Our last port, Grand Cayman Island, and we have an invite to what??

We tendered into shore at George Town, Grand Cayman Island.  Our original plan for the day was to take the local bus to Seven Mile Beach, with its white sand, tranquil turquoise waters, and blue skies.  It is considered to be one of the top beaches in the world.  But today just didn't look like the above picture.  It was overcast, much cooler than Aruba, and not really what we wanted for a relaxing day on the beach.

So, we switched up our plans and opted to take a 2-hour island tour with Roger, who was peddling - err--arranging taxi rides to the beach or island tours for the many cruisers just getting off the tender boats from the ship.

We boarded an 8-passenger van for the island tour.  Another couple was already in the van waiting and within minutes Roger's associate arrived with a family of 6 for the same tour.  Due to the overbooking, Roger felt really bad that he had  to "kick" us off the van so he offered us a private tour in his van instead of doing beach runs.  We said yes, and off we went.

We drove through the city and Roger pointed out various government buildings and talked about the island.  First stop was at the Tortuga Rum Cake Factory, with its pirate statues adorning the front entry.  The Cayman Islands were a haven for pirates back in the day.

Terry's always dreaming of owning an old truck!

We then stopped at Roger's favorite hotel midway up Seven Mile Beach, the Westin, and walked through the lobby to the beach.  We passed a group of people with scuba gear in one of the pools getting a quick lesson before going into the ocean.  Grand Cayman is great for snorkeling and scuba diving.

Now this would make for a great relaxing beach day!

What Seven Mile Beach really looked like that day.

Our guide, Roger

Scuba lessons

Next Roger drove us to Hell, which is a popular tourist attraction of short, black limestone formations in the town actually named Hell.  It even has a post office.

This was once a lake bed; now it is Hell

We can say we've been to Hell and back.

Much better idea

And here's the devil, himself.  The gift store proprietor.

Then it was off to the Turtle Farm.  We opted not to go in to see the turtles swimming around in large pools. We just had a view from the fence.  Thirty thousand turtles are raised here each year.

Then the tour took an interesting twist. Roger asked if we could stop by his apartment for a minute so he could leave a key out for a repairman.  While he stepped into his place, we got out of the van to take a photo of the beautiful flowers in the parking lot.  He saw us and invited us in to his apartment.  And we went!

Because he saw that we had an interest in plants, Roger wanted to show us a tree in his back yard.  It has seed pods, which according to Roger is Moringa Oleifera and is a cure-all for anything that ails you and you can buy it over-the-counter.  He offered us a seed to chew, but we declined....  He popped one in his mouth and the rest went in a jar in his kitchen.

The tree with bean pod.

While standing in the kitchen, Roger showed us his pot of leftover conch stew from last night's dinner that was sitting on the stove.  He turned on the burner to heat it up and offered us a taste, but again we declined.....you know, still full from breakfast on the ship!  So he just turned off the heat, put the lid back on and we left. Hmmmmmmmmmmm...no refrigeration of leftovers?  No, thank you.

The weather still was not ideal for a beach day so we headed back to the port where we said goodbye to Roger.  He was a very friendly guy; I think we know his life history--I hope he didn't get food poisoning from the stew left on the stove as he was going to have it for lunch!  But then, I think he's used to it!

And now a note about our totally unexpected, and will probably never happen again, invitation that we received to attend a Most Traveled Passengers Luncheon, hosted by the Captain and his senior officers for approximately 50 passengers.

We do have quite a few days traveling with Princess Cruise Line--doing transatlantic cruises really adds up the days-- but no where near the hundreds and hundreds of days accumulated by many of our cruising friends.  Lucky for us the really, really most traveled passengers were not on this voyage and we got to attend!

We had heard about these luncheons but never thought we would actually attend one.  This was special for us as we got a glimpse as to how nice Princess treats their loyal customers.

At the door of the restaurant, we were 'announced' to the Captain, Nicolo' Binetti, and then had our photo taken with him.

We were escorted to a table with personalized menus and name tags.  Six passengers were seated with one Senior Officer at each table.  At our table, seated right next to Terry, was William, the Chief Engineer from Wales.  Terry had a great time chatting with William about the inner workings of the ship.

The lunch was delicious!

Musicians provided entertainment

All in all, the cruise was very good.  We enjoyed sailing on one of the smaller ships.  This one held 1,904 passengers.  Going through the Panama Canal is a wonderful experience, and we would recommend a cruise like this to everyone!

And that's all folks, until we cruise again.....