Southern Caribbean.. Any suggestions

cruisingrandma2007 · #1 (**permalink**) January 12th, 2009, 04:26 PM

We are looking to book a 2010 spring cruise with Carnival. Looking for a southern Caribbean this trip. Did the western and eastern a couple times each. Now want a new place. Any suggestions on excursions,places, ships. We like to go on newer ships also. Any help will be great. Thanks.

Trip · #2 (**permalink**) January 12th, 2009, 08:26 PM

Since you can get to the southern Caribbean from San Juan and Florida, you have more ship choices...Friends are doing a 10 day from Lauderdale on the Emerald Princess, which has 2 different itineraries, which include..Barbados Aruba, & Curacao, to name a few
We did Harrisons Caves, and an island tour in Barbados, and for me surprisingly, I liked the cave tour, very open, not claustraphobic at all.

check it out athttp://harrisonscave.com/

Aruba has a jeep tour, great beaches & shopping.......

Colorado Alison · #3 (**permalink**) January 12th, 2009, 10:45 PM

Hi CruisinGrandma,

We (my two teenage sons and I) returned from a 10-day Christmas cruise aboard the Emerald Princess. The itinerary was Princess Cays, St. Thomas, Dominica, Bonaire, Grenada, and Curacao. We enjoyed it tremendously! A couple of thoughts....I would definitely do a shore excursion at Dominica and Bonaire. We did not do that..just got taxi cabs, and we were very disappointed. We did a catamaran snorkeling deal in St. Thomas (awesome!), Grenada we took the water taxi to a great beach, and in Curacao we did a shore excursion called Mambo Beach. Very pretty beach with good amenities, plus, there were some topless women there, so my teenagers loved that. If you are cruising with younger children you may wish to avoid this excursion. My guys certainly didn't mind.

Great trip! Still missing the ship!

Have fun whatever you choose to do.

Alison

Trip · #4 (**permalink**) January 12th, 2009, 10:57 PM

Most excursions for Dominica, are eco tourist types, so, if this not up your alley, there is not much to do..In Grenada, we did an island tour which included Granda Anse Beach, considered one of the worlds best beaches..we also went up into the mountains to see a spice factory,
If you are there on market day, [we were not] its a great take in..I have seen it on the travel chanel.

LisaK · #5 (**permalink**) January 26th, 2009, 10:59 AM

love the southern routes - Curacao, Barbados, Aruba

dlm2005 · #6 (**permalink**) January 26th, 2009, 01:23 PM

We took Royal Caribbean's Serenade of the Seas on a 7 day cruise a few years back leaving from San Juan. We stopped at St. Maarten, St. Thomas, Antigua, St. Lucia and Barbados and had a wonderful time. St. Lucia was probably our favorite island. We booked a tour with Cosol (a local driver) who took us all around the island and fed us with local delicacies. If you go there I would heartily recommend you look him up on the web. In St. Thomas, we took the ferry to St. John to snorkel at Cinnamon Bay. We also enjoyed the Silver Moon Catamaran in Barbados that gave us a chance to swim with sea turtles. In St. Maarten, we raced an America’s Cup Class boat against fellow passengers. Its great fun and everyone pitches in and takes a station. We booked this one through the ship and I understand that it fills up fast.

Whatever ship or itinerary you take, I’m sure you will have a wonderful time.

Anne G · #7 (**permalink**) July 20th, 2009, 08:59 PM

we sailed on the Celebrity Summit in January for a southern caribbean cruise. Grenada -- Definitely go to Grand Anse Beach -- it's beautiful. There's a little beach bar called Garfields that has cheap drinks. The water and sand is perfect there.

Dominica --if you are there at the right time you can book whale watching tours. We went on one and although we didn't see a single whale we did see close to 300 dolphins that raced our boat. It was a blast!

Barbados -- take a local bus up to Mullin's Beach Bar. It's great! Very nice restaurant -- great food. Tell Eugene the bartender hi! You can rent beach chairs and umbrellas for about $10. There's a floating dock you can swim out to. Jet skis can be rented nearby. The bus trip is cheap (I think it was about $1.50pp) and its a hoot. Get out of Bridgetown immediately, kind of dumpy.

I loved the Southern Caribbean -- probably my favorite so far! We also went to St. Marten's and Tobago -- great beaches!

Have fun!
Anne

green_rd · #8 (**permalink**) July 21st, 2009, 09:36 AM

We did Carnival's Southern Caribbean last spring. The ship at that time was Destiny but it is now one of the Conquest class ships. We sailed out of San Juan and hit St. Thomas, Dominica, Barbados, Antigua, St. Kitts, and St. Marten. A very busy itinerary. I believe they have dropped St. Marten for St. Lucia. I really enjoyed the eco-tours in Dominica. All the islands were beautiful.