Sun 26 Jun 2016
This week-end I visited one of Cayman’s newest attractions : I was not disappointed. This place only opened in January 2016 and is quickly becoming one of Cayman’s top tourist (and locals …) neat things to do. The attraction is called “Crystal Caves” and is located on Grand Cayman’s North Side. Well worth the drive out. As the name implies, you will be going into some caves.
Before we head out, they made a lovely deck area which is right in the forest. Very nice.
Ok so we head out into the caves. During the visit, which is guided, we get to visit 3 different caves. Each one very interesting. Here we are in the 1st cave – right away people were in awe that we have this in Cayman. We were told that these have been formed for over 250 Thousand years.
Here i’m in the “open air” cave which is mainly lit by natural light. You cannot see it, but my shirt is becoming wetter but the minute (more on that later)
Now for some even more spectacular pictures. The next two caves are closed – no natural light. However, there is LED lighting and it makes for a spectacular sight.
Isn’t this amazing? Note: if you are only mildly claustrophobic you should be OK. If you are VERY claustrophobic, then skip. In most places you will be, the ceilings are quite high. The only thing I really noted is how humid it is in there. Of course this is summer, so it was quite hot which did not help. But this is a cave visit after all, so I think some humidity is to to be expected.
The 3rd and final cave is for sure the most spectacular with the underground lake. There was also a place where we could see some water cascading in – really neat. We were told its all fresh water, which is quite rare in Cayman.
Upon exiting the 3rd cave, we had this awesome sight. This fig tree – which I’ll assume is very old, has some very spectacular roots. Note that the tree “sits” on top of the cave and that the roots then go down towards the ground via the air. Quite a sight.
The tour lasts +-90 minutes and is OK for kids and anyone who is able to walk a few hundred meters. I do recommend you wear proper shoes and not flip flops. Also, if you want to be able to take decent pictures, I recommend you bring a “proper” camera if you have one. I suspect pictures from a smartphone will not turn out great.
Here is the Web site of the company – reservations are required.
Thanks so much for this, Micho. Crystal Caves will go on the list for the next time we visit. Can’t be soon enough for me.
I love caves and have visited many of them in England and Europe. What a complete surprise to find them in Grand Cayman. What beautiful photos, Micho. I would love to see them for myself but your photos bring their beauty to me. Thank you.
Lovely! Just seeing this ~ we will be visiting late this year (end of Sept) and will add this to the list of things to see. Thank you for sharing!