Astrada Garden and City Tour

[MimiDee905]

Another Nassau excursion question! Looking for cruisers who have booked the Astrada Gardens and City Tour excursion through DCL...reviews/opinions!
Seems like it'd be a great half-day excursion with a way to see Nassau in a safe and informative way. I just really cannot find any recent reviews on it! Every review I've read has been positive but very outdated and most chose to not book through their cruise line. We will be booking through DCL so we're looking for reviews or experiences from cruisers who have gone this route!
What time was the excursion? (We are assuming morning since there's no lunch provided) Was there enough time at the gardens or did you feel rushed? How was the bus tour? Etc.
Thanks again fellow cruisers!

 

[dmunsil]

We took this tour on our first cruise to Nassau (about three years ago). The zoo itself is small, but quite nice, with some unusual animals and a "marching flamingo" show that's a bit silly, but all in good fun. The tour was not good. The only positive thing about it was that our minibus was pretty new and had good air conditioning. I'm sure it depends on the specific tour guide you get, but our tour guide ran out of things to talk about early on and then seemed to be basically killing time. He pointed out all the gas stations and fast-food restaurants we passed. I am not joking at all. "You can see on the left that we have Burger King here in the Bahamas, one of the many different restaurants that can be found in our country. And of course on the right you can see a Chevron station, just one of several gasoline companies that serve our great nation." He must have told us the correct pronunciation of "conch" at least a dozen times (for reference, it's KONK), and then spelled it each time so we'd know the word if we wanted to order it at a restaurant. We had a short stop at one of the old forts in Nassau, but we weren't allowed to go in because there wasn't time; we could just walk around outside and take pictures. Overall, I would not recommend the city tour.

If you want to go to Ardastra, just go. Just take a cab there. When you're done, have the folks at Ardastra call you a cab back to the port. It'll be cheaper than the excursion, and if you want you can ask the cab driver to give you a bit of a tour. It couldn't possibly be much worse than the tour we got.

 

[Floridatinaherb]

So glad that I didn't have the same tour guide that @dmunsil had! We did this tour through DCL in 2011, so it's been awhile, but our tour was pretty good and didn't feel rushed at all. We stopped at all the old forts and were given plenty of time at each one to take pictures and explore. Ardastra Gardens was a nice surprise...my kids loved it! I believe we left for our tour at like 8AM, I know that we were back to the ship in time to get lunch

 

[Barbydoll8]

Did this through DCL several years back. Loved the gardens/zoo but could have done w/o the city tour. If someone were to ask me today, I'd say go it on your own. Take a cab and save yourself a lot of cash. It's not far from the dock. As PP stated, most cab drivers will give you a small tour for a lot less.
I'd go back astrada gardens again though. The were updating and there was construction going on last time I was there so I'd like to see it finished.

 

[luxlvr]

We just did this two weeks ago. The zoo is cute and my kids loved feeding the birds. I agree with everyone though. I wish I would have just gotten a cab on our own and visited the zoo for an hour. The tour wasn't great and I couldn't wait to get back on the ship.

Did this through DCL several years back. Loved the gardens/zoo but could have done w/o the city tour. If someone were to ask me today, I'd say go it on your own. Take a cab and save yourself a lot of cash. It's not far from the dock. As PP stated, most cab drivers will give you a small tour for a lot less.
I'd go back astrada gardens again though. The were updating and there was construction going on last time I was there so I'd like to see it finished.

I'm not sure what they were working on when you last went, but the zoo suffered some pretty bad damage from Hurricane Matthew. They were in major repair mode the other week and it looked like they had lost quite a bit of enclosures and trees. The staff was so nice and positive about it all though. Really great people!

 

[TiszBear]

We did this tour in March 2016 and we all enjoyed ourselves. Our guide and bus driver were really good and funny; they also gave alot of information in Nassau and the Bahamas. The zoo itself was nice as it is the only zoo in the Bahamas and the marching flamingos are fun to watch. Out excursion started I think about 10 am or 10:30 am. When we did this tour it was our first time in Nassau and it was, in my opinion, worth the money and time.

Jennifer

 

[want2seepluto]

We did this tour on our cruise last February and enjoyed it. I heard a lot of negative things about Nassau but really wanted to at least get off the boat and see a bit of the city without committing to a long excursion. This tour fit the bill. We actually had a good tour guide and stopped at a fort that we took a short tour of, which was pretty interesting. The zoo was small but great. Some cool animals and the flamingo show was cheesy but fun. We had a good time but were definitely twiddling our thumbs for the last 30-45 minutes. It was too much time there in our opinion, although the fact that it was raining at the end may have contributed to that feeling. Still, I'd recommend it - I think it's good for what it is: a quick, easy way to see the sites and some animals.