St. Maarten

[famfoc]

We are trying to decide what to do while in St. Maarten. Does anyone have a suggestion for doing it on our own. We are interested in a great snorkeling adventure for our children who are 9 and 7. We all love the beach and the water, but are not at all interested in shopping or sightseeing. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[castlegazer]

YOu really can set up any snorkeling on your own, but you may be better off just doing the pinel island or we loved the Golden Eagle excursion.

You can try www.shoretrips.com - there are also several guides mentioned over on cruise critic.com There are some trips over to Anguila on there too but they don't seem to totally msh with the timing of the ship - they may be more for people staying on island.

I am all for doing shore excurions on your own, but I usually do it because none of the trips the cruise line does meet what I want to really do or are waay more expensive than I can do them on my own. This is actually not the case with regard to snorkeling adventures - booking it yourself is moderatly cheaper, but does not come with the added security of doing it through DCL and leaves you on your own to get there and get back.

Then theres the factor of doing something with other guests from DCL - something that some people don't like, but that we have always found to be enjoyable. We have done our own excursions even with people from our cruise ship and its been great because you see them again and again on the ship and they are your new friends. I find comfort in numbers - the one time we did a trip on our own we actually had the worst time, our taxi broke down, we were stranded alone, and well, it just felt a little off.

 

[LAMPSKIES]

We loved the Golden Eagle also.........Here's a couple pics before we boarded...

 

[Skallywag]

We stayed in timeshare for two weeks on this lovely Island and travelling around can be rather time consuming because of the roads.

If you want something quick to do after swimming and snorkelling try the small but beautiful zoo which is not far from the port. Our grand-children loved it and we had to go back for a second time.

 

[logan1_2000]

Love Sint Maarten, but I will confirm the traffic can be a pain in the patootie and I just do not want stress/traffic on vacation. The anguilla ferry leaves from the french side, so it would be a real schlep of a day to do that. I agree, when the savings ends up being just a few dollars, get yourself the security of booking through the cruise line. Shame you'll be somewhere that features shopping as a major attraction, and the shopping is good, I feel better than St. Thomas, but if you do choose to do some beach time, very easy to just go to Great Bay via the water taxi from the dock or just walk a bit further to the well organized cab stand, and a taxi to Orient Beach is easy, was not long or stressful, and the beach is beautiful, even if some of the au natural folks are not (our son was 9 when we took him, a couple giggles and he got over it quickly).

 

[jrabbit]

It seems to me (from experience and comments here on the DIS) that snorkeling can be an iffy proposition on St. Maarten. It gets a lot of wind that can stir up the sandy bottom of the ocean and make visability very poor. We had a wonderful afternoon at Orient Beach (did it on our own for MUCH less $$$$ than through DCL).

If you want snorkeling - and I mean very, very good snorkeling - set your sights on St. Thomas / St. Johns. There are lots of DCL excursions that take you to some great snorkeling places and there are lots of trips that you can arange on your own there.