CloudyDae Posted November 30, 2007 #1 Share Posted November 30, 2007 Sorry for the double post, but I should have made my review more clear. They were a great outfit, just take note that St. Maarten time is 1 hour ahead of ship time, so when you are supposed to meet the transportation at 8:30 their time, it is 7:30 ship time. Luckily, I had read from the capers, but I know some people weren't aware and missed their rides. Hi, We used StMaartencruiseexcursions.com to book our Power Cat excursion on Nov. 8, 2007. What this company does is have several boat owners on contract and they are the booking agency. It was comforting to know if there was a problem w/ our cruise and we didn't dock, that we would not be charged, that was my main reason for booking thru this company. It was supposed to be 10 of us, but my brother wound up sleeping in, so it was 9 of us (7 adults and 2 kids ages 9 and 13) and we had chartered a boat for $690 for 4 -4.5 hours. First of all, I didn't realize that St. Marten time is 1 hour ahead of ship time, and we were supposed to meet our driver at 8:30 am St. Marten time. Since we didn't get off the boat until 8:45am (St. Marten time), we were running late, but it was OK, our driver was waiting w/ a sign with my name on it (very cool!) and was very happy and greeted us w/ hugs. We took the tranfers thru the company, and it was the same price that we would have paid if we booked it ourselves. Our cab driver was Happy Harold, and he lived up to his name and made our ride very enjoyable. Getting to the ship took about 20 mins and we were greeted right away by the owner, we paid the cash, were put on the boat and introduced to our captain, Steve. He was awesome! As soon as we started driving, he said "Bar's Open!" and he had some rum punch that he made up for us, as well as beer, soda and water. We stopped at 3 different stops, the 1st being where we got our "mud bath". Steve got all muddy w/ us too, and he was having a great time, which made our time more enjoyable. The other 2 stops were pretty, the scenery is breathtaking, and we saw Anguilla and St. Barth's as we were riding on the boat, but the 1st island beach w/ the mud bath definately won 1st prize as being the most fun! Lunch was included too, and it was a turkey sandwich on a baguette, which was vey yummy. This was well worth the money and we would gladly do this excursion again, especially if we could get the same guide! If you go, you will definately enjoy it!:) BTW, we saw the girl that's on that website, the black girl w/ the mud handprints, she must be w/ another outfit because she was w/ a different group on another boat. Also, we saw different boats that had like 30 people on them (from cruise ships probably) and we all agreed, we were glad we weren't w/ those crowds, the private charter was a nice respite from the crowds on the Valor! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kal Posted November 30, 2007 #2 Share Posted November 30, 2007 ... just take note that St. Maarten time is 1 hour ahead of ship time, so when you are supposed to meet the transportation at 8:30 their time, it is 7:30 ship time.... Just to clarify, St. Maarten time is NOT ALWAYS ahead of US East coast time. The time is tied to Savings Time in the US. St. Maarten is always on Atlantic Standard Time; they do not go to Savings Time. When the US (Eastern Time Zone) goes into Savings Time, the time in St. Maarten is identical. When the US (Eastern Time Zone) is on Standard Time, St. Maarten is one hour ahead. Here are the times for the near term cycles: 11/4/2007 thru 3/8/2008 - 8:00am (EST) = 9:00am (AST, St. Maarten) 3/9/2008 thru 11/1/2008 - 8:00am (EDT) = 8:00am (AST, St. Maarten) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ellie424 Posted December 1, 2007 #3 Share Posted December 1, 2007 Does the ship inform you about any differences in time?? I have several excursions booked for my January cruise and am worried that I won't know that there is a time difference on any of the islands that I'm visiting (St. Thomas, St. Martin, Antigua, St. Lucia and Barbados). Will the ship let us know?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dengail Posted December 3, 2007 #4 Share Posted December 3, 2007 Thank you so much for the review...did you snorkel at all? We are booked for this same excursion for next week off the Liberty of the Seas...we didn't book the whole boat because ther is only the 4 of us so I hope there will be others, seems like it would be fun with more. Did you get to choose the islands? How did the kids like it...ours are 9 and 12. We did know about the time diff... but can imagine many don't. Thanks for the heads up. USUALLY it is announced and also in the ships paper and sometimes they have island/ships time posted as you leave but every ship is different.We just did a search for time zones and found one where you enter date and time and it translates it for you. I was waiting for your review...thanks so much! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StellaBella Posted December 17, 2007 #5 Share Posted December 17, 2007 We did the French Connection catamaran with St Maarten Cruise Excursions as well and it was fabulous. Great company, they have tours in St Thomas, and the Bahamas too Hi, We booked a sailing charter with their bahamascruiseexcursions division in October and had a fabulous experience. We're on Carnival in January and hitting Nassau, St Thomas & St Maarten. We're thinking of booking their Loterie Farm Zip Line Adventure. Looks like fun & we've never done Zip Line before. Any input would be appreciated. :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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