Which Port Would You Skip in the Western Caribbean?

[DCLMP]

If you like Mexican food and seafood don't skip Cozumel. The food on the ship is so bad the best thing about port days is eating local food.

 

[Kit Jackson]

You didn't say who was in your travel party. The reason this may be relevant/important is that many of the excursions in Cozumel involve alcohol, so if you have people with you under 21 or who don't drink, this might be something to keep in mind.

 

[iona]

Exclusive and Fun Beach Break (FA75)
Problems started as soon as on the bus. Incredibly pushy sales people ON the beach, the worst I've ever seen (And I've had people grab my hair in Nassau to try to get me to do braids). They did some kind of cooking demo right behind where they had the beach loungers with a sound system with really bad feedback. It was like something you would expect to see on a comedy show on TV.

Thanks, that doesn’t sound appealing!

 

[FairyGodmother00]

NEVER EVER again Jamaica.
It was horrible for us. DIL was tormented with people wanting to braid her hair. These people were relentless to the point if being rude. We were followed after leaving a shop with someone trying to sell us drugs. After that, we headed straight for the ship.

Grand Cayman was nice other than having to tender. I'm not a fan of using tenders. I would rather stay onboard.

 

[MsChristy12]

Definitely Falmouth, Jamaica unless there's an excursion that you're really interested in doing. Safety is a pretty legit concern right now too. The port itself doesn't have much except shopping and it's all made for cruise tourists.

 

[GOOFY D]

If you like Mexican food and seafood don't skip Cozumel. The food on the ship is so bad the best thing about port days is eating local food.

Always scared to eat in Mexico. Ship food bad? Having just traveled Royal Caribbean, DCL food is heaven! I did not realize how bad food could be on another cruise line.

 

[DCLMP]

Always scared to eat in Mexico. Ship food bad? Having just traveled Royal Caribbean, DCL food is heaven! I did not realize how bad food could be on another cruise line.

Why are scared to eat in Mexico? Millions of people vacation there every year.

 

[Kwami]

Always scared to eat in Mexico. Ship food bad? Having just traveled Royal Caribbean, DCL food is heaven! I did not realize how bad food could be on another cruise line.

That's how I felt after eating NCL food on a cruise last year!

I actually had a great time in Jamaica when I visited on a previous cruise. It was in Cozumel that I was followed around and harassed!

 

[ilovebassets]

We like Jamaica. We've gone mountain biking there which was incredible. We also visiting the Good Hope Estate while was really good for a family outing. The kids absolutely loved climbing up the waterfalls and jumping in. And the people who worked there were doing some crazy dangerous diving which was entertaining for the kids. No vendors pushing anything.

Plus get some authentic, 100% Blue Mountain Jamaican coffee while you're there for the coffee lovers in your life! You won't find it cheaper anywhere else.

Grand Cayman is just tough because of the tendering.

Cozumel is kind of blah. The beaches aren't great, the port area itself is a massive touristy shopping mall and hard to get out of, and I feel like everyone is more aggressive about wanting your money...way more so than Jamaica in my experience.

 

[Meriweather]

For us....and we don't do any water related activities, we have skipped Cozumel the last few times. We've done everything we want to there. We just go off to the shopping area off the ship.
We probably will start not going to Grand Cayman because we've done everything there also. We went off last time (a couple weeks ago) but all the stops on our excursion we have been to before......so done with Hell
We are still finding interesting things to do on Jamaica, so it will depend on excursions.
We went to a rum factory and it was a great excursions. We have never ridden very far