Grand Cayman Adventure: Day 7.

Today is our final full day of vacation…tear.  It went by so fast and it was so so fun to be here adventuring with Mike!  I think that we were good travel partners, and we got to do a little bit of everything, and ate lots of yummy food! That’s what life is all about, am I right?!

It was pretty cloudy and hot today, so it was great that we had planned to go to breakfast and then to the turtle farm.  Lauren’s was our restaurant of choice and it did not disappoint.  Mike had a breakfast burrito and I had a crepe filled with fresh blueberries, strawberries and pastry creme.  I had been craving a sweet breakfast so this was right up my alley.  Next stop was the much-anticipate turtle farm.  Mike and I opted not to swim with the turtles since we had swam with stingrays and gone snorkeling other times.  The turtles were HUGE.  And gorgeous, and very social creatures.  

^^ The turtles were HUGE!  I have no idea how much they weigh but they were much bigger than I expected them to be.

^^ This turtle looked that he/she was trying to walk up the stairs.   

^^ A turtle collision.  Lots of bumping into each other.

^^ This guy was very social--he let me get a close up of his face! 

They are housed in huge outdoor tanks, and they swam into, over, under and next to each other.  Then we headed over to smaller tanks where they house smaller but still big turtles.  My very favorite part came next…the baby turtles!  I’m pretty sure I skipped over to the tank like a little girl.  They were seriously adorable.  And we got to pick them up right out of the tanks and hold them.  Yes, you heard right…we got to HOLD THEM!  I about died.  We washed our hands with sanitizer and then reached right and picked one up.  They are quick swimmers, so it was easier said than done.  The way you hold a turtle is with two hands around the shell, kind of like you hold a baby under the armpits.  If you rubbed under their chins they calmed down and stopped struggling to get back into the water.  They were darling.  

^^ Mike using his animal magic to calm down one of the baby turtles!  I really did hold them too, but Mike has those photos on his camera.  The babies were super adorable, but did not like being held...unless Mike was rubbing them under their chins.  Animal whisperer ;)

^^ A close up of the baby's face.

We headed inside and learned a little about female turtles laying eggs, and we got to see a super teeny tiny turtle that was not more than a week old.  One other fun tidbit that we read about was that turtles need only 1-3 seconds to breathe above the water and then they can stay under water for 4-5 minutes.  Fascinating. 

^^ See the tiny turtle in the corner of the container?  It's less than a week old and smaller than my hand.  Adorable! 

^^ A few zoomed-in shots of the newborn turtle!

We then stopped at Cemetery Beach and saw some beautiful light aqua water, and took a few photos.  Apparently the beach was not well-known until recently, and since there were no cruises in, it was nice and quiet today.

^^ Cemetery Beach.  Such pretty water, even though it was choppy! 

After a quick pitstop at Hell (yes, it’s really called that, and yes, it’s a complete tourist trap), we headed to Camana Bay to check out the shopping.  Camana Bay is a huge, gorgeous, upscale shopping/office plaza that is really aesthetically pleasing.  There are a bunch of restaurants and shops that overlook the water.  There were Adirondack rocking chairs in a really pretty light blue color.  It was so peaceful to sit there and chat for a while.  We popped into a few stores and then  headed back to our hotel.  Since we have a lot of random food to eat tonight, we are cooking and relaxing in front of the TV.  It rained all afternoon, so unfortunately it wasn’t really conducive to sitting outside and reading which it what I would have liked to do instead.  

^^ The view from the observation deck at Camana Bay.  It was about 4 stories up and the walls were mosaic!  The view from here was awesome, and check out the colorful shutters on the windows! 

All in all, our vacation that we looked forward to for months was incredible!  It was wonderful to decompress, get away from work and stressors and hang out with my boy.  I cannot wait to start planning our next vacation!  Until next time, Grand Cayman.  Thanks for showing us a great time, chockfull of memories.

^^ On our way back to the U.S.!  Our trip was amazing.