Cozumel, Grand Cayman, and Belize help...

[CruisinJazz]

I will be sailing to Cozumel, Grand Cayman, Belize and Roatan on the Carnival Legend this September! WooHoo!!! This will be my second cruise, but my first cruise to these ports. Can you just grab a taxi at any of these ports to take you to a local beach without purchasing an actual excursion???? I know I will be scuba diving as an excursion in Roatan. I appreciate any advice or help! I would like to cut down costs as much as possible.

[ibcnusoon]

In Cozumel you can take a taxi to Paradise Beach, rent lounge chairs and order food and drinks. Cozumel also has a few all-inclusive day beaches like Nachi Cocom and Mr. Santo.

 

There are no beaches in Belize and it's best to have a planned excursion in Belize. Belize has excellent scuba diving so you may want to look into moving your scuba excursion from Roatan to Belize.

 

In Roatan, the ship docks right beside the beach at Mahagony Bay. You can rent lounge chairs and more through the Carnival excursion list on their website. The beach is free, so if you just want to lay down a towel, you can do that too.

 

In Grand Cayman, you can take a short taxi ride to 7 Mile Beach, rent a lounge chair.

 

It's probably best if you went over to the Ports of Call section and ask specific question in the threads dedicated to each of these port stops. There's alot more valuable information to be found there: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=5

[3kids1dog]

You can easily grab a cab in Cozumel or Grand Caymen and head to the beach..if you do some research on the excursion boards, you will find a lot of different suggestions. Belize, is a bit different, there is really no beaches right off of land, most of them are islands that you need to take a boat to. I think the general consensus, is that Belize is not really the place to venture out on your own. Again, if you spend some time on the excursion boards,you will get a wealth of information. We are headed to the same ports on the Legend in August!:)

[CruisinJazz]

Thank you for allowing me to post the question here and receive suggestions as I've been finding the excursion portion of the boards a bit overwhelming in trying to figure out what is best to do. lol I'm still a newbie at this!

[crusinpsychRN]

Did you join your roll call? I'm going 9/16 on Legend and losts of people are talking about excursions they are planning on the roll call.

 

In Belize I did the Carnival Land Rover cave expedition. It's a lot of fun and I can recommend it unless you want to scuba in Belize. Cave tubing is great there too!

[skiorcruise]

We just got off the Legend. Traveled with my 83 year young father, who is having a hip replaced soon (so mobility was a minor problem). In Belize, we took the Aquatic Wonders Semi Sub & Beach at Rendezvous Cay excursion through the ship. Great look at the reef & fish from the semisub, and about 1.5 hours on a little private island beach. We all loved it.

[lauraleigh9mm]

Nachi Cocum in Cozumel. Our day is COZ had 7, yes SEVEN cruise ships in port. It was nice to go to a small place that was not crowded and relax. I think it is $55 per adult now (plus tip and taxi fare) WELL worth it.

I would do Stingray City in Grand Cayman, plus the turtle farm!

In Belize, snorkel or scuba on the reef, or cave tubing.

[Bomax2]

skiorcruise - My husband and I have the Aquatic Wonders booked and I was wondering about the bathroom situation. Everything I have read about Rendezvous Island indicates it is very small with no ammenities. Does the Educator Too have a bathroom? Don' t have to go that often, but 4 1/2 hours, I may need to. :o

[rockbock]

I cruised to Grand Cayman and Cozumel the first week of October last year. The water was very warm and it should be similar when you travel this year at around the same time.

 

We had a GREAT time at both locations and we did a LOT in Cozumel for VERY little money. I wrote detailed reviewes of both locations.

 

Here's what we did in Grand Cayman:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1512357

 

Here's what we did in Cozumel: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1500129

When we travel to Cozumel this September 29th, we'll be spending the day snorkeling at The Money Bar *or* visiting Chankanaab park (which will include snorkeling)

 

When we cruise to Belize as part of that same cruise, we'll be doing Cave Tubing It runs about $40 per person with most of the companies for a 5-hour excursion. Some of the companies include lunch and unlimited rum punch for this price.

 

As another member suggested, you should probably visit the Port Of Call forum for each location. That's where all of the good information can be found.

[OCruisers]

Please do check out the Port of Call section under each of your port stops. So much helpful informantion there that you'd enjoy reading.

 

In Cozumel and Grand Cayman you can easily take a taxi to a nice beach.

 

Since you'll be on Carnival, you'll dock at Mahogany Bay in Roatan and there's a beach right there.

 

You'll need to do some sort of excursion in Belize! Excellent scuba diving there!

 

Have fun planning.

[divingmedic]

I will be sailing to Cozumel, Grand Cayman, Belize and Roatan on the Carnival Legend this September! WooHoo!!! This will be my second cruise, but my first cruise to these ports. Can you just grab a taxi at any of these ports to take you to a local beach without purchasing an actual excursion???? I know I will be scuba diving as an excursion in Roatan. I appreciate any advice or help! I would like to cut down costs as much as possible.

You will love diving in Roatan. I dove there a few years ago. The diving in Belize is an hour boat ride to get to.

[txtara]

Cavetubing in Belize is awesome! Search cavetubing with Vitalino Reyes. Awesome experience!

[StingRaysfan]

You can easily take a taxi to a beach in Cozumel and Grand Cayman. The previously mentioned Nachi Cocum is all inclusive for the day and is really nice so I second that, but there are also free beaches to go to. I would do some research on them... some will be rocky, some sandy, some will have good snorkeling if you want that, some will not. I know the Cozumel board will have a ton of threads just centered around the beaches!

 

The husband did a 2 tank dive in Roatan and he said it was great... so you will enjoy that.

 

Belize... I would find an excursion there... for all the reasons previously mentioned.

[vols_159]

Thank you for allowing me to post the question here and receive suggestions as I've been finding the excursion portion of the boards a bit overwhelming in trying to figure out what is best to do. lol I'm still a newbie at this!

 

 

In Belize theres a gate around the port area.. dont travel outside the gate alone... What we did was book the cave tubbing trip.. I would never book a excursion again that wasnt thru the cruise line.. Yes they cost 20 bucks more but the ship wont leave without you if your excursion is late and if you get hurt the medical staff will treat you for free..

[rockbock]

I would never book a excursion again that wasnt thru the cruise line.. Yes they cost 20 bucks more but the ship wont leave without you if your excursion is late and if you get hurt the medical staff will treat you for free..

 

And I'm the exact opposite. I won't book through the cruise line. The upcharge is normally much more than $20 per person. The groups are almost always going to be 3 - 5 times larger through the cruise line. The cruise line tours typically won't include as much "extra" information as the local tour operators (they live there and they have a lot more knowledge to share). And let's face it...if the tour guides made it a practice to let cruisers miss their ship, they'd be out of business. Search the Ports Of Call forums for horror stories about passengers missing the ship due to a private excursion not getting there on time. I'm sure if you look, you'll. find a few. However, I view these boards a LOT and I've yet to see even one.

 

And just to comment in a little more detail about the group sizes for cruise line excursions, I'd like to offer a personal example. We went with Captain Frank's for the stingray/snorkeling excursion in Grand Cayman last year. We paid $35 per person and it included 45 minutes with the stingrays, and 45 minutes with snorkeling. We also had snacks and drinks included (including unlimited rum punch). There were seven of us total on this excursion, with two guides. We pulled up alongside the Carnival excursion. They paid $70 per person. There were close to 100 passengers and two or three guides. They stayed at each location for the same 45 minutes, but they had almost no interaction with the stingrays. They had to wait in line to get off the boat. Then they had to wait in line to touch a stingray. They weren't really "swimming with the stingrays" because there were sooooo many people that the stingrays generally swam away toward our less crowded area. We spent our entire 45 minutes holding stingrays and viewing them as they kept trying to rub up against us. It was amazing. The same goes for the snorkeling. We were only 7 people, so we had a ton of fish to view and lots of swimming room. The Carnival excursion area had close to 100 people all trying to navigate the reef without swimming into each other. It just didn't look like any fun at all and they paid double...plus, they didn't get the snacks or rum punch.

 

They ONLY way I would ever consider a cruise line excursion is if there was something I reeeeeeeeeeealllllllly wanted to do and it was expected to take up the entire time we were on the island. But if there's even an hour of wiggle room, I'd never opt for a cruiseline excursion. Total ripoff, even if you get in on one of their 20% off deals.