Grand Cayman Dive Trip

[DanL]

Just spent a week in Grand Cayman on the East End. In the 80's and sunny every day, with a couple of very early am rain showers. Water temps 78-80 degrees. Viz a bit low - less than 100ft due to previous weeks rain, strong surge and current. Heavy swells most days. Take along Bonine - if the boat motion doesn't get to you, the surge bounce during safety stops probably will.
Dove with Tortuga Divers at Morritts Tortuga Club Resort. 10-12 people on a boat, 2-3 DM's. There are many dive operators, but this one seems somewhat typical. Next trip I will try West End and some different dive operators.
Surprise to me is that Tort Diver's boats have no heads - men's and women's are the aft ladders!
Cost is US$100 /2 tank trip. All tanks were AL70's, and dive plans were pretty conservative - basically table dives, no credit for having a computer. DM's give you some latitude and we typically went deeper than plan. Not just to go deep, but because reef or wall structure "took" you there and we had to duck the current. They don't budge on time, though. I had plenty of green and air left on most dives. Cayman regs allow only 100ft max dive plans.
Three min safety stops required - a problem on days with heavy surge and current. Nausea can set in pretty quickly as you get banged about on the safety stop. On to the dives...

12/21 -
Dove Iron Shore Pinnacle (wall, Dmax=105ft, total time=33min) and Fantasy Land (shallow, 55ft, 43min).
Coral structure on the East End is amazing with many channels, tunnels and caverns. Much fun to swim through.
A lot of surge even at 40-50 feet, so you need to quickly get the feel for moving with the surge and the current to navigate through the reef structure. Many large grouper, jacks, parrots, tangs and even a couple trumpetfish in Fantasyland.

12/22 -
Lighthouse Wall (114ft, 25min). Great coral formations on/through the wall. Many sponges. Saw a big hogfish.
Many fish above the coral heads on the second dive at Maggy's Maze (59ft, 30 min) - 4ft barracuda, big grouper, trumpetfish, etc. Surge and current a factor again.

12/23 -
The Maze (102ft,31min) was a great wall dive with a lot of swim-throughs. Used NOx32 on this dive (US$10 extra). Definitely felt less groggy that afternoon. Second dive at Grouper Grotto (53ft, 39min). Heavy surge and current, but a GREAT dive: saw three eagle rays and a HAMMERHEAD shark! I didn't actually see the hammerhead because I was so intent on following teh eagle rays, but it was captured on the dive video. Estimated 7ft! A few barracuda, one pretty large. The grotto was a great swim through - it was filled with 3-4ft tarpon and we just swam thru them. What a blast!

12/24 -
Wall dive at Turtle Pass (119ft, 31 min). Wow! on drama - swim down to a very tight tunnel entry at 75ft, into total darkness of the tunnel and continue down to the exit out of the face of the wall at 120ft. First thing you see is the deep blue light up/down all around, with the bottom below at something like 6000 ft! This dive was similar to Devils Throat at Cozumel, but not as long a tunnel and angled down vs vertically down like Devils Throat.
Second dive at Snapper Hole (64ft, 35 min). Very strong current and surge. An old ship anchor and chain is partially encrusted in coral - very neat! Burned a ton of air. Had to stay in the coral channels to keep from being literally swept away. Unlike Cozumel where you drift with the current and the boat follows you for pickup, in GC the boat moors and you need to return to it. Swim out against the current and back to the boat with (hopefully) the current.

12/26 -
High Rock Drop-Off (102ft, 37min) Uneventful wall. Could I be getting jaded at this point?
Kelly's Caverns (61ft, 35 min) Biggest Queen Angel I've ever seen! Swam right up to and with it. Many caverns, swim throughs -an underwater playground! Large barracuda cuts off my buddy. He just hangs back and lets the cuda pass in front of him! I look back to see the cuda look at me and turn my way - time to slowly move on. A very nice last dive.

The second dives of each day were unguided if you chose. Three of us buddied and usually went out alone. Used compass, current direction and reef orientation to find our way back to teh boat. Had to surface only once to look for the boat and it was maybe only 100 yds away. Vis on all dives was less than 100 ft - a lot of stirring due to current, surge and the previuos week of daily rain.

All in all, a great trip. But my vote still goes to Cozumel. Very easy, excellent drift diving, cheaper accomodations and food and 2-tank dives are US$55 vs $100 in Cayman. I looked at two vids I have from Cayman and two from Coz. Definitely more life, diversity, color at Coz. Cayman has much better complex structure like caverns, swim thrus, coral mazes etc. Coz drift diving is easy. Cayman diving in current and surge can be demanding. Coz dive plans are liberal and you have AL 80's - usually topped out green on all dives. Cayman is conservative and strict about total dive time and uses AL 70's.

Note that all my Cayman dives are East End (facing Atlantic) and with one operator, Tortuga Divers. West End is probably more protected and I hear it has great life and great diving. But on cost alone, Coz is the much more affordable choice and the drift dives are longer and so easy...

Hope this helps soothe dive info withdrawal. Happy New Year!!!
Dan