Good Hope Estate- Jamaica

[disneymagicgirl]

If we do this basic excursion do you get dropped off there and explore on your own or do you have to do the tour of the house? We don't care about the house but would like to just use our time to partake in the various offered activities.

 

[Bree]

I did the tour with Chukka through Royal Caribbean in April. Chukka also runs it for DCL since they own the estate and grounds. We did more than the basic tour. The one we did had a carriage ride, tour of the house and a rum tasting plus access to the aviary. We took a tour bus from the pier to the main building. We were directed to a check-in table where they put us on the carriage ride. It was really boring and I couldn't wait for it to be over since there were tons of mosquitos even though I was wearing bug spray. They showed us the new water slide they were building on the grounds, one of the fruit processing buildings and a water wheel that no longer functions and is overgrown with trees and weeds. When we came back we had to go back to the check-in table to wait for a shuttle ride over to the estate house. Once we got there we were given a tour of the house. We weren't really allowed to wander at our leisure. We got back on the shuttle to go back to the check-in table to go to the rum tasting. They showed us an infomercial for Appleton Estates rum and we got to taste three different types. After that we waited for a bus back to the pier and skipped the aviary so we could get lunch and shop inside the port area. The busses run on the hour so if you miss it you will need to wait another hour for the next one. I enjoyed the estate house tour, but could have skipped the rest.

Chukka does offer stuff like zip lining, ATVs, and some other stuff on the grounds, but I wouldn't expect to just show up and be able to do it. A woman with three children on our tour tried to do just that because the shore excursion desk on the ship told her she could. When she got there the Chukka employees told her that RCCL was wrong in telling her that. Her kids were so incredibly bored on our tour and crying. They don't just cater to cruise passengers on the estate grounds. You could be mixed in with other tourists that are vacationing in Jamaica.

 

[JW9DVC]

Courtney Taylor can also plan a trip for you on how you want it. We have not and did not use them the last time. They do have some good reviews though and I like how they use your schedule.

JW

 

[Sytrace]

We did this tour in September 2014 and it was very good. We did it thru DCL and first we saw the house and there was a lot of great history and information with that. Then we saw the watermill (long time out of service), the slave homes and school (more history) We had a great lunch and visited the Aviary right there. After that we went back to the ship. I thought it was a great tour with great value and history for the kids.