Southern Caribbean - Adventure of Sea

[needabreakcanada]

Ports of Call:

 

San Juan, Puerto Rico; Bridgetown, Barbados; Castries, St. Lucia; St. John's, Antigua; Philipsburg, St. Maarten; St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands; San Juan, Puerto Rico

 

Can anyone tell me about this cruise experience?

 

Any and all, thanks

[MOSusan]

Ports of Call:

 

San Juan, Puerto Rico; Bridgetown, Barbados; Castries, St. Lucia; St. John's, Antigua; Philipsburg, St. Maarten; St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands; San Juan, Puerto Rico

 

Can anyone tell me about this cruise experience?

 

Any and all, thanks

 

We've done both the Adventure and the Serenade out of San Juan and they have been our favorite cruises.

 

Bridgetown - We snorkled with the turtles. It was fantastic. The company was El Tigre and they were the best!

 

St. Martin - we spent the day at Maho Beach watching the planes land. Both the Hubby and son are airplane lovers so it was a blast. Beach was OK, but experience was a once in a lifetime.

 

San Juan - as we left the ship our porter took us to one of the tour buses outside the terminal. We paid $25 per head for a tour of the city, our luggage was secure in the bus and we were dropped at the airport. A great value for the money.

 

Make sure you stop by Barrachina Restaurant the birthplace of the Pina Colada - YUM!

[KAWS]

I've done this cruise (but with Carnival). It's a wonderful experience, but it's exhausting! I don't even remember much about the ship because with a port/excursion every day we were happy to come back, clean up, have dinner and go to the show, then bed. Start over the next day.

 

Not sure if this cruise has a port on the last day instead of a sea day. Ours was the first day, sea day, only. I don't want to do another cruise where the last day isn't a full sea day. That was a big major for us.

 

If you're going strictly to get bang for your buck port wise and you don't really care about the ship so much, then this is a wonderful, value filled cruise. It's a great itinerary, but I think it could have done with at least one less port. And yes I know I could have just stayed on the ship, but honestly who wants to do that if you haven't been there before. Nope, we did it all. Good but to me, a bit more memorable if you can actually remember the ports afterwards! :p

[Debitoo]

Ports of Call:

 

San Juan, Puerto Rico; Bridgetown, Barbados; Castries, St. Lucia; St. John's, Antigua; Philipsburg, St. Maarten; St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands; San Juan, Puerto Rico

 

Can anyone tell me about this cruise experience?

 

Any and all, thanks

We're doing this in December. I've been to all the ports except St Lucia and St Croix. LOVED them! The last day is a sea day....perfect! Why don't you book it and come along?;)

[ace1zoe2]

Ports of Call:

 

San Juan, Puerto Rico; Bridgetown, Barbados; Castries, St. Lucia; St. John's, Antigua; Philipsburg, St. Maarten; St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands; San Juan, Puerto Rico

 

Can anyone tell me about this cruise experience?

 

Any and all, thanks

 

We did this itinerary in 2009 with our kids & spouses. It is our favorite cruise to date.

 

We flew in 2 days early & stayed at the Marriott Stellaris Resort & Casino which I got on Priceline for $125/night. We rented a car & went to El Yunque rainforest & did several hiking trails. We saw beautiful waterfalls, flowers, birds, lookout towers, etc. that night we took a private excursion with East Island Tours which included a boat ride, drinks & dinner on the way to Vieques Island where we then took a bus ride to the bay & went out into the biolumnescent bay & swam with the dynoflajulites. It was amazing.

 

The second day we toured El Morro Fort as a family. Then my husband and I toured San Cristobal Fort. The kids (all adults) took the ferry to the Bacardi Rum factory for a free tour. They all thought the history and the free rum drinks were awesome.

 

In Barbados we took a taxi from the port & dropped the guys at a golf course near Accra beach then the girls got dropped at the beach. It was a nice beach & not crowded at all. When the guys finished golf they walked over to the beach & we had prearranged for the same taxi driver to pick us up. It was a great day.

 

In St Lucia we did a tour with Cosol Tours and had an awesome time. It was a tour of the island in a 12 passenger van with just the 8 of us. It included drinks, food, the tour and a boat ride to Jalousie Beach near the Pitons where we snorkeled. It was our favorite island & excursion.

 

In Antigua we did an excursion the Adventure Antigua. It was a boat trip that toured the island, went to Hell's Gate & snorkeled. It was another fun day & it also included lunch.

 

In St Martin we did a private tour with Joyce Prince. We went to Moho Beach to watch the planes come in, ate at a local cafe, toured the island then went to Orient beach in the afternoon.

 

St Croix we did not book a tour we just walked around the port area. It was our least favorite spot which was probably because we chose not to do anything.

 

It was an amazing trip.

 

We did the other itinerary with friends this past March & stayed at the same resort for the same price again. We just went one day early since we had already seen most of what we wanted in San Juan the first time. However, this time we did the Segway tour of Old San Juan & I would highly recommend this tour also. We did it in the morning before we boarded the ship.

 

Hope this gives you some ideas. All the islands were beautiful. St Lucia being our favorite.

 

All of these excursions can be found easily online & will allow you to see and do so much more for a lot less money than the ship's excursion.

 

Happy Sailing!

Cindy

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

[Aviator of the Seas]

You might want to check out this thread:

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=691783&highlight=aos

[cruiseguy1016]

The Southern Caribbean offers the best islands and the most gorgeous beaches. We have sailed various Southern routes three time and have our fourth booked for next March. We have been to all of the ports that you will be visiting. There are so many things to do at each of them that it's hard to recommend just one. You know what types of activities YOU like. My recommendation is to look at the shore excursions that RCI offers and find a few that interest you. Then go to the Ports of Call boards here on Cruise Critic and do some research on excursions at each port. You will find a lot of advice and recommendations there.

[Host Faith]

We loved this route, though we sailed it on the Serenade of the Seas. Check out my review from 2010, in my signature. I have photos of what we did in each port, as well as our time precruise. If you can spend more than one day in San Juan precruise, go for it! It's a wonderful place to wander and explore in itself.

[Daycare Provider]

:DWe loved this route and ship sooo much that we are doing it again.....can not wait...5 ports in a row...!

 

 

 

Angela

[Loves_Dogs]

I have done 2 Southern cruises from San Juan, both port intensive. As a previous poster stated, it is a wonderful itinerary but kind of exhausting. Can't share any excursion ideas as we scuba dive in port. And honestly, Puerto Rico is so beautiful it's like the pre-cruise day is another port.

 

Also, no matter what time of year you do this route you have warm weather every day of your cruise. I have a deposit on a cruise out of Galveston for December of 2013 but have been looking at AOS the same week with the exact same itinerary you are doing. I will probably end up switching my cruise to AOS, I just LOVE :D that southern route. Have a GREAT cruise!

[NorbertsNiece]

I have a B2B coming up really soon..... really excited to be visiting so many islands on a wonderful ship. As I've been to a couple of the ports of call already I may very well use some down time.....

[Pricetag]

All I can say is Fabulous! We will be going on our fourth cruise out of San Juan on AOS in March. We have sailed both itineraries and have no complaints whatsoever. Loved every minute of it!

[Let'sGo!]

We did a similar route earlier this year. The one decision we made early on that we are so happy we did - we chose to skip the main dining room. We knew we would be tired from visiting a port everyday and it was nice to be able to come back, clean up and grab a bite at the Windjammer at our leisure.

 

San Juan is still our favorite port to embark from, and the Southern Carib itineraries can not be beat!

 

Enjoy!

Ann

[Mary521]

We did this exact route this past Jan 2012, and LOVED it so much we are doing the exact same thing this Jan 2013!!:D

[crisndeefromde]

love this cruise..did this as part of a b2b in feb. going again this coming feb for the last two weeks of the month.

 

St Croix we took a tour that involved seeing parts of the island, went to a rum factory...oh what you can drink for 5 bucks...and then went to the main town for about an hour or so before heading back to the ship.

 

Our driver said st croix has highest unemployment rate of the islands up in the 30 percentile. also high crime. so our driver told us what streets to stay away from

[iamsunnysarah]

Like others have said, very port intensive but we LOVED it and are booked again for same route next year. I am going to disagree with the PP- we had our sea day as the first day, and it was a great way to just unwind and really get into vacation mode.

 

Barbados- beach day at the Boatyard

St. Lucia- did the land and sea tour through RC; very well done but we much more enjoy being on the water vs. land-based tours, lesson learned.

St. Maarten- morning at Orient Bay; afternoon at Maho Beach; timing was very tight and we just missed the 747 landing!

Antigua- did a snorkeling tour through RC; snorkeling wasn't that great but the excursion was fun, had a crew from Wadadli Cats, lots of dancing and rum punch :D

St. Croix- ATV tour through Gecko's Island Adventures, LOVED IT, also did horseback riding with Paul and Jill that morning, it was a great experience but now that we've done it once, we're probably good...to each their own

 

Radiance class is our favorite, enjoy!

[Daycare Provider]

love this cruise..did this as part of a b2b in feb. going again this coming feb for the last two weeks of the month.

 

St Croix we took a tour that involved seeing parts of the island, went to a rum factory...oh what you can drink for 5 bucks...and then went to the main town for about an hour or so before heading back to the ship.

 

Our driver said st croix has highest unemployment rate of the islands up in the 30 percentile. also high crime. so our driver told us what streets to stay away from

 

We are doing this cruise in March...the couple we are going with would like to do the island and rum tour thing....who was your guide?

 

Angela

[LeesSummitCruiser1]

Ports of Call:

 

San Juan, Puerto Rico; Bridgetown, Barbados; Castries, St. Lucia; St. John's, Antigua; Philipsburg, St. Maarten; St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands; San Juan, Puerto Rico

 

Can anyone tell me about this cruise experience?

 

Any and all, thanks

 

This is the second best cruise we have ever done (first was a med cruise). Get to PR a day early and stay at the Ritz. St Lucia is my favorite island. Find a snorkel/sail that lets you see the Pitons. St Maarten is for shopping. Antigua is another nice place to get a snorkel sail. We had a taxi tour of Barbados and then did the snuba. Can't go wrong with any of these islands.