in, we noticed there was a family there going diving. They happen to be the same family that we seem to run into everywhere we go. They have been diving at various dive sites that we had snorkeled at. They had 2 teens, probably about Sakari's age, and they were all certified.
We put our things down and geared up to snorkel and in we went.
We ran into some more Tarpon after we entered.
Four-Eyed Butterfly fish
French Angelfish
Banded Butterfly Fish
About this time I felt something in my pocket while swimming. I reached inside, brought it up to the surface and took a big gasp...it was the keys to the car!!! With the remote!!! Funny (well not funny really) is that they have a tag on the keys that states "Please make sure not to swim with or get the keys wet". Oops. Oh em gee...I started panicking. I quickly swam back and handed them to the hubby and told him what happened. I was so scared we were not going to be able to get in the car or it start. He did wait awhile and let them dry out and tried it and it did work...THANK GOODNESS!!!
I went back to snorkeling.
Various Squirrelfish around the area.
This place was also loaded with dips and valleys.
Smooth Trunkfish and a Four-Eyed Butterfly Fish
Slippery Dick Wrasse
More red feather dusters
Goby
We came across something we had never seen before. This was a sea fan that had been taken over by fire coral and was solid as can be. It was sad.
A shot of Eden Rock Dive Shop from the water
After our snorkel adventure we got out to rest and seen the family had just came back from their dive. They were talking all about how great the dive was and looked so excited that I had to go up and ask the dive shop about possibly diving there ourselves. I explained our situation to him, how many dives we had done and we had just done one the other day. He told us since we had just done a dive he could take us out without the class and it would be $150/pp. I told him when we were leaving the island and would like to come tomorrow if possible. We really wanted to get another dive in before we left.
He did say he couldn't do tomorrow but had Sunday open if we wanted. We decided on a time that would work and still give us enough time in between the dive and a plane ride.
There are 2 dive sites here: Eden Rock and Devils Grotto. He said that we would only be able to dive Eden Rock because Devils Grotto had "swim throughs" and since we were not certified we couldn't do that.
Meanwhile...Sakari was off exploring the rocky shores.
Here's a video of our snorkeling adventure for the day:
It was time to head home and the keys worked good.
I turned on my MapsMe, signaled my...washers, then off we went. One thing I learned about the MapsMe app this time around (after using it so many times in the past on each land vacation) is that it tells you the speed limit in the upper right hand corner...but not only that, it tells you what speed you were going as well. That made it a lot easier to keep an eye on things than trying to look at the dash in kph and figure things out (the mph was the very small numbers).
Our sign signaling we were almost home...Welcome to the North Side!!!
Since we only had a few days left, I figured I needed to start on the laundry. It's so nice to come home to all of your laundry done.
I went out to the car to grab some of our things that needed washed. Then I had a surprise waiting on me right off our door step...
Yep, it was one of those black Cayman racers. We didn't even need to go to the parrot sanctuary to see one. I yelled for Sakari to come see and we watched it slither into the bushes.
While I waited for the laundry, I headed out to the dock and found a beautiful rainbow.
The family was hanging out on the patio and missed it. I guess pictures were good enough for them since they were too tired to move.
After dinner, I went out to watch the sunset in our back yard and take some pictures.
As the sun set, it gave off one last fiery show and it was over. The clouds were starting to look a little ferocious as well. Time to head in,
We headed up to our balcony and hung out for awhile. We had our ice cream and Sakari was munching on Cheeze-It's. Life is grand.
Off in the distance was a lot of action...it made me wonder what the night would bring.
After finishing our snacks...it was time for bed.
