Ocho Rios with 5 yr old & 10 yr old...which excursions?

[scrapperluv]

Hi all!

 

We'll be in Ocho Rios for one day with our 2 children. Daugher is 5 yrs old and son is 10. What would a 5 year old enjoy here? My husband might take our 10 year old on a more challenging excursion while I take our daughter to do something fun that's more for her age.

 

I'd REALLY like to play in the water at Dunn River Falls with her but don't want to take her on the 600 foot climb. Is there a way to splash and play in the falls without walking down to the bottom and climbing back up?

 

Thanks!

[cccole]

Have you read the thread started February 13 titled "Anyone done Peat Taylor Private Beach Tour?" There is a post by moesyk4 re their tour. My daughter and friend have Courtney Taylor scheduled on Monday to do river tubing and then Bamboo Blu beach. The reps at Courtney Taylor Tours have been great in getting this planned.

 

Several years ago we took our 1 yr old great niece tubing and it was great. Very safe, we just made sure she had a life vest appropriate for her age (which we purchased before leaving on the cruise). Cherie

[#1TravelMom]

Email Noel "Steve" Smith. Our family had a great day with him. He took us river tubing( soooo fun ). Then we went to the falls as the crowds were leaving. We had a spectacular time there. You can definitely enter the falls at different points and play. I bet your DD will end up doing the whole climb. My dd has done it on 3 separate cruises - the first time she was 4. She is part monkey and just loves to climb. My dd said this was one of her best days ever.

 

It's really nice to have a private driver for the day. Easy to stop along the way for great photos and local jerk chicken. Steve will make sure you have a great day! We've been on more than 40 cruises and have high expectations for our drivers - Steve is great!

[moesyk4]

Hey, that's me! Glad I could help :)

As the PPer stated, we took our 4 year old to Jamaica through Courtney Taylor tours in January. My understanding is that you can't climb Dunn's River falls unless you are over the age of 6, and unfortunately most tours included that, so it was tough.

We ended up doing river tubing with Courtney, it was so beautiful and peaceful. We saw 2 other people the whole time, and that was at our break stop. They were excellent with our son, and he loved it. Some little rapids, but no problem at all for him, and most of it was peaceful. Fairly short (1 hour total), which it could've been longer!

Then he took us to Bamboo Blu beach, which was small but very nice and only one vendor, which was sooo nice not to be harassed. They have nice bathrooms and a little restaurant as well. Then we went to Scotchies. I believe they had a 4 person minimum, our DS was free and then we had 2 couples. We had a blast!

[KatieCharlotte]

We have daughter who will be not quite six and two older kids. We're doing a tour with Peat Taylor that includes Dunn's, horseback riding, and a stop at a local school. He said kids could climb if they were over three years old, or we could take turns playing with her at the bottom and walk the steps up. The age limit varies depending on the company, I think. She's done challenging hikes and river tracing, so I expect she'll be climbing better than many adults. We're bringing a helmet for the horse riding and she will share a horse with an adult.

Edited March 11, 2014 by KatieCharlotte

[scrapperluv]

I just Googled Peat Taylor Tour Ocho Rios and it came back with 3 different companies calling themselves "Peat Taylor" tours or something like that with Peat Taylor in the name. One looked pretty shady when I clicked on it. I'm assuming there might be a scam using the name?

 

Does someone have a link or can they tell me exactly how to identify the one that so many people seem to love?

[heckofagator]

We did Blue Hole and Dunns with our 7 and 10 year old boys in December. the 10 year old loved both. Blue Hole was a bit too much for the 7 year old, but he did fine at Dunns. Some of the rocks are pretty big so the 5 year old might have some trouble climbing, but there's a beach at the bottom which would be perfect.

 

If you split up the boys, have them do Blue Hole. It was scary at times, but def fun.

[busyone]

We used Marvyn Gayle and did river tubing with a two-year old. It was very safe and he really loved it. In fact, he liked it so much that he asked on the pier at the next port if we were going to get our tubes again. We had him wear his flotation vest, which we brought with us on the cruise, but there was no danger because the river is fairly shallow and the "rapids" are just small rock areas that the tube bumps. He rode in his mom's lap in her tube. The guides sang songs as we floated along. We also did Dunn's but it didn't interest him as much as the tubing.

[mypokey2]

Hi! We just got off the Breeze. We used Courtney Taylor for our excursions in Jamaica and could not be anymore pleased with our trips to the Blue Hole, river rafting and lunch at Scotchies. We were quite a mixed party with two 60 year old one with rods in the back, a 35 year old Down syndrome son ,daughter and son in law 30 somethings and their 2 and four year old boys, so we didn't know what to expect. We had crazy Dean as our guide and he made sure that we got the best of all guides at each stop. They took extra care of the kids and said that they were the youngest to ever do the Blue Hole. Yes both boys took the leap with a guide and loved it. They carried them both up the side of the waterfall and still were able to assist us up the hill and encouraged all of us to jump, which we did and it was quite the rush. after 4 jumps we were ready to move on to our river tubing. We had 2 guides ( Orlando and George ) who kept us safely away from the rocks and banks and sang to us all the way. After all of this activity we were off to Scotchies, a stop not to be missed great Jerk,peas, rice and festivals and some Red Stripes. We invited Dean to eat with us and enjoyed his company and conversation. So if your looking for a company that goes above and beyond look no further than Courtney Taylor. He's the bomb!!!:D