Cruise: St. Croix, USVI {and a little Puerto Rico}

Here is the last recap of our Southern Caribbean Cruise.

Jason and I love kayaking, so we booked the Salt River Kayaking tour in St. Croix. The tour took us to the Salt River National Park and Ecological Preserve. 

The water was extremely calm and we got the chance to listen to the guide talk about the various Indian burial grounds and villages that were originally here. Christopher Columbus anchored outside the reef at Salt River in 1493 and we sunbathed at his original landing site.

The mangrove trees were absolutely beautiful and we got a chance to see iguanas and a variety of birds. There is a bioluminescent bay here, but since it was a daytime tour, we couldn't really see the effects.

We had time to eat lunch in "downtown" St. John's and swim in the beach for a while before we had to be back at the boat. This was our last night on board before we disembarked.

 

So - our overall thoughts on cruising? It's just not for us. I think it just comes down to the fact that we like more freedom in our travel choices. It's a GREAT way to see a lot of places at once, so I definitely understand why people do it.

I'm not totally ruling out cruises in our future, but I will say we won't be doing another Caribbean one. I'd much rather spend my time exploring one place in depth.
 

My favorite part of this trip was the time we spent in our final destination - San Juan, Puerto Rico! We ate some great food, walked around Old San Juan, explored the rainforest and relaxed at our amazing hotel - the La Concha Renaissance. This was our second time here and we can't wait to go back! If you click the link above, you can read about more of our favorite things to do here.

 

 

 

We'll be back Puerto Rico - we'll be back!

Cruise: Antigua

Stop 4 of our Southern Caribbean Cruise was Antigua!

We had scheduled our day (via Royal Caribbean) at a ropes course. We were picked up at the port and driven to our destination across the island. Holy cow, the main thing I remember 2 years later is how HOT it was there.

Once we got to the ranch, we suited up in our gear and set off. There were wooden walkways high in the treetops that we got to walk on to reach the areas where we zip lined and repelled! I honestly don't have a ton of pictures from the stop as we were actively flying through the treetops. They even let us zip line upside-down!

After this, we headed back to the port and walked around downtown St. John's. The port cities are usually just full of duty-free shops and cheapo souvenir stores, but there are a few hidden gems that were fun to discover. We also perfected the art of sneaking duty-free alcohol on board here!

That night, there was a "Minute to Win It" style competition and all of my travel buddies participated. Tip: Get there early if you want to join in the fun! It was fun to watch and they all won a prize for providing the entertainment.

 

 

There are always fun shows to watch. We stayed after this and watched a fun "newlyweds" style game that definitely provided a lot of laughs.

All this time, we were making our way towards our last stop - St. Croix!

Cruise: St. Maarten

Time to jump back onto our cruise recaps! Without further ado, Stop 3!

This day started off being a little disappointing. We had originally scheduled a full day of snorkeling, hiking and kayaking directly through Royal Caribbean. We received a notice the night before that something was wrong with the boat we were going to take and that the tour was cancelled. This left us in a bit of a bind as we couldn't schedule anything else to occupy our day since all of the good tours were already booked. Boo!

St. Maarten/St. Martin is half Dutch, half French. We ended up at a beach on the Dutch side and it was stunningly beautiful. We spent the day just swimming around and laying out. Not necessarily our style, but it was nice to just relax for a day. The only bad thing was that it was off-season, so most of the bars were closed.

The water was insane - we could clearly see the bottom that was more than 10 feet away.

 

That night was the second formal night, so we got all dressed up again. Oh I miss that tan...

 

 

St. Maarten was a beautiful place that I wish we had gotten to explore more. Next time!

Up Next: Antigua

Cruise: St. Lucia

Continuing on with our Southern Caribbean cruise recap (before we leave for our *Surprise Trip*)...our next stop was St. Lucia!

Our excursion here was similar to the one we did in Barbados - we took a catamaran out and did a coastal tour. Our first stop was Margot Bay, where we stopped at a little beach. We drank Piton beer and swam around here. I'm not the biggest water person, but this water was stunning and impossible to dislike.

 

Hot dogs or legs?

 

We had fun drinking and dancing on our boat as we navigated along the coast. The focal point of our tour was seeing the famous Pitons. Apparently it's pretty common for people to try climb to the top of these. This may be something we attempt if we ever go back here!

 

We got to know the boat captain during our cruise and he offered to take us to their docking point in Rodney Bay after everyone from the tour disembarked. This was amazing as we ended up getting a tour that was basically 2 extra hours just for talking to the crew.

Once we got off, we grabbed lunch at a little local place and caught a "bus" back to the docks. This is generous as it was basically a van with a bunch of removable seats. It was a nice way to meet some locals and way cheaper than a taxi.

That night, we got to eat dinner as we sailed along to our next port - St. Maarten!

Cruise: At Sea & Barbados

We knew we would have 3 days to explore San Juan after our cruise, so when we arrived at SJU, we went straight to the boat and settled in. Our boat was Royal Caribbean's Serenade of the Seas and the itinerary for our Southern Caribbean Cruise was:

Day 1 - San Juan, Puerto Rico

Day 2 - Day at Sea

Day 3 - Bridgetown, Barbados

Day 4 - Castries, St. Lucia

Day 5 - St. John's, Antigua

Day 6 - Phillipsburg, St. Maarten

Day 7 - St. Croix, US Virgin Islands

Day 8 - San Juan, Puerto Rico

Honestly, the schedule was a little too packed for me. It would have been nice to have that "at sea" day later on in the trip, but it worked out alright. The first day, we were able to lay out on deck, explore the ship and enjoy our meals at a leisurely pace. It was a formal night, so we took lots of pictures. The welcome reception included free drinks, so you can bet we attended that as well!

The next morning, we arrived at our first stop - Barbados. We did a tour that was organized through Royal Caribbean - the Tiami Five Star Catamaran & Turtles. We took a catamaran out and were given snorkels to swim with wild green sea turtles.

This was honestly my favorite experience of the entire cruise. We were so close to the turtles - I even got "slapped" in the face by the fins of one. We anchored up later along a beach and were able to lay out and swim some more. The water here was absolutely stunning!

After we got back to the ship, we had time to get ready for dinner, grab some drinks and enjoy some of the entertainment on board. What a good start to our vacation!

Next up: Our day in St. Lucia!