Who has used Nativeway recently?

[davethomasowns]

Hello!

 

I will be in Grand Cayman next week (Wed May 20th) and booked the Rays, Reef and Rum Point tour with Nativeway. I have since emailed some questions to them and they yet to respond. I am assuming they are busy or that I waited to long, so I am just wondering who has done this particular tour with them.

 

1) Do they have someone taking photographs that you can purchase like some other tours? I know that some people hate having a photographer but my girlfriend really wanted pictures with the rays.

 

2) She told me that lunch was included? Is seafood the only thing on the "menu"?

 

3) Weather.com shows storms and 60% chance of rain that day. I am assuming they won't start the tour if it's raining?

 

Anything else we should know about the tour? Thanks as always!

 

Shane

[Ron_L]

Hello!

 

I will be in Grand Cayman next week (Wed May 20th) and booked the Rays, Reef and Rum Point tour with Nativeway. I have since emailed some questions to them and they yet to respond. I am assuming they are busy or that I waited to long, so I am just wondering who has done this particular tour with them.

 

1) Do they have someone taking photographs that you can purchase like some other tours? I know that some people hate having a photographer but my girlfriend really wanted pictures with the rays.

 

2) She told me that lunch was included? Is seafood the only thing on the "menu"?

 

3) Weather.com shows storms and 60% chance of rain that day. I am assuming they won't start the tour if it's raining?

 

Anything else we should know about the tour? Thanks as always!

 

Shane

 

We did this tour about a month ago off of carnival Valor and loved it! Here are my answers to your questions...

 

1. Yes, they have a photographer and he did a nice job. He takes four ro five shots, one with each of you holding the ray, one with both of you kissing the ray (it's good luck!) and one with each of you getting a back massage from the ray. He sells one, two or the full set. i think the prices were $20, $30 and $50. If you buy the whole set he throws in some pictures of stingrays and fish. My wife wanted the whole set. You can wee them here.

 

2. Yes, lunch is included. When you are done snorkeling they will pass around the menu and then call in the order. The food was ready when we got to Rum Point. The menu has a lot of non-seafood choices. My wife had a jerked pork sandwich that was good. The chicken wings looked very good. I had the catch of the day which was grilled Mahi Mahi in a pesto cream sauce and it was possible the best fish of the cruise.

 

3. If it is just rain, they will probably go, but if there is lightning then they probably won't go. High winds would also be an issue since the waves would make it difficult to stand on the sandbar. Remember that most tropical destinations get some rain almost every afternoon, to you may not even be affected.

 

What else... As i said, we had a great time! We met the Native Way folks at the information hut at the dock. It is a small white wooden structure with light green trim. there were two guys holding Native Way signs. Check in with them right away and they will tell you what time to meet for the bus. Sharon (the owner) was there ans she is a very nice lady. The bus was clean and air conditioned. It takes about 15 minutes to get to the boat harbor. We were on the Trippin' Out with captain Chris and mates Andrew and JC. The boat ride to the sandbar takes about 15 - 20 minutes. They only had 20 people on our tour, unlike the large tour boats that show up with 50 - 100 people. Captain Chris anchored away from the other boats and we had our own stingrays all to ourselves. They will find a willing stingray for the pictures and will show you the difference between the males and females. They will also show you how to feed the stingrays. While all of this is going on there are stingrays swimming all around you. they will swim right by your legs and as they pass tey will fold up the wing closest to you and you will feel them slide along your leg. The underside of their wings is like silk.

 

After about 40 minutes with the rays you'll move about minutes to the barrier reef to spend about 40 minutes snorkeling. They have equipment or you can bring you own. They throw out a life ring on a rope so you can hold onto the rope if you aren't comfortable swimming around. The water was crystal clear and the fish and coral are beautiful.

 

After that it is a short ride to Rum Point. Rum Point is beautiful with good food, a great beach and a nice souvenir shop. We had about 90 minutes at Rum point. Then it is back on the boat for the ride to the boat harbor and the bus ride back to the dock. We were back at the dock by about 2:00 ship time so we still had a little time to look at some shops.

 

There is a link in my signature to some videos on You tube. There are two videos of the stingrays. Also, I have all of my pictures here, including the pics from the RR&R tour.

 

BTW, try sending NativeWay an e-mail from a different account. i had problems getting e-mail from Roatan to my Yahoo account but had no problems from my G-mail account.

[davethomasowns]

Wow, thanks a lot Ron. You have me really looking forward to this tour now. I appreciate you taking time time to post all the details! :cool:

 

Shane

[C. Anne]

We did this tour about a month ago off of carnival Valor and loved it! Here are my answers to your questions...

 

1. Yes, they have a photographer and he did a nice job. He takes four ro five shots, one with each of you holding the ray, one with both of you kissing the ray (it's good luck!) and one with each of you getting a back massage from the ray. He sells one, two or the full set. i think the prices were $20, $30 and $50. If you buy the whole set he throws in some pictures of stingrays and fish. My wife wanted the whole set. You can wee them here.

 

2. Yes, lunch is included. When you are done snorkeling they will pass around the menu and then call in the order. The food was ready when we got to Rum Point. The menu has a lot of non-seafood choices. My wife had a jerked pork sandwich that was good. The chicken wings looked very good. I had the catch of the day which was grilled Mahi Mahi in a pesto cream sauce and it was possible the best fish of the cruise.

 

3. If it is just rain, they will probably go, but if there is lightning then they probably won't go. High winds would also be an issue since the waves would make it difficult to stand on the sandbar. Remember that most tropical destinations get some rain almost every afternoon, to you may not even be affected.

 

What else... As i said, we had a great time! We met the Native Way folks at the information hut at the dock. It is a small white wooden structure with light green trim. there were two guys holding Native Way signs. Check in with them right away and they will tell you what time to meet for the bus. Sharon (the owner) was there ans she is a very nice lady. The bus was clean and air conditioned. It takes about 15 minutes to get to the boat harbor. We were on the Trippin' Out with captain Chris and mates Andrew and JC. The boat ride to the sandbar takes about 15 - 20 minutes. They only had 20 people on our tour, unlike the large tour boats that show up with 50 - 100 people. Captain Chris anchored away from the other boats and we had our own stingrays all to ourselves. They will find a willing stingray for the pictures and will show you the difference between the males and females. They will also show you how to feed the stingrays. While all of this is going on there are stingrays swimming all around you. they will swim right by your legs and as they pass tey will fold up the wing closest to you and you will feel them slide along your leg. The underside of their wings is like silk.

 

After about 40 minutes with the rays you'll move about minutes to the barrier reef to spend about 40 minutes snorkeling. They have equipment or you can bring you own. They throw out a life ring on a rope so you can hold onto the rope if you aren't comfortable swimming around. The water was crystal clear and the fish and coral are beautiful.

 

After that it is a short ride to Rum Point. Rum Point is beautiful with good food, a great beach and a nice souvenir shop. We had about 90 minutes at Rum point. Then it is back on the boat for the ride to the boat harbor and the bus ride back to the dock. We were back at the dock by about 2:00 ship time so we still had a little time to look at some shops.

 

There is a link in my signature to some videos on You tube. There are two videos of the stingrays. Also, I have all of my pictures here, including the pics from the RR&R tour.

 

BTW, try sending NativeWay an e-mail from a different account. i had problems getting e-mail from Roatan to my Yahoo account but had no problems from my G-mail account.

 

 

Thank you so much for the details of this excursion that we are looking at doing. It looks great!

[davethomasowns]

Do you know if they provide snorkeling equipment?

 

Also, we don't know much about snorkeling. If we bought our own snorkel and brought it, could we use their goggles? :confused:

 

Thanks again

Shane

[Ron_L]

Do you know if they provide snorkeling equipment?

 

Also, we don't know much about snorkeling. If we bought our own snorkel and brought it, could we use their goggles? :confused:

 

Thanks again

Shane

 

Yes, they have everything including inflatable vests if you want to use one. You can use your own in conjunction with theirs if you want to. We brought our masks and snorkels but left the fins at home to save bag space and weight so we used their fins.

 

The guys on the boat will be in the water with you and will gladly help you if you are a novice and they will also let you go on your own if you are a veteran.

 

Enjoy your cruise! We learned so much from this forum that I am happy to be able to give something back!

 

Take along an underwater camera (the disposables work fine. I take a lot of pictures so I used my underwater Olympus digital). You'll be able to get some great shots of the stingrays and of the coral and fish at the reef. We also saw a couple of sea turtles on the way out to the sand bar.

[Ron_L]

Thank you so much for the details of this excursion that we are looking at doing. It looks great!

 

You're welcome.

 

This was our first cruise ever and GC was our first port ever (doh!) so this was our first excursion ever, so I was very worried about making the right choice and not screwing up by missing the ship or something stupid like that. Sharon at Native Way went out of her way to make me feel comfortable and we were glad that we went on this tour.

[blessedwith12]

I had e-mailed Sharon with some questions before we left and was surprised when I didn't get a response. On our return, I happened to find them in my Spam, even though previous e-mails from her had made it through to my inbox. She seems very prompt, so I would assume either she didn't get your e-mail or maybe it's in your spam.

We had a great time with Nativeway this March.

[fishbait]

i too appreciate your sharing of the photos. our first time will be in July. you answered my question about the photos. I was going to buy disposables but unsure how well they would take. sounds like I will be fine.

:)