Wife and I are celebrating our 30th wedding anniversary next year. We have decided to do a Caribbean Cruise.

Our anniversary is in July, but we are going to wait until Jan/Feb of 2028 to do the cruise.

We've done other cruises in the Med. and other places, but none in the Caribbean.

Anybody have any recommendations on which islands we should hit.

We have found some that go out of San Juan and would hit some of the more popular islands. St. Kitts, St. Maarten, etc.

The problem is the air fare would be outrageous to fly into San Juan. I'm hoping to go out of either Miami or Ft. Lauderdale.

Miami would be my first choice because we could hit some of the beaches and touristy stuff when we get back.

I would really like to hit somewhere close to Daytona so the when we get back we could hit Bike Week.


Also what cruise lines to use. Most of the ones we used in the Med were Norwegian CL. But they don't hit the islands we want.

I've always gotten a suite on the ship, except our first one. Not good because I tend to get a little seasick.

I'm wondering what the smaller rooms are like on these ships.

Also some of the things to do at some of these ports.

I know we want to try a little of the local cuisine. My wife is a foodie.

She also said she'd love to parasail. She is also up for possibly going to the more adult "oriented" beaches.

This is a question for Reddit .. plenty of cruisers on there

We have done the cruise thing a couple of times but it was decades ago. Did western Caribbean out of Maimi (Jamaica, Grand Cayman, Cozumel). Some years later did eastern out of San Juan (Martinique, Barbados, St Maarten, somewhere I don't remember St Thomas maybe). We enjoyed the eastern much more. Personally, I would not now step foot anywhere in Mexico for any reason.)

Ed, we went to Acapulco for our honeymoon. I too would not go to Mexico anymore. The main problem with Mexico was after 3 days we'd seen basically everything it had to offer and got "bored" for the last 4.

Scratch the Caribean, take her on an Alaskan cruise in July on your anniversary....

I would not go in January or February…sea conditions can be pretty rough during that time.

I can't add anything on the cruise as we've not been on one before. We go to the Caribbean or somewhere tropical every winter usually in February. This year it's going to be the Grand Cayman Islands for the first time. I guess we're the odd ones out here as we've been to Mexico 9 times. 5 to Cancun, 2 to Cabo, 1 to PV, 1 to Cozumel. Didn't care for Cozumel as there's not a much for a beach area on the side of the island where the hotels are at. I'm a low level guy so my wife will book a tour while we're there to go see something for us to do on one of the days.

I will strongly suggest when you return if you're in the Daytona area for a few days take a day and go up to St. Augustine. That city is full of history. You can get on the hop on hop off trolley and it will take you around far easier than you can drive around town. The tour will be guided so they'll tell you about the history of what you're going by. If you want to get out and walk like in some areas that peaked your interest like we did you got that option. That is a place that my wife and I will return to. It's only about an hour or so from Daytona. There's also a whiskey Distillery in St. Augustine if you want to do a tour of that. Of places to eat we haven't been disappointed with Sunset Grille whether you choose to try that is up to you. The bang bang shrimp and fish or shrimp tacos were really good along with their burgers IMO.

LOL, just came in out of the rain and took my Sunset Grill T shirt off.
Get a free one every time we eat there.

We always recommend St Augustine to.folks and have never had anyone not like it.

Haven't been on a cruise since I was a kid (50.years ago).but prolly try to.line up.Alaska this year

I guess I'll be "that" guy...

for the life of me, I don't understand why anyone would want to spend 7 days with 5000 of their closest friends, on a timetable that's not their own, etc...

[sorry...I really dislike being "that" guy....}

I think staying in the Florida Keys and renting or taking a boat would be fun. You can catch shrimp with a cast net, trap blue and stone crabs, catch spiny lobsters, dive for scallops, collect oysters and fish for all sorts of fish including fresh water, brackish water, salt water and invasive exotics like peacock bass, snake heads, oscars and Mayan Cichlids. You can even hunt iguanas and feral pigs There's loads of nice, pretty cheap houses to rent, many with boat docks. There's lots of deserted islands that allow camping, where you might be the only people on the island.

The Tug Trash Outdoors YouTube channel:

https://m.youtube.com/@TugTrashOutdoors

has a bunch of interesting videos of doing all that and more in the Florida Keys. If I could get away from the farm, I would go to the Keys.

Keith

You’re not alone Don…
You ever see that documentary about the cruise ship where everyone had to pee in the showers and poop in biohazard bags cause the ship went kaput?


Talk about trapped …


But I’m sorry, happy anniversary to you and your wife Elk!!!

I’ll second this. Beyond the social side of it, they’re awful for the environment and attract a bunch of mostly clueless tourists to places where the locals don’t want them.

I lived in Alaska on an island for three years. Nearby island is a hub for cruise ships. I’d drawn a mountain goat tag on the cruise ship hub island. As I was flying back home on a float plane we flew over top a ship that was leaving port - I noticed there was a go kart track on top of this ship, and could see cars racing around. Meanwhile, there were humpback whales breaching within 200 yards of the ship. Guaranteed those on the go karts completely missed those whales.

…. Sounds like fun …. Just not my kind of fun lol

We probably will never do a cruise other than possibly an Alaskan cruise. We have had too many people that we know that have not had good tropical cruise experiences. To each their own but for now we would rather fly to a destination and spend 4 or 5 days there.
Now DaveP how are you getting a free t shirt from Sunset Grill?? I'm guessing you're spending quite a bit to get one.

White Marlin you gave the main reasons why I am not interested in a tropical cruise and they are a big reason why our friends didn't care for them. There's not near as much freedom to do what you want either with deadlines to get back, the port areas are usually more expensive to shop at if you want anything. It doesn't sound appealing to me. Too dang crowded and there's been too many illnesses over the last few years on cruise ships as well. I haven't heard of an outbreak on an Alaskan cruise ship though.

Keith and anyone else that may go to the Florida Keys I'll give a suggestion on a fishing charter you may want to check out. It's called Fish Monster. It was by far and away the cheapest we found. It cost us about $110 a person when we went. We both caught plenty of fish. Had a shark follow one guys fish right up to the boat then lunged at it after it came out of the water. He was fishing right next to us and that was cool to see. Now Fish Monster has a few boats and the one we were on had spots for I think 35 people to fish but I believe there was only 16 on our trip. Plenty of room for everyone. It was about 4 hours or so on the water. People were nice and cleaned my fish when we got back and I took them to a restaurant right on the dock and they cooked them for us. It doesn't save much by doing that literally a couple of bucks so I'm not sure I'll do it that way again. I may just release what I catch unless the mates want to keep what I catch to use for bait which they did on some species because they aren't the best eating anyway.

I didn't see that documentary, Ashley; but I heard about it on the news at the time.

Kevin, I shouldn't have crapped on your thread...Happy Anniversary to you and the Mrs.!

Went on a cruise to the Caribbean and it wasn't bad. Didn't go hungry. I would have probably have liked even better in my 20's when I would try to drink my body weight in alcohol. lol. Did an all inclusive trip to Cancun during those times and enjoyed myself immensely back in those days when I was young, dumb and full of ......

i would second doing the Alaskan cruise i have only ever heard good things i plan on doing it one day maybe after retirement

My first trip when I turn 59 1/2. They can be up to 10 grand. I'm doing that one.

On their website, coupon in local flyers, etc.

Used to be with $40 purchase, think it went to $50 last year or two

https://sunsetgrillea1a.com/