We were on the 5/5 Fantasy and booked directly with Bernard's on St. Maarten and the Full day sail and snorkel to Turtle Cove and Honeymoon Beach on St. Thomas/St. John.
Bernards: Easy to book, very quick at responding and very easy to find at the port. First time to St. Maarten for us and we felt like it gave a good overview of the island and for $40/pp it was a reasonable option. The highlight for us was the stop at Maho Beach, although we also enjoyed Marigot but it was a French holiday so a lot was closed the day we were there. The tour guide was very knowledgeable and friendly and forewarned us of anything that people might not enjoy or find offensive. As a group we agreed to shorten the time at Orient Beach and have 30 mins longer at Maho. The first stop is to see iguanas at a "residence" that they could probably drop from the tour and nobody would care. We were warned that the location was run down ahead of time, but it just felt like a waste of time to us. Orient Beach was just OK to us - interesting to say that we did it - but wouldn't go back. The entrance we took (I assume everyone does?
) was directly between the clothing optional beach and the regular public beach - if you LOOKED right as you drove in, then the "Adam & Eve" people, as they tour guide put it, were right there, nothing blocking anything.
Overall: OK - glad we got to see a good overview of the island and it definitely gave us a good feeling for what we would/would not want to see if we were to ever go back. I probably wouldn't do this with kids - just IMO.
St. Thomas/St. John - Full Day Sail & Snorkle to Turtle Cove & Honeymoon Beach. Everything provided for the day, great crew, great service and a lot of fun. The excursion got split into 2 groups, one on the pirate schooner and the other on the catamaran. You sail out to snorkel for about an hour, a guide helps find sea turtles and shows you were to find coral etc. You either climbed down a ladder or jumped into the water, which proved tricky for some of those with smaller children - just an FYI - but everyone seemed to manage in the end.
After snorkeling they served rum punch, soda and water plus chips and salsa while we sailed to Honeymoon Beach. We were on the schooner and either had to swim or wait to ride the dingy to the beach (we elected to swim), although the catamaran got pretty close, looked like those people really only had to wade a short distance. One of us should have been savvy enough to figure out how to carry sunscreen while swimming to the beach though.
Lunch was a decent BBQ, nothing out of this world but we were pretty hungry so it tasted pretty good!
We were there about 2 hours. Lunch, beer, soft drinks and bottled water were all provided.
Overall: We really enjoyed this, although the rum punch definitely loosened up the crowd and everyone was having a GREAT time by the time we got to Honeymoon Beach.
I would be remiss if I were to not mention (for the benefit of my fellow females) that each crew had one member who could be a body double for Matthew McConnaughey, and in my book it added to the overall ambiance.
Seriously though - I don't think that there was anyone on our boat that didn't have a fantastic time.