first time cruisers Valor Caribbean

[ohkneemac]

I am A first time cruiser aged 67 travelling on the Valor next week. What excursions are best at St Maarten,St Kitts ,Grand Turk, Porto Rico and what Currency do I need on the Islands

[Honolulu Blue]

I am A first time cruiser aged 67 travelling on the Valor next week. What excursions are best at St Maarten,St Kitts ,Grand Turk, Porto Rico and what Currency do I need on the Islands

 

Greetings! You'll find a lot of discussion of excursions in the Caribbean Ports of Call sub-thread here: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=587 . They're divided into different islands.

 

As for currency, US dollars are the coin of the realm in Puerto Rico, and widely accepted at the other islands. Euros are accepted for sure on the French side of St. Martin (you'll be docked on the Dutch side) and possibly elsewhere. I'm not sure about GBPs.

 

I hope this was of help to you. Have a safe and enjoyable cruise!

[Krazy Kruizers]

Welcome to Cruise Critic.

US dollars are accepted in all your ports. Get small bills from the front office as you may get some foreign change back.

You may want to join your Roll Call. Just scroll down at this link until you find the date of your cruise. Click on that date to open it up. You can see what others on your cruise are doing.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=336

[kat001971]

Hi! Welcome to cruising. We were on the Valor last summer. It's a nice ship.

 

Review the cruise critic boards for excursions. Trip Advisor is also an excellent source of information. We haven't had much luck with Carnival excursions so we either find a private when we get off ship or book private ahead of time.

 

Grand Turk has a lot of activities right off the ship so we didn't take an excursion there. St Maarten has a really neat butterfly farm. We did a rain forest hike in Puerto Rico. We haven't made it to St Kitt yet.

 

I haven't been on an island in the Caribbean yet that didn't take US currency.

 

A first time cruiser tip: take a power strip. If you need to plug on more than one item, you will need it.

 

Have fun!

 

 

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[msstatechick2016]

I cruised on the Valor 3 years ago, and I highly recommend snorkeling in St. kitts. In St. Maarten I like to just shop around the Dutch side and then take a taxi to the French side for some pastries. It's also cool to go to the beach where the planes take off.

 

 

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[Judie]

If you take a power strip, be sure it does NOT have a surge protector.

 

 

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[902tater]

We just did St. Kitts for the first time...we had considered the sugar cane train, after seeing it I am glad we did not. When you get off the ship, there is an area right to the right where there are island tour operators. We paid $20 per person for a four hour tour with stops and it was a great tour, lots of information and a good overview of the island. Beaches in st. kitts are not that fabulous. In Puerto Rico you doc in old San Juan and you can do a walking tour of your own, the buildings and streets are magnificent or I can recommend the fort, it is pretty cool. There is no public transport right at the dock area, taxicabs are not allowed down there so unless you are taking a tour it is difficult to get in and out. Traffic backs up easily there as well and on our cruise people were delayed up to an hour in traffic trying to get back to the ship. We have also done a horse drawn carriage tour of old San Juan. It was $50 for one hour. St. Maarten we usually shop, but have done tours. The airport, or Maho beach is nice. There is a wide beach area right in town where you can rent a beach chair and umbrella and swim. The French side is interesting but much more expensive and we went once, didn't bother to go again. To get to downtown you take the water taxi from the dock area, it is eight dollars for all day, you can get off and on as much as you like. Get off at the third stop for right in the middle of downtown. If you want to have a little look at st. Maarten and other cruise ports, you can look at them in real time cameras on ptztv port cameras. The st. Maarten camera is right downtown and you can see the ships docked. The maho beach camera is also available. All of the ports take US dollars.

 

 

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[grandmarnnurse]

St Martin is my favorite island, as we spent a whole week there back in 1995 for our 25th anniversary, and have been back a few times since on cruises. Our favorite beach is Orient Beach on the French side. You can grab a taxi up to the beach, and there are always several waiting to take you back to the pier. Marigot, on the French side, has the best shopping and cafes. As for San Juan, we just walked around Old San Juan. Beautiful there! There is a free trolley that will take you around that goes up to the fort, that you can hop on and off, and it goes to the pier. I've also been to St Kitts, where we did a train ride around the island. Nice for sight seeing.

 

 

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