Today is the last day in Grand Cayman and our beautiful AirBnB. We are quite sad to leave something which we really didn’t expect when planning the trip. We were quite surprised at the excellent birdwatching, beautiful beaches and laid back atmosphere. Before going to the airport we decide to explore one more nearby pond and hopefully find the only major bird we missed, the West Indian Whistling Duck.
We enjoy the last morning and breakfast in our AirBnB while watching the herons and warblers pass through the mangroves. Then it is time to clean up and check out and make our way to the airport.
But before the airport we have a couple stops planned, first Malportas Pond where whistling ducks were sighted repeatedly. On the way we see a couple ani but even more exciting a wild agouti! It is gone so fast that we can’t take photos of it but we saw it and that makes this a worthy detour.
Malportas Pond, at least from where we parked, is a bit dry with the water far in the distance. The dry section is really scenic but we are here for the birds and none that we see are whistling ducks. At least we notice a few pelicans very far in the distance and that is that and we have to return to get in time to the airport.
The last detour is for Bodden Town Mission House which is closed today as far as we can see but we still want to see it from the outside. We are happy that we have it waypointed as it is difficult to understand exactly where it is.
But we can identify it immediately when we arrive in the parking lot and we also explore the nearby pond and then it is off to the airport. On the way we stop to buy some gas and then it is time to return the car and start the airline check in process.
The airport is really small and it doesn’t even have a lounge and we explore the one shop for a while before going to the waiting area where our plane is leaving from. Here we are forced to measure the carry on bags – there is no issue but it is weird as we didn’t have to do it for quite some time.
Leaving we take one last look at the island from above. Now we can point at different spots and say we have been there and we have seen them, it was a great trip overall and we really enjoyed it.
We pass again over Cuba and we see marshlands and small villages and then arrive in Miami. This time we don’t fly to Chicago but to Miami so that is really good as at least here we have a lounge that we can visit during the downtime.
Finding the lounge takes some time but we find it after some vigurous hiking of about 30 minutes. Here we find out we have to order via app and everything needs to be requested from attendants but we still eat enough until it is time to return to the gate for our flight. Luckily there are no further issues and we enjoy our flight back after our great trip in Grand Cayman.
