The Cayman Turtle Centre is a large wildlife conservation facility located in Grand Cayman.
In addition to educational information, the park provides opportunities for guests to
swim and snorkel with green sea turtles; see sharks, barracuda, and other predators; play
in a large freshwater pool; and more.
In this video, we’ll provide an overview and tips from our December 2022 visit to the
Cayman Turtle Centre, when our ship, the Carnival Sunrise, visited Grand Cayman.
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Although cruise lines offer excursions to the Cayman Turtle Centre that include transportation,
we decided to purchase our tickets directly through the park and travel by public bus.
Doing the visit on our own saved some money for our family and also allowed us to experience
the park on a more relaxed time schedule.
We booked the full-access “Turtle Adventure Tour” through the Centre’s website prior
to our cruise.
The tour included general admission and access to all of the major attractions.
The day of our visit, we took the complimentary water shuttle from our ship
to the Royal Watler Cruise Terminal.
We then exited the terminal area and walked along Harbour Drive to the intersection with
Fort Street, then turned right, crossed the street, and walked along Fort Street to Heroes
Square and the bus depot.
The entire walk from the entrance of the cruise terminal area to the bus depot took about
five minutes.
Buses at the depot left roughly every five minutes and cost $2.50 per person each way.
With a very short wait, we were soon on our way to the Cayman Turtle Centre, about 10
minutes after stepping foot on the island.
It’s worth noting that we paid for everything on the island in US currency, which is accepted
everywhere as part of the Cayman Islands’ dual-currency economy.
The drive to the park took about 25 minutes.
After arriving, we went to the park’s ticket booth, where we redeemed the tickets we purchased
online for wristbands.
After entering the Cayman Turtle Centre shortly after it opened, we quickly realized there
were only a few other guests at the park because the cruise ship excursions had not yet arrived.
We decided to take advantage of the low crowds and headed straight to the saltwater Turtle
Lagoon to swim and snorkel with the young green sea turtles and reef fish.
Before heading in, we stored our belongings in a locker at the nearby shower facilities
using a lock we rented from the ticket booth at the entrance to the park.
A small shed structure located at the entrance to the Turtle Lagoon water provided life jackets
and snorkeling gear that was included with our ticket.
The lagoon was lengthy and some areas were too deep to stand with our heads above water,
so we greatly appreciated the life jackets letting us enjoy a relaxing swim among the
marine life.
We really enjoyed our time swimming and snorkeling with the turtles, especially since we practically
had the whole lagoon to ourselves for about an hour before other guests arrived.
After snorkeling, we showered and changed, then visited the Turtle Education Centre and Hatchery.
Unfortunately, we visited during the hatchery’s off-season, but there were still educational
exhibits and videos available.
Our next stop was Green’s Breeding Bay, which was located near the entrance to the
Cayman Turtle Centre.
The bay was home to the park’s fully mature, breeding green sea turtles and some of the
turtles weighed more than 300 pounds (or 136 kilograms)!
Continuing counter-clockwise around the park, the next exhibit we visited was the Turtle
Tanks, which featured turtles of varying ages and sizes.
As we walked around the Turtle Tanks, we saw the first of many wild green iguanas and feral
chickens that were wandering around the park.
Nearby, the Turtle Wading Pools allowed guests to enter the water and touch younger turtles,
much to the delight of JellyBean.
Guests were not allowed to pick up the turtles and were instructed to interact with the turtles
by using a gentle, two-finger touch.
A hand washing and sanitizing station was located nearby.
Breakers Lagoon was a freshwater pool area located near the back of the Cayman Turtle
Centre that featured waterfalls and the Turtle Twister waterslide.
The lagoon had pool depths that ranged up to eight feet (or about 2.4 meters)
and the minimum height to ride the water slide was four feet (or about 1.2 meters).
Around the pool area, there were sun loungers and shaded areas,
bathrooms and lockers,
a small playground for small children,
and more chickens and iguanas.
The pool area also featured an underwater view of the nearby Predator Reef, but we used
the dry viewing window to view the sharks, barracudas, and other predators.
Near the pool area and the Predator Reef, the park had a restaurant with food and drinks
available for purchase.
Our final stops at the Cayman Turtle Center included the Caribbean Free Flight Aviary,
which featured birds that are native to the Caribbean;
the Cayman Butterfly House, which had very few butterflies due to the time of year;
and the gift shop which was located at the park’s exit.
To catch the public bus back to the bus depot and cruise terminal area, we waited in the
shaded area in front of the park.
We only had to wait a couple of minutes before a bus arrived and we headed back.
Now, a few quick tips for your visit to the Cayman Turtle Centre.
Signage is plentiful throughout the park, but we found it helpful to have an understanding
of the park’s layout before we arrived.
A map is available on the park’s website, which we’ve linked in the description below.
We also found it helpful to take a photo of the day's schedule of events, which was posted
at the park’s ticket booth.
If you’re planning to rent a lock for a locker, the rental required a 20 dollar cash
deposit during our visit.
Ten dollars was returned to us when we returned the lock as we exited the park.
Free public WiFi was available throughout the park.
The WiFi password could be requested from the staff at the park’s ticket booth.
For the public bus, don’t wait until the last minute to catch a bus back to the bus
depot and cruise terminal area.
The buses are basically just large passenger vans and they will not stop if they’re already
full of passengers.
Since the bus routes begin and end at the depot, this really isn’t a problem for the
bus ride heading to the park.
During our visit, the Cayman Turtle Centre was available from the Yellow Westbound #1
and the Green Westbound #2 bus routes.
Bus routes can change, so we highly recommend checking with the driver to confirm the bus
is headed to the park before getting in.