Princess Cays is on the island of Eleuthera, the southernmost portion of the Bahamas, and was stumbled upon by Christopher Columbus in 1492. The island of Eleuthera is 100 miles long and two miles wide. Greeted by white-sand beaches, lush mangrove trees and turquoise waters, one would think you have arrived in paradise.
Princess Cays is a 30-acre beachfront resort, reserved for Princess passengers to enjoy exactly as they wish. For us, that meant dressing in bathing suits and rashguard shirts and taking our snorkelling gear with us as we jumped aboard a tender boat.
We experienced some pretty rough weather in the night. In fact the Captain told us the storm front that was bringing all the rain ended up having winds of 70 knots per hour - which we learned on land, would be the equivalent of a Category 1 hurricane. But we awoke to calm seas and a cessation of the rain. When we boarded the tender to go ashore our plan was to snorkel till we got cold, then take a tender to return to the ship. Instead, the clouds parted and the sky got bluer! What a lovely day in paradise.
We were in tender group 15 - this ticket number was given to us once we went to collect it after breakfast - good thing we weren't in a rush! We met some fellow Canadians in the line and learned the sustained water damage in their rooms last night with the heavy rain. Their cabin on deck 10 was wet enough that they were moved to another stateroom. They and 19 other rooms were affected! The expectation is that their room will dry out today and should be able to return by supper.
Once on land, we walked down the beach and selected a couple of lawn chairs to drop our few belongings (like the assigned blue beach towels), before heading into the water. The water was quite warm, if the waves a bit strong. J of course snorkelled longer than I did so I made some friends from Australia chatting about places we have been and hope to visit. His highlight while snorkelling was swimming with a school of squid!
We have visited this island a few times. Most recently, on a family trip with our boys over the Christmas holidays in 2017/2018. The island has changed a bit since then since it has weathered at least one hurricane.
This photo of our youngest P was taken in 2017 on the long pier with a red roofed structure at the end
Today's photo in 2026 with J and no shade structure at the end. The pier is looking a little more weathered. The lifeguard would routinely blow his whistle as people climbed up on the rocks to get a photo. That same lifeguard confirmed the shade structure was destroyed in a hurricane.
After snorkelling we wandered down the beach and an American couple were kind enough to chat with us and take our photo:
We decided to return to the ship to eat lunch as the quality of food is better on the ship, rather than what is offered on the island. The food on the island is delivered from the ship - but it just isn't our cup of tea.
We were lucky enough to catch an almost full tender that headed back to the ship just a few minutes after we boarded it. We did a quick clean up then headed to the Lido deck where we had a slice of pizza and a salad for lunch. J ironed some shirts in the laundromat (we love that there is a self laundry service on Princess ships) and I wrote my blog.
Supper will be at 5 pm and we will go the Princess Theatre show at 7 pm which is designed to feature ABBA's Greatest Hits as sung by Ashley Rose Smith. We hope to enjoy that!
No comments:
Post a Comment