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Going to 6 Souther Carribean ports on a cruise - overwhelmed


Joebucks
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As the title says, I will be going on a cruise in a few months that stops at St Kitts, St Maaten, St Lucia, St Thomas, Barbados, and Dominica. Previously, I had only been on cruises with 2 stops. I'm trying to figure out what to do there to not waste the stops, and to not break the bank either.

 

My top priority is to go to nice beaches, with clear, calm water. I do have my own snorkeling equipment. I understand without the right spots, I won't see the best reefs. I'm good with seeing anything. I am slightly intrigued to hear that Dominica has rainforests. All in all, I just don't know where to start. What are some good ideas?

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St. Maarten: Orient Beach is a gorgeous beach with clear, calm water. Not much to see snorkeling.

 

For St. Thomas, Coki Point meets your criteria. Great snorkeling, lovely beach, plus the Coral World Ocean Park. Magens Bay is an exceptional beach, but little snorkeling.

 

If you are interested in a Dominica rainforest tour, I can highly recommend Bumpiing Tours.

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Don't be nervous! My husband and I took this cruise last year, and it was our first time cruising, ever! Best week of our lives.

 

St. Thomas - Coki Pointe was absolutely beautiful, had some snorkeling areas, and had clean bathrooms

 

Barbados - The Boatyard for sure!! $20 per person US gets you into the boatyard (beach bar, but better) chair/umbrella, free cocktail, bathrooms, seaturtle and shipwreck snorkel for about an hour, and some awesome water activities, plus a ride back to the boat for free.

 

St. Kitts - We did the Fan-ta-Sea excursion. Had an absolute blast! It is your whole day, but it truly worth the money.

 

St. Lucia - We made some mistakes on this one... so Dont bother with Vigi beach (just lame and not good for snorkeling) or the beach right outside Pigeon Island. If you go inside the park, it may be better, but we were constantly offered drugs, and there was a lot of trash in the water. The next day, someone told us we should have gone snorkeling between the pitons as it was wonderful.

 

St. Marten- I cant recommend Mullet Bay Beach enough!! It is absolutely gorgeous, calm, and we found our own wild stingray! some decent snorkeling. A 10 minute walk or $3 cab ride will get you from there to Maho Beach, where the planes come in. Super cool! We did go to Great Bay for a little while, but it was just ok. Nothing special.

 

We had budgeted $100 per day for the 2 of us. We were always on or under budget, including bucket of beer and chairs, and taxis. Sometimes, we were way under.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Coki for st thomas wont break the bank....good choice...will see fish

levi bumpiing on dominica is so awesome....choose the gorge,waterfall and champagne reef....great day,so well run....money well spent here...

 

St lucia....agree a boat to the pitons is pricey but memorable....most other trips require a lot of time and traveling on awful roads loaded with other cruisers...

Stmaarten....beach,bars,shopping close to the ship...water taxi over..easy on the budget....

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  • 1 year later...
On 2/3/2018 at 11:01 PM, Joebucks said:

As the title says, I will be going on a cruise in a few months that stops at St Kitts, St Maaten, St Lucia, St Thomas, Barbados, and Dominica. Previously, I had only been on cruises with 2 stops. I'm trying to figure out what to do there to not waste the stops, and to not break the bank either.

 

My top priority is to go to nice beaches, with clear, calm water. I do have my own snorkeling equipment. I understand without the right spots, I won't see the best reefs. I'm good with seeing anything. I am slightly intrigued to hear that Dominica has rainforests. All in all, I just don't know where to start. What are some good ideas?

We are beach people when we cruise the Caribbean so that's all I can offer!

 

'St Martin' we take the water taxi ($6. pp) over to the beach next to the port, you can rent 2 loungers with 1 umbrella there for about $20-25. Great beach area, lots of drink/food options, and lots of shopping nearby.

 

'St Thomas we take a taxi usually shared (so it costs around $7 pp) over to Coki beach, which has good snorkeling, or to Megan's beach which is a nice swimming beach!

 

'St Lucia' we took a taxi(most expensive taxi is here on this island, abt $20. one way for 2)to Reduit Beach, to the St Lucia Yacht club where on one side there's Spinakers, and on the other side there's Hi Tide which is part of the Bayside beach resort. All of these 3 have decent food, there's loungers and umbrellas to rent on the beach (abt $25.) 

 

'Barbados' we took a taxi,(abt $6. pp) over to Brownes Beach where there's Pirate's Cove, The Boatyard, and Cococabana all in a row next to each other. All about the same, decent food, and drinks! Nice beach to swim!

 

St Kitts you can taxi over to Frigate Bay where there are a number of beach bar/rests. Boozies, Buddy's, Inon's, etc.. farther away is Reegae beach and Reegae beach bar!

 

Dominica the best bet is to share a taxi up to Coconut public beach!  Since you mentioned an interest in rain forest, that might be the best pick here other then the public beach!

 

Happy cruising!

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On 7/27/2019 at 2:29 PM, mitsugirly said:

I realize this is from last year, but hoping the OP will come back and tell me what cruise line it was? 6 ports is my kinda cruising!!! 😄

I’m doing a 6 port cruise with Celebrity in early January 

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  • 2 months later...

mitsugirly, I've done this itinerary twice.  Once on Carnival, once on Royal Caribbean.  Greatest itinerary ever.  It starts in San Juan, which is why you can get to so many islands in a few days.  I think Carnival dropped the stop in Dominica.  

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