Tourist Information
Best things to do on a Royal Caribbean Southern Caribbean Cruise?
Question: Best things to do on a Royal Caribbean Southern Caribbean Cruise?
Our honeymoon cruise is coming up and I’m hoping someone can offer some recommendations as to the best excursions and activities. Any first hand information would be helpful. Our ports of call are:
Barbados
St Lucia
Antigua
St Maarten
St Croix
We like snorkeling, hiking, sea-dooing, zip lines, eating, drinking, etc
Thanks for the help!
(southern caribbean cruises)
Best answer:
Answer by MomSezNo
For great info on all these ports, go to CruiseCritic.com, click on “Boards”, then “Ports of Call”.
Barbados is a great beach destination. Carlisle Bay is nice. The sea turtle excursion is popular. [At CC there's a local who posts great info.]
St. Lucia is a beautiful island and land tours are very popular. There are several people who offer independent tours there who are quite reliable. The tour will be long and possibly hot and travel over twisty, narrow roads. You may want to consider a tour to see the Pitons by boat [at least one way]. There will be lots of persistent vendors here, tho not as bad as at Ocho Rios, for example. I think there’s a zipline excursion here, too.
Don’t know Antigua at all.
St. Maarten has lots of beaches and also has a popular land tour by, I think, “Bernard”. Lots of people like to go to the clothing-optional Orient Bay beach. We went to Le Gallion and loved it – very quiet and not at all crowded.
St. Croix – Haven’t been, but most of the cruise lines stopped going there several years ago due to the crime against tourists. I think I’d just stay on the ship there, but check out what the CC board says. There probably won’t be many postings, though.
Have a great cruise!
I’ve been on lots of cruises and done a similar itinerary, on both Adventure of the Seas and Serenade of the Seas. Guessing you’re probably on one of the two.
To answer your question:
Barbados – best excursions involve combo of snorkeling (lots of sea turtles and man-made wrecks) and drinking.
St. Lucia – most famous for natural scenery, particularly the Grand Titons and volcano. While I’m generally not a huge fan of “see the island” type land tours, if you’re going to do that in one place, this is the one.
Antigua – I find St. John’s (where the cruise ship ties up) to be kind of dirty for my taste, generally not that impressed. I’ll generally buy a 1/2 day pass for an all-inclusive, recommend Hawksbill Resort. Cheap and nearby taxi ride, only around $ 40/ea for a 1/2 day pass. For that, you get all the food and alcohol you want, private beaches, non motorized water sports. Well worth it. See a thread here:
http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=732254
St. Maarten: Probably my favorite place in the world. Here, just get a cab and head straight to Orient Beach – it’s the best beach I know anywhere, hands down. No problem getting food, alcohol, renting jet skis, whatever. The far right hand side in front of Club Orient is clothing optional – obviously you can skip that section if not your thing, but if feeling adventuresome, it’s very liberating, I’d recommend trying it at least once in your life. Hey, it’s your honeymoon…..
St Croix: Find a beach…..