Grand Cayman 2018 (page 10 of 10)

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Day 10

It’s the last day in paradise. It’s sad to go but we’re all anxious to get home too (just not to the weather). We tried to eat/drink most of the food/drink that was left over but we had to leave a little bit of rum. Sad but true.

We got everything packed & into the car. We had a few hours to kill so we first stopped at Caymana Bay to check out the Observation Tower that we noticed too late on Valentine’s Day to have time to climb up. It’s a multi-stair building built that brought to mind M C Escher. There were a lot of beautiful mosaics in tile on the interior walls depicting what it looks like undersea. The undersides of the stairs were also tiled in various pastel Carribean colors – similar to what a lot of the houses were painted there. From the top levels, you could look out in all directions at the island, even the nearby giant garbage dump; it may actually be one of the tallest points on the island. Dump aside – it was a beautiful view. Then we headed towards the east end of the island. We stopped for a bit at Spotts Beach, which was next to Spotts Cemetary. A small group of similarly dressed people was having some sort of quiet ceremony, but the beach below had swimsuit clad people on the sand and in the water. There was a large set of stairs where you could go down into the water & snorkel and we saw a number of people out there, but there were also permanent signs there, warning of current. It was not part of 7 mile beach, but definitely a pretty place to be.

We headed towards the airport & got gas. Then we stopped at the Mango Tree restaurant, which was right by the airport, for food. It was close & Greta had seen it had gotten some good reviews. When we first went in, we were nearly the only people sitting in the dining area, but there was a steady stream of local take-out customers, which is always a good sign. The dining room did start to fill up by the time we’d left. The food was VERY good. Jim & Trina shared a HUGE chicken quesadilla that had sort of a curry/jerk flavor to it. Mike got a shrimp dish "Cayman Style" with vegetables, rice & beans. Greta got Snapper Escovietche , with the beans/rice/veg. It was a WHOLE fish, so that was an interesting challenge to pull out all the bones (pulling out by the spine appears to be the trick) and eating around the head. On the other hand, it was one of the best pieces of fish she’d had an the plate was beautifully presented.

Then, it was on to the airport. The boys dropped off the car & the girls waited inside with the luggage. We got everything checked in & through security. Mike had noticed he couldn’t get a boarding pass online and had an “SSSS” on his printed boarding pass. It turns out the SSSS stands for “Secondary Security Screening Selection”. Since Greta was with him, they were both led to the head of the head of the security line. There, Mike had to put all of his things in red bins, whereas everyone else, including Greta, used gray bins. The red bins indicated a special check. They went through all of his carry-on luggage, which meant that they took his camera case and took out every piece inside and looked at it and wiped down everything. Of course nothing popped up but it is always worrisome to be pulled aside in a separate country. Luckily, Greta had been carrying the rest of the carry-on stuff, so we only had to wait for one carry on to be searched. In the end, we got out of security about the same time as Jim & Trina, who had to wait in line. Then we headed on to the main gates where it was packed with people but at least air conditioned in some areas. Trina stood in a LONG line for rum cakes. There was just the one line for everything you could buy in the airport – souvenirs, food, drinks, snacks, etc – hence the long line. She bought us all beers to make up for the long wait. Mike thought he’d heard himself paged but didn’t think much of it. We stood & waited in a corner. At one point, the girls headed to the bathroom (where there was a ANOTHER line) and while waiting, realized that Mike WAS getting paged. The Wi-Fi didn’t cover that area so when they got back, they let Mike know. It was so crowded & noisy, we realized that in our little corner, you couldn’t hear any of the announcements. It turns out due to his SSSS assignation, his checked luggage was to be opened & inspected, with him present. Since he’d purchased the checked-bagged tags for all three bags, that meant they inspected ALL three bags. Thankfully, it was a pretty general search and he wasn’t stuck with repacking anything, including Greta’s overpacked-to-the-gills bag. Eventually, it was time to board.

We filed out onto the tarmac and got on the plane to Charlotte. Jim & Trina bought a round of drinks to celebrated a great vacation. We got to Charlotte & headed through the security hoops once again. Since the Howards had TSA pre-check & Mike/Greta did not, we said goodbye in the terminal there & went our separate ways. Surprisingly, after we all went through security again, we crossed paths in the main terminal on our way to our gates. We laughed, waved & headed on. Jim/Trina got a pizza snack and Greta/Mike got a beer, then got on our planes. The Howards’ plane was delayed but our plane to MSP was on time. We had to go around some “bumpy” air on the way back and it sounds like it was similar for the trip to IA.

In MSP, we got our bags rather quickly (Mike’s bag been searched by the TSA as well, we found out later). It took about 30 minutes to get our shuttle back to La Quinta, which was frustrating since it was supposed to be a 10 minute wait. But the driver got us loaded, couldn’t find his other fares so he left & dropped us off at our car, so that helped.

We all had uneventful drives home & everyone arrived around midnight. Calvin & Sam greeted their parents at the door. Mike & Greta will get to see Remi tomorrow.

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