Monday, July 10, 2017

A Week At The Cayman Brac Beach Resort


We stayed at the Cayman Brac Reef Resort during July 1 - 8, 2017 not only as our honeymoon but also as part of a SCUBA diving package. Other than one incident on the night of our arrival (for which the resort manager apologized profusely to everyone staying there that night) our experience with this resort was perfect and we would return in a heartbeat.

 Room 121 was the left most room on the first floor

 A large, comfortable, king bed

Plenty of storage and a work area for downloading dive videos onto our computer.  We never turned on the television


Large and well-equipped restroom and shower

Our room (#121) was closest to the beach but, unfortunately, had no direct view of the nearby ocean. However because we were diving most of the time, an ocean view room wasn't really needed. The room was spacious with plenty of space for storage. The king bed was comfortable and the restroom large enough to play rugby in. In room amenities included a television (that we never watched), a small refrigerator, and a 2-cup coffee maker. WiFi is available throughout the resort and the signal was quite strong.

Our package was all-inclusive with three meals a day in the resort restaurant. Everything is served buffet-style with two or three main entree options for lunch and dinner. Breakfast was also buffet-style with an optional omelet station. The food was bountiful and quite tasty. Because absolutely everything consumed on the island (except the falling coconuts) has to be shipped in from Grand Cayman, food on the island is very expensive making the all-inclusive option at the restaurant a great value.

Brown Booby (it's name has nothing to do with breasts) is a common seabird on Cayman Brac and it wasn't unusual to see adults and sub-adults flying over the resort property

The resort has a supply of fat-tire bicycles that can be checked out and used to pedal around the island and tennis players will enjoy the one on-site tennis court. Birdwatchers are in luck because West Indian Whistling-Duck, one of the rarest birds in the West Indies, is easily found on the adjacent Westerly Ponds. One evening a local wildlife rescue group released 16 baby Loggerhead Sea Turtles that had been removed from a nest after the young were able to dig themselves out. It was great fun watching the two-day old turtles scurry to the ocean just before sunset.



The bar is well-stocked with local and imported beer (make sure you try at least one Ironshore Bock), various wines, and also hard liquor. Don't expect any of the mixes (grapefruit juice, etc) to be fresh - that won't happen on The Brac. Our favorite bartender, Nils, was a baseball fan so he made certain that one of the two televisions in the bar was always broadcasting a game. 


Adjacent to the bar was a large pool whose maximum depth is 5 feet making it more of a wading than swimming pool. This was a perfect place to chill with your favorite adult beverage after a day of diving. Entertainment options at the resort are limited but they all center around the pool (the debacle on Saturday night was not very entertaining although it occurred by the pool). Wednesday night was trivia night, Thursday night was the highly entertaining triple elimination crab race (we chose crab #22 who came in dead last), and on Friday night we were treated to an excellent island barbecue. The latter consisted of either beef (which I don't eat), grilled shrimp, and Jamaican jerk chicken that was so tasty I told the chef it was better than any Jamaican jerk chicken I've ever had in Jamaica!


The weekly crab race is one of the entertainment highlights at the resort.  Our crab (#22) apparently blew out an antennae and couldn't find his way to the finish line

One final, gorgeous, Cayman Brac sunrise before our reluctant departure

The Cayman Brac Reef Resort is definitely for an older crowd and it certainly caters to divers so if you are looking to party hearty, plan on staying on Grand Cayman. However if you are looking for an ultra-laid-back island experience where as Bachman Turner Overdrive said in their song "I love to work at nothing all day" then you simply cannot find a better place on Cayman Brac than this resort.

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