Question 1

Grand Cayman on Your Own

Accepted Answer

George Town is easy to see on foot from the tender landing, and one short taxi ride takes you to Seven Mile Beach for the afternoon. The thing to plan around is the tender: allow for the queue back to the ship. Morning in George Town: Walk to the Cayman Islands National Museum at 64 Seafarers Way, in the Old Courts Building, and to the remains of Fort George, built around 1790 to guard the harbor, at Harbour Drive and Fort Street; the fort site is free. A taxi to the beach: Seven Mile Beach is public along its whole length, so you can walk onto the sand at any point. Cemetery Beach, at the northern end, has snorkeling offshore. Stingray City: Trips to the stingray sandbar go by boat, so book one that returns well before all-aboard. Getting back on time: All-aboard is usually about 30 minutes before sailing, and your ship posts the exact time. A ship will not wait for passengers touring on their own, and the last tenders back can have long lines, so aim to be at the landing early.

Question 2

Getting Around Grand Cayman

Accepted Answer

Taxis are the simple way out of George Town, and they wait at the cruise landing. Public minibuses also run from a depot in George Town, and driving is on the left if you hire a car. Taxis charge fixed rates to every part of the island, so ask the fare before you set off. Public buses are large passenger vans, not full-size buses. Licensed ones carry blue license plates, and they leave from the depot on Edward Street next to the library. If you drive, keep left, wear a seatbelt, and remember that speed limits are posted in miles per hour. Drivers must be 21 to rent a car. Pedro St. James, the restored 18th-century great house in Savannah, is about 20 minutes' drive from George Town.

Question 3

Food & Dining

Accepted Answer

Grand Cayman's local cooking centers on fish, turtle and conch, and turtle stew is often called the national dish. Most other food is imported, so meals of every kind cost more than many visitors expect. The turtle meat on local menus comes from the island's own turtle farm in West Bay, which also releases turtles into the wild. Rum cake is a very popular souvenir, and the Tortuga Rum Company shows how it is made and sells it. Ask a taxi driver for a favorite jerk stand if you want something quick and local. About 90 percent of food and consumer goods are imported, and much of the food from North America comes by container ship from Miami.

Question 4

Culture & History

Accepted Answer

Cayman culture grew out of the sea: turtling and seafaring kept the islands going for two centuries before tourism and banking arrived in the 1960s. Today George Town is a crossroads, with residents from more than a hundred countries. The islands' name comes from caimán, the Carib word for the crocodiles that once lived there. The Old Courts Building, now the National Museum, has served as a courthouse, a jail and the islands' first post office. Before there was a lighthouse, a lantern was hoisted on its flagpole each night to guide ships home. Hell, in West Bay, is a patch of black rock formations with gift shops, and you can have postcards postmarked there. The Queen Elizabeth II Botanic Park on the North Side has an orchid garden, a sand garden and an early-1900s Caymanian farmhouse, and it is home to the rare blue iguana.

Question 5

From Turtles to Tax Havens

Accepted Answer

For most of their history the Cayman Islands were a remote, lightly governed outpost, settled from Jamaica and living from turtling and the sea. An airport in 1953 and new banking laws in the 1960s changed that within a generation. Columbus, 1503: No trace of earlier inhabitants has been found. Columbus sighted the islands in 1503 and called them Las Tortugas for their many turtles; by 1530 they were known as the Caymanes. Turtling and frontier years: Early islanders hunted turtles to supply ships for the Atlantic crossing. For about two centuries the islands were home to a mix of pirates, privateers, shipwrecked sailors, refugees and enslaved people. British rule, 1670: England gained the Cayman Islands and Jamaica under the Treaty of Madrid in 1670, and governed the islands from Kingston as a dependency of Jamaica. Pedro St. James, 1780: A wealthy Englishman built a three-story stone great house at Savannah using enslaved labor from Jamaica, at a time when most islanders lived in small thatched houses. The Wreck of the Ten Sail, 1794: In the early hours of February 8, 1794, ten ships of a convoy from Jamaica struck the reef off Grand Cayman's East End. Islanders from East End and Bodden Town went out in stormy seas and rescued the crews and passengers, though eight people died. Self-government and emancipation: Islanders elected their own assembly from 1831. Slavery had taken hold mainly on Grand Cayman, and the island resisted emancipation after Britain abolished slavery in 1835. The airport, 1953: Until the 1950s the islands could be reached only by ship or seaplane. The first airfield opened in April 1953 and was later named for Owen Roberts, the pilot who had proposed it. Leaving Jamaica, 1962: When Jamaica became independent in 1962, the Cayman Islands chose to stay with Britain and report directly to London. Banking and tourism, 1966: A 1966 law providing for offshore banks and trusts, followed by banking secrecy in 1969, turned the islands into a financial center, while tourism grew alongside it. Hurricane Ivan, 2004: Ivan damaged or destroyed about 85 percent of the buildings on the islands in 2004, and new building is now held to strict requirements. To learn more ashore: The Cayman Islands National Museum at 64 Seafarers Way in George Town, housed since 1990 in the 1830s Old Courts Building, has natural and cultural history galleries; its collection runs from coins to a 14-foot catboat. It opens Monday to Saturday, with last entry 45 minutes before closing; check before you go.

Question 6

Traveling with Family

Accepted Answer

Grand Cayman is a water day for families: calm stretches of Seven Mile Beach for younger children, stingrays and turtles for school-age children, and snorkeling for teenagers. Keep the plan to one main outing, because the tender adds time at each end of the day. Younger children: Take a taxi to Seven Mile Beach, which is public along its full length, and keep to a short stretch near shade and food. School age: The Cayman Turtle Centre in West Bay breeds green sea turtles and releases some into the wild; besides the turtles, it keeps sharks, birds and butterflies. Check the children's ticket age limits when you book. Stingray City: Boats take visitors to a sandbar in the North Sound where wild southern stingrays gather in about 3 feet of water. The rays have come to boats here since the mid-1980s, when fishermen cleaned their catch nearby. Teenagers: Cemetery Beach, at the northern end of Seven Mile Beach, has snorkeling just offshore, reached by a small path from the road. A rainy-day option: The National Museum is on Harbour Drive in the town center, and a quick visit takes about an hour.

Question 7

Shopping

Accepted Answer

Shopping is concentrated in George Town, where a small area of shops surrounds the harbor and the tender landing, and along Seven Mile Beach. Almost everything is imported and carries a steep import duty, so prices are high. Rum cake from the Tortuga Rum Company is very popular with visitors. Most imported goods carry an import tax of about 20 percent, sometimes more. Know whether a price is in US or Cayman dollars before you pay; the Cayman dollar is fixed at 1.20 US dollars, so a price in Cayman dollars costs more than the same number of US dollars.

Question 8

Beaches

Accepted Answer

Seven Mile Beach, north of George Town on the west coast, is Grand Cayman's main beach and is public along its whole length, so you can walk the sand past every hotel. It is a taxi ride from the tender landing, not a walk. Despite its name, the beach is shorter than seven miles, roughly five to six. Cemetery Beach, at the northern end, takes its name from a small cemetery beside it and has snorkeling offshore; a small path leads to it from the road. Because of its hotels, clubs and resorts, Seven Mile Beach has more visitors than anywhere else on the island.

George Town, Grand Cayman

Good to know

What Cruise Travelers Should Know