We arrived on Little Cayman on Saturday. On Tuesday afternoon I finally went ashore and checked in with Customs. On Wednesday the whole family stepped ashore for the first time since the previous Friday. The kids had been on the boat for five days and thought nothing of it. They didn’t want to, as they were perfectly content to spend their days with their toys and books, in between heading out to snorkel the reefs. We live such a strange life. I really marvel over it.

I think the stingrays are just swimming under the boat laughing at me for the completely missing bottom paint on the keel. Scraped it clean when I ran the boat up on the sandy shallows. That mistake is going to cause some extra work when the barnacles begin to find me.

Anchored behind the reef on Little Cayman. Nasty weather on the way, and that little reef just under the surface is the only thing keeping the open ocean from us.

With nasty weather on the way we scrambled to see as much as we could in the water before it hit. There was some nice snorkeling areas outside the bay, but they were a bit deeper, around 25′ or so, than we’d like. Nice and clear, though, and there were actually some fish around.

Kids learn better on their own, but when they are stuck on something we can come along and bridge the gap.

This is the learning I really like to see. These two were determined to get one of those green coconuts out of the tree. They scoured the beach for tools, worked together, and eventually discovered that the green cocos are attached by green “roots” and don’t come off with a smack from a stick. They never did get that coco, but they spent an hour working through problems to try and reach the solution. Ali and I were sitting on the beach talking about this when an old guy who was staying at the resort came up to us and said, “I’ve been having fun watching your kids work together on getting that coconut. It’s good that you didn’t help them, it would have ruined their fun.” Exactly.

The winds have arrived and from the looks of the extended forecast they may never end. We’ve got wind from the East and swell creeping over the reef from the South. So, while this is a protected bay, it isn’t necessarily going to be a comfortable one. We’ve got a back anchor out to hold us pointed into the swell.

The reef pass is no longer passable. Not that there is anywhere to go. This is the only bay on Little Cayman, and on Cayman Brac ten miles away there are no bays at all. When the ocean swell builds there is nowhere on these islands to hide completely.