Best St. Maarten & St. Thomas excursions thu Freedom of the Seas

Another vote for taking the excursion from St Thomas to St John & Trunk Bay. It's a beautiful beach and you can see some nice fish if you snorkel. It's one of the most beautiful places I've ever been. Definitely take the ship's excursion, you don't want to be stressed about making it back in time and ruin such a nice, relaxing day!

In St. Maarten .....

The Golden Eagle Catamaran excursion through the ship is always an extremely enjoyable & fun time! :D

The America's Cup is a good on as well! :)

LuLu

We did Capt. Bob's in St. Marteen and it was really great. He has multiple speed boats and takes you to 4-5 different beaches, snorkeling at two of them, one with sea turtles. A delicious lunch was provided at a restaurant on one of the beaches. And they serve water, sodas and beer throughout the excursion.

We're booked with Cap'n Bob in April...we've read good things and can't wait to go!

Another vote for Bernard's...we did his tour in 2011 and absolutely loved it!!

I've been to both quite a few times and last December I went back to St Maarten. Rather than do an excursion we decided to walk into town and go to backstreet. We waited for a bus and got on and went to Marigot. It cost I believe either one or two dollars each. Took around half an hour and we saw the island. Once there we wandered around the town, found the most amazing French bakery and cafe on the front and had coffee and cakes. We then wandered along the sea front and up the hill to the old lookout. After a couple of hours we got the bus to the beach by the airport, it was really busy but we wanted to see it.

We then went back to the Dutch side, sunbathed on the front beach and had jet skis. Followed by some amazing cocktails at a little bar called Dirty Sanchez :p then wandered back to the ship.

Really laid back, low cost relaxing day, one of the very best we've had. Done the tours and like them but this was amazing - all because I read a post on here months ago saying why pay for a taxi to Marigot when you can easily find a bus for a buck or two - don't normally do those things but did and loved it.

Following that we decided to do the reggae bus in Barbados where there's what seems like 50 people on a bus seating 20 and music blaring out - it was really good fun :cool:

Will go to St Barth on a day trip from St Martin / from the Indy on April 14, trying to find a review on this. It seams,that RCL just started offering this trip . I wish someone had this done .

Thanks ,any suggestions will be appreciated,

Not sure if they still offer it but we have done the America's Cup regatta through RCI and it was an amazing exciting time. Worth every penny.

 

In St. Thomas, we have done an excursion to St. John through RCI to see Trunk Bay, very pretty beach.

I agree these our my favorite tours at both ports.You can be as active or inactive as you choose on america'a cup. some jobs are very physical. I was timekeeper and husband was beer server. lots of fun even though we went throught a bad rain storm and got soaked.

Going on the Oasis in May and booked tree limin zipline in St Thomas, since it got all good reviews from everything I read.

Son, wife and 12 year old just did zipline and loved it.

Will go to St Barth on a day trip from St Martin / from the Indy on April 14, trying to find a review on this. It seams,that RCL just started offering this trip . I wish someone had this done .

Thanks ,any suggestions will be appreciated,

RCCL offered this excursion (or one like it) years ago and I wished I had gone. Now I'm wondering if I should do that or go to Maho. If you can't even get near the beach bar then I don't want to stand on a beach waiting to see a plane.

Just booked a cruise for late summer on Royal Caribbean's Freedom of the Seas. I was curious if there are any "don't miss" excursions you'd recommend in Philipsburg, St. Maarten or Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas. Thanks!

St Maarten this excursion is only thru the ship. It is excellent

http://www.12metre.com/regatta.htm

St. Thomas. On your own. Not crowded and the best snorkel we have ever done. :)

http://www.usvisailing.com/daysails.html

Ciera123,

looking at this excursion through RC, it say the departure is 1:00 pm. Did you have to hurry through to make it back on the boat? We will be in St Thomas 10:00 am - 7:00 pm

We just got back from sailing on the independence and I highly recommend Soualiga Destination tours in St Maarten. It's rated number one on trip advisor and for good reason. It was hands down the best excursion we've all ever done. He takes you around the island and then snorkelling before an amazing included lunch. We then went snorkelling and touring around before heading to the airport to see planes landing. It was absolutely amazing.

This was a blast! Underwater scooter and snorkeling tour!

http://www.royalcaribbean.com/shoreExcursions/product/detail/view.do?sourcePage=shorexByPort&ProductCode=STB8&DestinationCode=CARIB

If you want to go to St. John, it's the one time I'd recommend the ship's excursion. The ferry picks you up at the cruise pier and returns you to the same spot. The extra few dollars beats taking a taxi to Red Hook and then the public ferry.

We have done it on our own 3 times with no problems. Saw the tour come in from the ship herding everyone on and they dont let you stay very long. It was so enjoyable to go at our own pace leaving plenty of time to return. ready to do it again in Sept. I think its my favorite beach ever, plus there is a nice restaurant right off the ferry to sit on the deck and have a cocktail on th water...ohh I cannot wait!! :D

It's actually a very enjoyable ride despite the 'herding' you witnessed. The crew kept us entertained and actually gave us a history of the islands as we passed and they provided plenty of time on the island. St. Thomas traffic can be tough and jumping on the ferry at the cruise pier beats a taxi ride in our book. Glad we have that choice.

Does the champagne catamaran to St John leave right from the port or do you have to take a bus first ? Also, was it a small 20-30 people group or those large 60-80 people tours ? Thx

On St. Martin, we take the water taxi to the main beach, walk 2 streets in to grab a bus going to Maho Beach to eat, drink, and watch the planes land!

Water taxi is about $6. a person round trip, and the bus is about $2. per person one way.

The Driftwood bar is closest to the bus stop, while at the other end of the beach the Sunset bar is the most popular.

Either bar are about the same in food and drink prices and quality! (prices are reasonable, food OK)

The 2 streets of shopping that you'll walk by to get to the bus have all kinds of shopping, and some really good prices.:)

Does the champagne catamaran to St John leave right from the port or do you have to take a bus first ? Also, was it a small 20-30 people group or those large 60-80 people tours ? Thx

When I did this excrusion, there was a ~20 min ride to the marina in an open-air van taxi thing. There were 20-30 people on the cat - there was plenty of space. I loved this excursion and would highly recommend it :)

Has anyone recently done Godfrey, or Sonny Liston tours in St. Thomas?

We will be on Freedom in September and trying to decide what tour we should do.

I know I already posted about this excursion on this thread, but I can't emphasize enough how great this excursion was.

RB,

did you book through the ship? I can only find a 1/2 day excursion though the ship and it does not include lunch

Did it twice. Loved it.

 

Stars and Stripes vs. True North, real race with real racing yacht. And you are the crew.

Should read: ...and you are the working crew!:p

(I was the time keeper)

We actually did a ship tour in St Thomas and it was one of the best excursions we've ever done. It was a snorkeling excursion where they took us out on a motorized sail boat to swim with the turtles. Then on the way back they hoisted the sails and we sailed back drinking rum punch and eating chips and salsa. this is the company that ran it.

Screaming Eagle in St Thomas is great, but you will get soaked. I was surprised a fish didn't end up in our laps! America's Cup Race was okay. I looked forward to it so much, but was disappointed. I couldn't enjoy the race because I had to concentrate on my "wrench" role. It was not fun. We did fishing in St Thomas. We didn't catch anything and 1/4 of people were seasick, but Crew was very nice and helpful. I don't regret going.

Sent from my iPad using Forums

We were on the Allure last March which brought us to both St. Thomas and St. Maartin. We very much enjoyed the Paradise Tours Tramway on ST. Thomas. From the smaller dock, you can just walk across the street on the other side of the market , but the Allure has to use a docking area farther away so we took a large open roof jeep like taxi for $5pp.

The Tramway is about $21 or so per person if I remember correctly, but we had to "correct their math" with our change from a $100 bill to get the right amount of change. There is a wonderful restaurant up there, and the view is phenomenal! We thought it was just an hour or so type trip, planning to do some shopping but we enjoyed the food and libations for a few hours. If you go, you've got to try to "Key Lime Pie" cocktail or the "Bushwacker". They are delicious!

We've been to ST. Maartin twice, and enjoyed a lovely tour by Bernard's Tours as well as a quick cab ride to Maho Beach. Being that we run a small airport on Cape Cod, we LOVE the huge jetliners taking off and landing over the beach! People go crazy for it! But the biggest surprise is that the Sunset Bar has really good food! We had pizza and wings with a few cocktails and it was great!

We're heading back on the Freedom 2/21/16- can't wait!

Related question: do these independent tour operators and taxi drivers generally take U.S. cash?

Related question: do these independent tour operators and taxi drivers generally take U.S. cash?

They have on our trips to St. Maarten. St. Thomas is the US, so no problem there.