August 2 - Castaway Cay

On this day, in 1998, the first boatload of guests got to enjoy the Caribbean paradise known as Castaway Cay. A small island called Gorda Cay (even though it looks like it's pronounced like the letter k you actually say it like key) has been a small part of the Abaco Island area of the Bahamas ever since, well, ever since people started naming things. A cay, by the way is basically a pile of sand sitting on top of a coral reef. There are thousands of them throughout the Caribbean, but Gorda Cay has had an inkling that it was destined for something bigger for a while now.

Image copyright Touchstone Pictures

The first people to live on the island started doing so in 1783. The semi-remoteness of Gorda Cay lent itself to smuggling operations and plenty of nefarious people would leave footprints in its sand for the first two hundred years of inhabitation. When air travel became a thing, a small airstrip was built on the island and is still there today. The first planes to land on Gorda were carrying illegal liquor during the Prohibition of the 1930s. When booze became legal in the US again, it didn't take long for the planes to start carrying illegal drugs instead. Eventually the Bahamian government cracked down on such illicit activities and Gorda Cay was used for more glamorous things.

The picturesque sands of Gorda Cay made it a beautiful, if somewhat remote, location on which to film beach scenes. The Walt Disney company had used it for just that purpose twice. In Touchstone Picture's inaugural movie, Splash, the scene where Tom Hanks' and Darryl Hannah's characters first meet is a glimpse of Gorda Cay. Twenty years later, parts of Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl were also filmed on the island. Of course by the time the Pirates movies came around, Gorda Cay was virtually owned by Disney and was a ready made location for the company, but I'm getting a little ahead of myself.

Image copyright Disney

In the mid-Nineties, as the Walt Disney Company was gearing up to get into the cruise line business, company management knew they needed a private island getaway. Somewhere that guests could spend a day swimming in the waters of the Caribbean, but in a controlled way, a way that would entice them to spend some more money, more money that Disney could keep instead of going to Bahamian locals. It may sound like I'm waxing a bit cynical here, but that really isn't that far off from how corporate people think. I don't know if someone in upper management at that time had been part of the production team for Splash a dozen years earlier or not, but everyone became very interested in Gorda Cay as that destination.

Image courtesy cruisemapper.com

After scouting other nearby cays, the size and location of Gorda Cay cemented its future (the fact that it already had an airstrip was helpful, too). Disney entered into negotiations with the Bahamian government and came out the other end with a 99 year lease on the island, but not a lease like you or I would get on an apartment. Disney basically had full control to do whatever they wanted with the place and boy did they have some plans.

Image courtesy reddit.com

Not only did Disney plan to basically build a resort on Gorda Cay, they knew they needed to make some changes to its very topography. While other cruise lines had private islands at the time, all of them required the cruise ship to park offshore. Guests then had to ride smaller boats, called tenders, back and forth between the liner and the island. Those tenders frequently showed up as complaints on guest surveys. Disney decided to dredge out a docking area so their cruise ships could just cozy right on up to the island and guests would just walk between their staterooms and the beach. 50,000 truckloads of sand and coral later, they got their wish (sometimes it's good to be a multi-billion dollar company before starting a project). All told, Disney spent $25 million transforming their island into the highest rated private destination in the cruise industry.

Image courtesy mousecastpodcast.com

Since it was so different from what it had been for hundreds of years, it needed a new name as well. Gorda Cay became Castaway Cay. Around 120 people now live there full time, none of which, as far as we know, are involved in the smuggling trade in any way. The cay technically opened for business on July 30, 1998, the same day that the Disney Magic left Port Canaveral on its maiden voyage but it was a few days into the Magic's itinerary that guests actually set foot on its beaches. Disney ships have been docking there several days a week since. And while it may seem like there has been a huge environmental impact on the island in that time, there has. But it could be much worse. Only 55 of Castaways Cay's 1000 available acres has been developed and Disney does a pretty good job of conserving the other 94% of the island.

I've been to Castaway Cay several times myself and also been to the "private" island that Royal Caribbean operates. While there were a few things I think RC does better than Disney, the island getaway is not one of them. If you can swing yourself a Disney cruise, the day you spend on Castaway Cay will very likely be your favorite day. And coming from someone who doesn't ever really feel a need to get off a cruise ship, that's saying something.