Adventure Guide to the Cayman Islands (Adventure Guide Series)

 (8 customer reviews)

My wife and I spent 6 days in Grand Cayman. Overall the book gave great information on what to see and where to go. We especially enjoyed the section that points out where the movie "The Firm" was filmed. We are big movie buffs and that was fun to see the sites of some of the filming. The book did not point out that there are basically two spots to go see the stingrays in "Stingray City". We took two different snorkel trips. One trip took us to a reef in stingray city. The water was about 15 feet deep. We saw about 10 stingrays but had some trouble getting close to them because of the deep water. A second trip took us to a stingray area that was in water about four feet deep. This location was more enjoyable because you could actually touch the rays and hold them if you wanted. Also there were several more rays at this location. Both trips were great but I recommend going on the trip with the shallow stingray area first. The book was...Read more

We were disappointed in the book. If you have ever traveled to an island before and have some idea of what to expect, then I do not recommend this book. We were able to find as much useful free information about the Caymans at the airport (rental car agency, whatever). The restaraunt guide in the book is extremely incomplete, and the descriptions of beaches and snorkeling locations needed to be much more specific to be worth the investment. As another reviewer alluded to, the lack of detailed maps is a serious drawback. If there was a roadmap and maps to snorkeling sites then I would have been partially satisfied. Unless you need to learn that Grand Cayman is a "world class SCUBA diving destination" I recommend learning the basics on one of the many internet sites and then picking up the freebies when you get there.

This is a very recent guidebook (Feb 1998), and therefore, provided the most up to date information on what is available in the Caymans. I purchased the book to provide more detail than that provided in the "Fodors" guidebook and was pleased with the amount of detail provided in this book. For example, it was the only place that informed me that a championship golf course was located on Grand Cayman Island. Other references only identified a single "par three" course on Grand Cayman. I give it high marks for it's insight on the atmosphere and costs at restaurants and hotels along Seven Mile Beach and West Bay. A major improvement to the guidebook would be to include better, more difinitive maps. For example, my wife and I spent an hour trying to find "Stingray Brewery" which was identified as being "west of town" in the book. It would have taken us ten minutes to find it if they provided a decent map. In general, the authors seem...Read more