Kid friendly activities in Cozumel, Montego Bay, Grand Cayma

[katt1975]

We will be cruising next week on the Carnival Conquest and our ports this time are Cozumel, Grand Cayman, and Montego Bay. We will have our 10 year old and our almost 2 year old (2 in March) with us and are interested in finding relatively low cost (compared to the cruise ship excursions, anyway) activities for the family that do not include shopping. We can do that at home, lol!

Any ideas, please reply or feel free to email me kathywiehl@bellsouth.net

[Darcy]

Grand Cayman: Stingray Sandbar - We booked through Soto's Cruises and paid $24/pp. We stopped at 2 snorkel sites and the Sting Ray sandbar. There were two young children on our tour (there were about 14 of us in all). The guides caught a stingray and brought it up to the boat for the little ones to see. The sandbar is pretty shallow and one of the kids did get out with his dad holding him. They had a great time. My kids (10, 12 & 15 at the time) had a ball.

Cozumel: Chankanaab Park - This is very nice, clean relaxed place with a seperate beach for the little ones. My kids went snorkeling right off the beach and saw a lot of fish (they brought dry cereal with them from the ship to attract them). They have beach chairs, shade huts, restuarants, bars, restrooms, lockers and showers. They also have a botanical garden and a Mayan ruin replica. They have a sea lion show several times a day. This is also where you can swim with the dolphins. Even if you don't swim with them you can see them there. There are several excursions that are offered at the park if your interested, or you can just hang out and relax. We did the sea lion swim and the helmet dive here. The kids all had a great time. Admission is $12/pp for adults and $6 for kids. You can take a taxi there right off the pier and they had them lined up outside going back.

We didn't go to Montego Bay so I can't help you there. Hopefully someone else can.

Grand Cayman , just grab a cab to " a nice hotel beach " on Seven Mile beach. The ride will be cheap and Seven Mile beach is ideal for kids, clear water, warm, soft sand, and gentle to non existant surf.

[katt1975]

Thanks for the info. Chankanaab Park sounds very interesting. Keep the ideas coming! I'll be checking in again this evening.

Definitely try Captain Bryans catamaran for Grand Cayman its a really nice catamaran, really stable which is great for young kids. Its a great trip with a great crew who were awesome with my kids and kids 3 and under are FREE:-) I LOVE FREE!!

[LisaK]

definately do a Sting Ray tour in Grand Caymen - all the above mentioned tour companies are very good, we had very good luck with Captain Marvin- book these on your own via the internet.
Cozumel - Channunkaab National Park is a great choice, nice beach, snorkeling, clean facilites, aquarium, replica of the ruins, dolphin swims(book in advance)
There are also plenty of fun beaches with lots of water toys - Paradise, Mr. Pancho's and Playa del Sol to mention just a few.
Montego Bay - Marqueritaville - fun place for the family, lots of water fun,- toys & slides
or you could get a day pass for one of the hotels to use there beach.

We didn't get into Grand Cayman last cruise, but will be going to Stingray City (assuming waves are not 20' high again).

Montego Bay - we tried the Jungle River tubing and really enjoyed it. Water was very low in April, and our guide O'Brian pulled 8 tourists down the river by paddling backwards. High school kid alternates school one week and guiding the next. Looked like a thin Mr Universe. Wondered if we needed permission to leave the US. Drivers are crazy there - honk and pass. Don't get nervous when they turn the bus off the road into an orange grove - both the river and their treetop tour are there. They sell drinks, digital pictures (and the CDR). Tip well - the kids worked really hard to give us a good trip.

Cozumel. We took the snorkel cruise and it was pretty poor. Maybe 20 minutes in the water near the cruise dock. Cloudy, fairly deep and thousands of 1" jellyfish. Also ran us down the shore to a beach area with floats, vollyball and a really nice beach. We are planning on just taking a cab to Chaakanaab this time. By the way, we had no problems with the jellies although some folks have reported getting stung. Probably
had at least 20 within arms reach at any given time, sometimes many more.

We did those islands last spring. At Cozumel we went to Paradise Beach which was great. Grand Caymen we went to stingray city with Captain Marvin's which was fantastic, and in Montego Bay we took a tour we booked separately that brought us to Mayfield Falls, around Montego Bay and back to the boat. Mayfield falls was great. We had a wonderful guide that carried our 3 year old through everything. Not crowded and lots of fun. I will try to look back to see the name of the tour we went with and the name of our guide. He was too wonderful.

[HappyCruiser383]

Doctors Cave Beach in Montego Bay is clean and only $3 per person to get in. Take a taxi from the pier.

I agree, Stingray city is a must see in GrandCayman, even for the little ones. I saw quite a few little tykes in the water that seems to love them. Your may have a hard time getting your 10 year old out of the water!

We did the Fiesta Party boat (ship tour) in Cozumel.