need help deciding on snorkeling tour with our 12 year old son

[busymomcanada]

My 12 year old son loves snorkeling! (His only experiences so far have been in Coco Cay and in Key West)We would like to take him on a snorkeling tour while we are in Grand Cayman on the Carnival Inspiration in April. Carnival offers a coral reef snorkeling/stingray city tour combo, and I was wondering if the coral reef was the best place for snorkeling in Grand Cayman. I would love for him to feel like he is swimming in an aquarium (seeing lots of fish, clearer water etc). Anyone with any suggestions?

[JohninDC]

Great snorkeling in Cayman off of the reef, and he'll get a kick out of stingray city. We did this tour last spring through Moby Dick - smaller boat, not crowded, great service, very safe with kids, and no high pressure sales pitch to buy pictures, etc... Can't say enough about them or how much fun we had. Good luck!:)

[bruce-r]

Just don't go with the ship's tour, unless you want to go with a big group.

[jlovely]

we just booked Moby Dick after a LOT of research for our cruise in March :)

[MacSmooth]

Just don't go with the ship's tour, unless you want to go with a big group.

lol, I agree with you on that, you don't even want to know how many times I got kicked in the face with flippers and elbowed by people on the Carnival snorkeling excursions.

[broberts]

My 12 year old son loves snorkeling! (His only experiences so far have been in Coco Cay and in Key West)We would like to take him on a snorkeling tour while we are in Grand Cayman on the Carnival Inspiration in April. Carnival offers a coral reef snorkeling/stingray city tour combo, and I was wondering if the coral reef was the best place for snorkeling in Grand Cayman. I would love for him to feel like he is swimming in an aquarium (seeing lots of fish, clearer water etc). Anyone with any suggestions?

 

Sound like a good excursion.

 

An alternative, likely also offered by Carnival, is a reef & wreck dive. This takes place just off-shore between the ships and the island. The excursion first visits an area with coral and lots of fish in 10 - 30 feet of water. The second swim is over the wreck of an old freighter, the Cali. It's in about 20' of water. Lots of fish and the wreck is deep enough and waters calm enough that swimmers are safe from accidentally brushing up against sharp protrusions.

 

You might find the summary of sites here useful.