April 2014 Summit Cruise - The Ports

Instead of continuing to use the diary format, I am going to switch to themed posts since our evenings were all pretty similar. This post will be on the ports.



Barbados
Our first stop was Barbados. We signed up for the Shipwrecks, Turtles and a beach day. We took the later tour so we had a nice morning having eggs Benedict at the breakfast buffet, coffees at the coffee bar and enjoying the scenery. We got off the ship early to check out the port, but there really wasn't much there. I wish we had taken a taxi to Carlisle Beach. It is close to the port and that is where they took us to swim with the turtles. We met the tour at 1230 and took a short ride to board our boat. Our tour started with snorkeling with the turtles. The guides jumped in the water and started putting fish in the water. I got into the water a little late. One of the guides had been feeding the turtles by himself as the other snorkelers followed the main guide. So it was just me, the guide and two turtles for about 10 minutes.

 It was so cool.  I also saw two large turtles. After we snorkeled for about 30 minutes, we got back on the boat and drove a little further to a shipwreck. 

The visibility was not great because it was so windy so I didn't stay in the water too long. After the snorkeling, the "bar" opened with sodas and rum drinks. They took us to a deserted beach. I called it the prison beach because it as in front of an abandoned hotel development.

 The water was beautiful. 

After the tour we headed back to the port to try the local beer - Banks.

 It was an average lager.

St Lucia

We had to cancel our shore excursion in St Lucia because I was over the weight limit. Since no one could tell us why the weight limit was in place,  we though it best to cancel.  At that point, all the other shore excursions were all booked so we had a free day in St Lucia. I was bummed. I was most looking forward to exploring St Lucia. We made the best of it and headed to Reduit Beach near Dickinson Bay.

 The view was beautiful but the vendors were very agressive. We stayed a few hours and then headed back to the port. We had to try the local beer here - Pitons. It's a refreshing lager. I tried the shandy and it was just okay.

Antigua
We had originally planned to visit the Sandals in Antigua, but since we cancelled the tour in St Lucia, we decided to go on the Antiguan Experience. We visited a woman's house, a pineapple farm and had a beach barbecue. The house visit was a little odd. I am used to visiting plantation homes,but not ones with people living in them and filled to the brim with collections.

 The pineapple farm was really interesting.
 Then the beach was phenomenal. Absolutely stunning. 

We had a lovely barbecue buffet with a steel drum band and a singer. 

It was a lot of fun.

St Maarten
We took a taxi to Orient Beach and set up just on the edge of the clothing optional side. We like it over there because it is less busy and you had more space, but there are naked people. We had a great day enjoying the beach.

St Thomas
We took the St John Self Explore tour - a boat ride between the dock and St John's. The boat ride was quite adventurous on the way there. 

Then we took a taxi to Trunk Bay. It is breath taking.

 It has an underwater snorkel trail that was really fun. It is a national park so we had to rent chairs at the gift shop and drag them to the beach. We stayed for about 2 hours and then headed back to the dock for nice lunch at a local cafe. The boat ride back was smoother. The tour company was called Topsails and they did a nice job.