Living in Grand Cayman

Last year was the 1st time I ran the Cayman Islands Marathon. In fact I “only” run the 1/2 Marathon (21.1km / 13.1 Miles)  This year was the  10th year of the event and my second of this event.

Saturday, the day before the race, was the pickup of our number and goodies bag.  This was done at the Marriott and due to the numerous volunteers, I was in and out in less than 10 minutes.  Here is a shot of my friend Sean at the pickup.  Good job sir and to all your colleagues.

The always popular goodie bag was once again filled with quite a variety of things, including the “tech shirt” (i.e: polyester), sunglasses, sunscreen, cell phone arm band, etc.   Great stuff.

Included with the registration was a coupon for a “pasta loading” supper the evening before. For those who run, it is a well known fact that pasta is a must the evening/day before the race.  So, being a sucker for a free meal, I obliged and made my way to Breezes (ocean/harbor front) in George Town Saturday PM.   Here is a sample of one of the 2 plates of pasta I took. Needless to say I did not go to bed hungry. 🙂

New this year are the bibs … your name is on it.  Very nice.   This picture was taken post-race and has some obvious Gatorade spill marks on it.

After the run, every finisher gets a really heavy and shiny medal.  Very nice.  It will hang in my office with last years medal.

The course is the same as previous years. (it is “officially certified” so they don’t change it around) The official certification is important since a runner can use the result of this race to qualify for other races where you need to run a certain time/speed in order to be able to participate (e.g: Boston Marathon)

My result: 40th out of 650 runners in 1h43mins 58 seconds. I am obviously very pleased.  🙂

Every year, for the past 10 years, Cayman has hosted a Tennis tournament called “The Legends”.  Its a Tennis event where former pro’s come to play in a somewhat friendly format. Every year, a few big names come to play on our small islands.  We as spectators are able to see some great tennis and see these players up close.

This year the big names were Stefan Edberg and Martina Hingis (I am not a tennis fan but had definitely heard these names before)

Here is what the “stadium” looks like.   It is behind the Ritz-Carlton who is one of the sponsors of the event.

Here are some action shots I took during the evening.   Below is Stefan Edberg. As you can see,  everyone is close to the action.  Not a bad seat in the house.  The weather has been absolutely perfect for this kind of event ; breezy and not too hot or humid.   +-mid-20’s (c) in the evenings and mornings.

Martina Hingis warming up on one of the side courts.  Quite neat to be able to get so close.  Probably something impossible at a “large” tennis event. (although by Cayman standards this is quite a large event)

In the match.  It was easy to see why her and the other players are former champs.

A short video I took during the men’s match.   Will give you an idea how close we are to the action.

I very much enjoyed my evening of tennis.  Definitely something different!  Ill try to make it each year.  Its a great way to spend an evening, even for someone who is not a huge tennis fan.

Once again, we had the 10-10-10 Halloween race today.  Last year was the first edition and I enjoyed it very much.  Running in the east end is not something I do often since I can easily run where we live ; a change of scenery is definitely welcome.

I am repeating myself from last year, but in a nutshell, the race is a 10km x 3 runners relay race (some do the entire 30km though). It starts at The Reef Resort in the east end and essentially does a loop and back to the resort.  Its a 6am start (I got up at 4:30am) on a Sunday morning, so anyone who manages to make it out to east end is already a winner in my book!

So I had the 1st leg of the race.  Its actually a good bit uphill.   The highest point on Grand Cayman, a whopping 79 feet above sea level, is somewhere along the northern side on my leg of the race.  However, as hills and elevations go, its not a big deal!  The first leg did have the advantage of starting in the dark (sunrise was 6:25am) so I had very little sun to deal with which obviously makes things easier.  Later runners did have a nice breeze and somewhat overcast which also helped.  If anyone cares, I ran my 10k section in 45mins, 25 seconds.  I am quite pleased.  Our team finished first of the corporate teams.  🙂

Here you can see my leg (starting at the green dot). After that, it keeps going south and then back to the start point along the ocean.  A very pleasant run.

Here is my team getting our trophy from a representative of The Reef resort.  Good job guys ; it was an honor to have you as team mates.

While waiting for the prizes & food … I took some pictures of the beach at the Reef resort.  Its a really nice place.  Will probably have to go back and spend a bit more time at one point.

There is a nice pier, not unlike the one at Rum Point.

From the pier, we saw masses of fish.  Not sure what they were doing there, but it was a nice sight.

Here is the beach.  Really nice place.   It seems that quite a few people who live on Grand Cayman come here for “Staycation” week-end.

All-in-all, a lovely event! I sure hope they have this each year. Attendance for this second year seemed up from the first year, so seems hopeful.

Cayman Islands Marathon is +-5-weeks away … ill be running the 1/2 marathon again and will of course post here.  For any runners out there, its not too late to sign up.  Its a fabulous event and definitely justifies a quick (or long) trip to Cayman in early December.

So hurricane Sandy passed quite a distance east of the Cayman Islands.  WHEW!   Other parts of the Caribbean and now the USA may not be so lucky.

We have had some effects though.   In George Town, the wave action this Saturday morning was quite impressive.  Definitely no snorkeling or diving going on today in this area.

It always amazes me that just 2 miles or so down the same street, on the southwest corner of the island (“South Sound”) the ocean is calm and barely any wave action. On the first picture below you will notice the boats.  All of the George Town dive operators bring their boats here to protect them from the large waves and to be able to take their clients diving in calmer waters.

Finally, another consequence of the storm.   Since the path somewhat “blocked” maritime traffic between us and the USA, there are some food shortages.  Now, this is nothing massive … no one is starving, but there are some basic things missing.  Essentially, food items that would come in weekly (e.g: bread)  I would expect this to be all cleared up early next week.

More posts soon …

Its been quiet recently … great news, but nothing exciting report on 🙂

However, a new story last week caught my eye.  Some lucky tourists were out boating a few miles offshore when they encountered a bunch (many) dolphins that followed their boat.   Below is the Youtube video of this awesome experience. I which I had been there.   Near the end of the video, you can see over 40 (or so) at one time.

The full news story can be found here:

http://www.compasscayman.com/caycompass/2012/08/31/Visitors-have-rare-wild-dolphin-encounter/