Western Caribbean port to miss?

[BrytEydBelle]

Personally I would skip Falmouth. Sketchy area and the nearby beaches aren't the best.

Honestly shocked by all the Cozumel answers as it is the favorite Western port of my entire family. I usually just take a cab to Paradise Beach and have a fabulous beach day. Very affordable, spotlessly clean with great service and a huge pool. I would at least give it a look if you haven't been there before.

 

[My2litteprincesses]

We are sailing this itenerary in 10 days
We have booked Xcaret excursion thru Disney for Cozumel. Great reviews on cruise critic, etc. We are super excited for that excursion!
For Grand Cayman we are going to venture to the Turtle Farm on our own & maybe a beach after that if time allows. (You get to hold baby sea turtles!!) Can't wait!
For Jamaica, we are deciding to just check out the port area (there's a pool & swim up bar at Margaritaville.) and then just re-board the ship. We have been to Jamaica 2x before and love it there! But we are not interested in doing any of the listed excursions with 2 kids in tow. So that will be our "skip" day even though we'll checkout the port itself.
Check out Xcaret! Or Xa-Hal in Cozumel. Your party may be interested in those. I'll post a review when we return!

 

[JimGA]

Going to Cozumel, Cayman, Castawy Cay and Jamaica on 7 day cruise. Wanted to stay on ship for one of these port days. Any suggestions which to skip? Never been to any of these places. First cruise of any kind.

Cozumel, its a dump.

 

[jrez]

Most people love Castaway Cay. As beaches go - it's a very nice beach, but I always return to the ship right after the BBQ on the island.

That is what we did last Friday. Hit the beach in the morning...ate at Cookies. Got back on the Fantasy and enjoyed the pools, Aquaduck, and AquaLab which were almost completely empty.

 

[MickeyBobby]

I would definitely skip Cozumel. If you ever do western Caribbean again on ANY line, it will 100% stop in Cozumel. I will say that DCL stops at the best dock in Cozumel, right in the center of downtown. Every other line docks at the far end of Cozumel. DCL makes it easy to stroll right off the ship where you can easily walk around downtown without doing an excursion. We walked around town for an hour or two and got back on the ship about mid-day. Most everyone was still off and we had the best of both worlds.

 

[Sydnerella]

We are sailing this itenerary in 10 days
We have booked Xcaret excursion thru Disney for Cozumel. Great reviews on cruise critic, etc. We are super excited for that excursion!
For Grand Cayman we are going to venture to the Turtle Farm on our own & maybe a beach after that if time allows. (You get to hold baby sea turtles!!) Can't wait!
For Jamaica, we are deciding to just check out the port area (there's a pool & swim up bar at Margaritaville.) and then just re-board the ship. We have been to Jamaica 2x before and love it there! But we are not interested in doing any of the listed excursions with 2 kids in tow. So that will be our "skip" day even though we'll checkout the port itself.
Check out Xcaret! Or Xa-Hal in Cozumel. Your party may be interested in those. I'll post a review when we return!

Thanks for the reply and ideas! We actually stayed at the Iberostar resort in 2015 on the mainland across from Cozumel and went to Xel Ha for a day. We all enjoyed it - super pretty and expansive water areas to enjoy - this was with the other grandparents (my parents) and my two nephews. I debated Xcaret and Xel Ha that trip and settled on the latter. I hope you love Xcaret though!

We want to stay on Cozumel if we go ashore since we have been to The mainland area once and also to save travel time. So perhaps we would do just a beach break or some good snorkeling on Cozumel though it sounds like GC might be better for snorkeling.