RCL Excursion to Trunk Bay

[whglee]

I am going on a cruise with RCL Freedom of the Sea this Dec and I wonder if anyone would recommend the RCL excursion to St John Trunk Bay from St Thomas. I read a lot on this forum about going to Trunk bay by taxi-ferry-taxi route. RCL excursion cost $67 pp ($35 for kids) for a 4 hr tour and I think I can save about $20 avg. Anyone has done this RCL excursion before? The excursion allows about 1.5 hr on Trunk Bay. Will that be enough?

 

With Me, my wife and 2 kids (10 and 8 yrs), I just think it may be better off to go with RCL excursion and not worrying about traffic and not getting back to the ship on time. What do you all think?

[4cogscruzin]

Hello! We are going on the Independence in Nov. and were wondering the same thing. Anyone have any feed back for us:rolleyes:

 

Thanks!

[love2cruiseseattle]

I am going on a cruise with RCL Freedom of the Sea this Dec and I wonder if anyone would recommend the RCL excursion to St John Trunk Bay from St Thomas. I read a lot on this forum about going to Trunk bay by taxi-ferry-taxi route. RCL excursion cost $67 pp ($35 for kids) for a 4 hr tour and I think I can save about $20 avg. Anyone has done this RCL excursion before? The excursion allows about 1.5 hr on Trunk Bay. Will that be enough?

 

With Me, my wife and 2 kids (10 and 8 yrs), I just think it may be better off to go with RCL excursion and not worrying about traffic and not getting back to the ship on time. What do you all think?

 

We will be doing the RCL excursion - St. John Beach and Snorkle Tour - I am assuming that is the one you are refering to?? If it is bump your post up around the 4th of November (in case I don't find this thread again) and I will let you know what we thought.

[MiniMom57]

If I were to go back and had more than just me and my husband to get from the ship to Trunk Bay, I probably would go w/a ship excursion. It's not all that hard to do the taxi-ferry-taxi thing, but keeping a group together might get stressful! And if it can save you money, it makes sense with a group.

 

1.5 hrs at Trunk bay is not a lot of time if you plan to snorkel, but may be enough for a beach experience. We spent over 3 hours there when we went on our own and loved every minute!

[whglee]

We will be doing the RCL excursion - St. John Beach and Snorkle Tour - I am assuming that is the one you are refering to?? If it is bump your post up around the 4th of November (in case I don't find this thread again) and I will let you know what we thought.

 

Yeah thats the one we are planning to go for. Since its just a 4 hr tour, we can join another excursion or tour. And we plan to go for a Catamaran tour or excursion on the same day. The RCL excursion costs $52 for adults and $32 for kids for the catamaran tour. Is it worth the price tag?

 

Is St Maartin part of your itinerary as well? Can you share your plan there at St Maartin?

[love2cruiseseattle]

Yeah thats the one we are planning to go for. Since its just a 4 hr tour, we can join another excursion or tour. And we plan to go for a Catamaran tour or excursion on the same day. The RCL excursion costs $52 for adults and $32 for kids for the catamaran tour. Is it worth the price tag?

 

Is St Maartin part of your itinerary as well? Can you share your plan there at St Maartin?

 

Our itinerary is as follows:

Depart San Juan

Aruba

Curacao

St. Maarten

St. Thomas

 

We have been to St. Maarten a few times and always like to get into town (Front Street) around 9am for a little shopping:D . We then head back to the ship for lunch and change and do the ships tour to Orient Beach. We just love Orient Beach, great place to people watch (sometimes you will see nudity) and the water is beautiful and there is lots of water activities you can purchase. We hang out there for a couple hours and then head back to the ship. I will let you know how it was this year as we will be there next Friday:p .

[figs]

Is RCL offering a Snuba experience at Trunk Bay that day, and could you combine that with the beach trip to get more time there?

 

My family spent a week on St. John two years ago, we spent a few days at Trunk Bay---my little sister and I did the Snuba thing while we were there. That was a REALLY cool experience. She was...err....12, then, so if you have any pre-teen/teens, it's a great option.

[love2cruiseseattle]

I am going on a cruise with RCL Freedom of the Sea this Dec and I wonder if anyone would recommend the RCL excursion to St John Trunk Bay from St Thomas. I read a lot on this forum about going to Trunk bay by taxi-ferry-taxi route. RCL excursion cost $67 pp ($35 for kids) for a 4 hr tour and I think I can save about $20 avg. Anyone has done this RCL excursion before? The excursion allows about 1.5 hr on Trunk Bay. Will that be enough?

 

With Me, my wife and 2 kids (10 and 8 yrs), I just think it may be better off to go with RCL excursion and not worrying about traffic and not getting back to the ship on time. What do you all think?

 

Hi whglee:

 

Well we are back home now:( and I said I would let you know what I thought about the St. John Beach and Snorkle and I want to stress this was our experience.......

We boarded the boat that takes you to St. John at the Cruise Pier. The ride to St. John was a rough rocky ride that took about 30 - 45 minutes. Once at St. John we transported to Trunk Bay in a taxi (St. Thomas version of a taxi - back of truck that has seats). When we got to the park we were told that there was not any snorkling that day and we could only swim in a certain area of the beach. You could hear the waves crashing before we got to the beach so that told us the surf was rough. We went to the section of the beach they told us we could use and the waves were coming up the sand pretty high, most people had they belongings in the trees. We ended up sitting at a picnic table waiting for the to go back to the ship. The experienced people were allowed to snorkle and swim at their own risk, we didn't, but was told no one saw any fish. The prices for food and other items there are very expensive. We spoke to the RCCL contact at the beach and she said she informed RCCL of the conditions hours before the tour was to start. The tour was about 1 1/2 hour at the beach and then we were transported back to the boat for the 30 minute (this time) smooth ride back to the ship.

When we got back to the ship we complained (which we have NEVER done before about an excursion) that the conditions at the beach were so bad that we should have been told ahead of time and since the contact had said they were notified we asked for a refund. Later that night we were contacted and told our $67 x 2 was refunded which I thought was very nice.

So my thought is if you can find out what the conditions are ahead of time (maybe on the internet??) and they are calm, then it would be a great excursion. The contact at the beach said the day before the water was like glass. Was it BEAUTIFUL, yes it was amazing.

 

I hope this helps a little, let me know if you have any other questions. And once again I want to stress, this was our experience.

[138east]

I think that folks do this type of excursion on their own both to save some money and to not be committed should the weather be bad. My mother and I took the "windy" cruise one January. Fortunately, we were renting cars in most ports and we just enjoyed driving around. The weather was spectacularly nice, but the wind and surf were unbelievable. Orient Beach on St. Martin was like being in a sand storm. For St. Thomas we picked Secret Harbor which was possibly the only place on the island where you could swim that day. Even the ship tours that were supposed to go to Magen's Bay ended up at Secret Harbor.

 

So you never know what you might find. If you are not committed to a particular excursion, you can always go with Plan B.