Dive Review of Sunset House in
Cayman Islands/Grand Cayman

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Sunset House, Nov, 2013, by Patricia A. Sinclair, LA, US ( Top Contributor 31 reports with 10 Helpful votes). Report 7410.
No photos available at this time
Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Accommodations		Food
Service and Attitude		Environmental Sensitivity
Dive Operation		Shore Diving
Snorkeling	N/A
Overall Rating
Value for $$
Beginners
Advanced
Comments	Grand Cayman Trip Part 2 - June 28 to July 6 2013 Wednesday Morning – The ACCIDENT, the Dives and more! It rained overnight and I was oh so careful heading down to breakfast. Made it there and back in plenty of time to sit down for a second and look at my iPad. Once I did that, I was ready to head down to go diving! I picked up my camera, carried it in my left hand and with right hand on the railing proceeded down the stairs. On the second stair down, my right foot flew out from under me, I pulled back on the railing and then rolled on my left side, trying to get my arm up to avoid the camera from being broken during the fall that was happening. I impacted on my bum, left elbow and back, hit quite hard, very painful. A nice young man at My Bar came running up the stairs to me and offered help. I was most concerned about the camera, so went straight to the camera bucket and put it in, hoping that there would be no bubbles, there weren’t. I slowly walked to the locker and got my gear together and over to the boat area…of course I was going to dive! Once the gear was at the boat, I got the camera and boarded. I explained what happened to the boat captain, the DM and Steve and Fred. I asked if I could gear off in the water and then walk up the ladder, they said it would be fine. I did the two dives but I sure hurt, but worst of all, my left strobe no longer was working. I thought that it had impacted the concrete too, so I checked to see if it was flooded or cracked. It wasn’t. So, figuring the fall and impact had damaged it, I wanted to get it to Cathy to see if there was anything she could do to make it work. Once back to the dock, I got the gear rinsed, and into the locker. I then proceed up the stairs and after resting about every 3rd step, I made it to the room. I cleaned up and dried my hair. The bruises were already livid on my elbow, back and bum. I then CAREFULLY went downstairs to the office to tell Keith what happened. On the way there I sneezed and the pain in my back was like a knife stabbing me. From that point on, every deep breath I took hurt. I could not possibly take the strobe class with Tony, so I had the office contact Cathy. She met me in the office, and she recommended that I go to the hospital, and I agreed with her. But first things first, the strobe! She tried it and it didn’t work. She took it and went to the photo shop while I had Keith drive me to the hospital. My biggest worry was the possibility of cracked or broken ribs…that would kill the diving totally. At the hospital I waited and waited to see a doctor. When I finally saw one, he checked my elbow and said it was not injured, other than bruising. For the rest, he sent me for the x-rays I already knew were needed. While in the radiology lab, the technician was ever so kind and tried very hard not to cause me any further pain. She was so very nice. When she saw my name, she said to me, ”You are Ellen’s friend – Pat!” Turns out, she too is a diver and a photographer (and a pretty good one as well) – from that point on we talked like old friends. I got back to the doctor’s waiting area and finally he came in and said that nothing was cracked or broken, but apparently the muscle pulls were very bad. He prescribed a muscle relaxant and an anti-inflammatory. The muscle relaxant was to be taken once a day and the other twice a day. I took the first at night and then took the anti-inflammatory in the morning, after my dives. I did not want any drugs to mask the pain, that way I would know if I did something to make it worse or not. Upon returning to the resort, Keith told me he was moving me to a downstairs room. This turned out to be a lovely ocean view room that was huge! The ocean view was lovely, and there were very few steps for me to negotiate. The bathroom was very nice, but the shower was absolutely decadent!!! Thursday and Friday Mornings were spent diving. Since I could not do the shore dives as planned with Ellen and Michael on Thursday, we agreed to meet for lunch on Friday before I headed to Sting Ray City. I opted out of the Thursday Kittiwake boat dive, and am glad I did. Steve went and the current was rough – he said he felt like a flag on the down line. I would have never made it through that dive! Instead I spent the afternoon on Thursday taking a nap. On Friday, in between the morning dives and the StingRay City dive,I met Ellen, Michael and their two teenage children at My Bar. They ate lunch while I had a nice cup of coffee and a glass of water (I tend not to eat between dives.) It was a lovely visit and the two teenagers are both quite intelligent and have already pretty good senses of humor. Piled into the car with Steve to go on the Sting Ray City dive and we were driven over to the other side of the island. This was going to be the pictures that I always wanted to take. When I got into the water, and did a test shot, my camera would not shoot. It would turn on, but you could not shoot it. Great, I thought to myself, a 49 minute dive and no camera, so no shots. I was worried that I might have somehow broken it, but that was not the case. When I got back to my room and took the camera out, I found the gear ring on the lens had slipped up against the camera, and that caused the problem. When I put it back into place, it took pictures without any issues. Another lesson learned. Once you change the SD card and battery, put the camera in, turn it on and off and further, check to see that you can take a picture with it before you ever leave the room. After coming back to the resort, I cleaned up my gear and took it to the room. I then hung it out to dry on the porch, where there was still a little bit of sun. I planned in the morning to move it to a brightly lit area so that it could complete drying before I packed up and headed to the airport. I checked my weights back in at the dive shop and found that what I had thought was 14 pounds was really only 13 pounds. I had 3 3pound weights and 1 4 pound weight. So, for the whole week I was diving 1 pound lighter than I thought I was. So, bottom line is I don’t need more than 12 or 13 pounds, since by the end of the trip I was dropping like a rock and feeling heavy in the water. Saturday My flight was at 4:10 PM, so I had plenty of time to go to a leisurely breakfast, then moved my bcd, bcd pockets, dive skins, dive socks to a warm sunny spot to complete drying. I spent the morning packing my camera system into the pelican case, going out and flipping the items over and ensuring they were thoroughly dry before packing it up and packing my clothes and toiletries. At 11:00AM I got the dive gear, and finished packing my dive bag. Then I read for an hour. At 12:30PM, I called for the person to come and get my bags. I dropped off the tip for the dive shop and then went to the office. I checked out, cleared my tab and then left the tip for the housekeeping staff. Caught the cab to the airport and checked in, checked my dive bag and the pelican case and then waited around until my flight home. The flight to MIA was uneventful, nothing was offered for food in first class, so I just read. Getting through MIA customs was fairly easy and then getting through the TSA was entertaining. They had a young TSA officer who decided to let us all know that while, he personally agreed that all this was a massive hassle and all, that we still had to comply. His attitude was so nice and funny that I had no problems with the fact that having come from a secure plane, once again I had to go through security checks. There must be a way that international travelers who just came off a plane can be routed through secure areas of the airport for customs and then on to their connecting flights. Caught my flight to New Orleans and made it home to MSY at 12:30 AM on the 7th and once I had put my bags in the office and messed around with the cats, I was able to go to sleep. Bottomline – For the whole trip, I got in 16 dives and got in 16 hours and 16 minutes in the water. I have now completed 451 dives. The average dive time was one hour and about 1 minute. Next year I hope to make it to 500 on either my trip to in Roatan or Bonaire. Will I go back to Grand Cayman and Sunset House, you bet I would, in a heart-beat. Defiantly not planning on slipping and falling again, but everything else was just great. Keith is a wonderful manager/host and the dive shop is very good. My DM Reese and Boat Captain, Aaron were both wonderful in and out of the water. Both had a fanatastic sense of humor and we very accommodating after my injury. Cathy Church is a great instructor. I am going to go back and get the Strobe class and Photoshop class I need from her. More instruction on how to use the camera might also be needed. Meeting up with and diving with Ellen and her husband will be high on my list of to-dos on the next trip. I am keeping in contact with Steve and there is a chance we will meet up again in July of next year. I also found that I no longer see as well as I first did when underwater. So I have resolved to purchase a prescription dive mask so that I can once again see all the little stuff, which would help for shooting them, eh? And Lastly (but not least) The FOOD: In case I have not yet mentioned it, the Indian food at Sunset House is wonderful. Some of the best I have had. I had the Tikka Masala, the Chicken Biryani, Korma and Samosas over the course of the week. I also had the bacon wrapped shrimp – to die for!
Websites	Sunset House
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	251-500 dives
Where else diving	Caribbean and Philippines
Closest Airport		Getting There
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny, windy, rainy, cloudy	Seas	calm, choppy, surge
Water Temp	80-85°F / 27-29°C	Wetsuit Thickness
Water Visibility	50-75 Ft/ 15-23 M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	no
Enforced diving restrictions	follow DM for 45 minutes and lmit time to one hour.
Liveaboard?	no	Nitrox Available?	yes
What I Saw
Sharks	None	Mantas	None
Dolphins	None	Whale Sharks	None
Turtles	1 or 2	Whales	None
Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):
Corals		Tropical Fish
Small Critters		Large Fish	N/A
Large Pelagics	N/A
Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Subject Matter	N/A	Boat Facilities	N/A
Overall rating for UWP's	N/A	Shore Facilities	N/A
UW Photo Comments	[None]

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Dive Review of Sunset House in Cayman Islands/Grand Cayman

Sunset House, Nov, 2013,

Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Overall Rating

Reporter and Travel

Dive Conditions

Dive Policy

What I Saw

Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):

Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Dive Review of Sunset House in
Cayman Islands/Grand Cayman