Drsmael 9 months, 3 weeks ago.We spent a wonderful, relaxing month in Grand Cayman. We had 1 day of rain and a few rains at night. The first 10 days were a bit windy and cool enough that we didn’t need air conditioning at night.
We found a few new restaurants on the quiet side of the island, Italian Kitchen where we enjoyed a number of meals and Kurts Kitchen where we enjoyed a lunch.
We stocked up on Cayman meat patties at the local grocery store because it seems like the big stores are always out of meat patties by the time we get there.
Kaibo added sand to their beach this year. It’s always fun to watch. Big piles of sand are dropped off and then the machines spread it around and men then rake it smooth. They did the same thing at the condos 2 years ago.
We had a number of wonderful meals at Kaibo. Upstairs, which is open this year Thursday thru Sunday nights and has a tasting menu that was excellent. It included an onion and goat cheese tart, poached and roasted grouper, sliced steak, and pot of chocolate dessert, I’m missing the 5th course…was it soup or salad? I can’t remember. On another evening we ordered ala carte and loved the baked herb-crusted cayman mahi mahi, and the Tenderloin. The sticky banoffe puddling for dessert was delicious.
Downstairs at the beach restaurant, our favorites are curry grouper which is served on a plate with regular silverware as opposed to many of the things that come in a basket. The mahi mahi sandwich on a baguette along with the fabulous French fries is a lunch time favorite. They have updated their menu, with many new additions, but I really did miss the fried onion straws. They have great non-alcoholic smoothies too. I had the strawberry mango.
On Tuesdays nights, there is the barbecue at Kaibo and the band Bonafide plays from 6-9. We really enjoyed their music. Sometimes we just stopped over for a drink and to listen to the music.
Next to Kaibo is the kitehouse where you can rent stand-up paddle boards and kayaks. They also have a bioluminescent tour by boat or by kayak. The biolum tours are run on nights without a full moon.
I tried paddleboarding this year and it was a lot of fun. You need good balance and a firm core—it’s pretty easy—however my grandson told me that when he did it at camp he kept falling in. There were a number of days that were not conducive to paddleboarding because the wind or currents were too strong, but I did get to go 4 times.
In the mornings, we walked up to Rum Point . We got there early while they were just raking the sand and cleaning up. Usually we are the only people there. On one windy day at Rum Point Pier we saw these 2 groups of birds. One group of one kind of bird at one side of the pier and another group of another kind of bird on the other side, all standing facing into the wind.
I convinced our group to go to the Botanic Garden. We hadn’t been in a few years and as always enjoyed the beauty and serenity of the place. There is a new cactus garden that is in the process of being built. We enjoyed walking on the boardwalk through the orchid garden which is a few years old. Although this is not the season for orchids to be in bloom, we did see one and saw where lots of baby plants were attached to trees.
The color garden is always beautiful.
I love the cayman cottage and sand garden.
We only saw one iguana standing guard over a trail.
and a turtle
and a snake-they are harmless grass snakes.
We took a few walks up to Starfish Beach and saw a couple of starfish close to shore.
There was a single egret that was hanging around the beach at kaibo.
Here are a few signs we wouldn’t see at home
Driving to east end one night for dinner, we saw a rainbow…although my husband didn’t stop soon enough for us to get a great picture, I think you can still see the remnants of it if you look carefully.
Another wonderful year in Grand Cayman. Looking forward to our return.
Mrs DS and I could get into the iguana count. We checked out the iguanas on Little Cayman last year and they were cool.
DS
