Excursions for Carnival Southern Caribbean

Good evening! I am going on the Fascination out of San Juan in December. The itinerary is as follows: St. Thomas, Barbados, St. Lucia, St. Kitts, and St. Maarten. The most important thing for us is scuba. My question is: what are the top 2 out of the itinerary for scuba diving? Do any of these destinations have must-have diving? And what are some other active, exploring excursions (for example, do any of these have great rain forests or amazing must-see beaches?) for the other ports? Thank you!!

Cruise Critic has separate boards for the areas of interest you mention. Here's the link to the scuba/snorkeling board and then you'll want to visit the ports of call boards.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=40

Oh thank you! I apologize, I have not frequented this site and I am not too familiar with what goes where. Again, thanks!

Oh thank you! I apologize, I have not frequented this site and I am not too familiar with what goes where. Again, thanks!

Welcome and have fun researching :)

I had had 2 nice dives in St Thomas. I haven't dove in the other ports yet. I used a private company Blue Water Divers in St Thomas and like them.

My favorite of those is Barbados, where I recommend West Side Scuba Center (http://www.westsidescuba.com). They're extremely easy to work with,and provide transportation to/from the port.

My favorite dive operator of those ports is Dive St. Kitts (http://www.divestkitts.com). They provide outstanding service.

St. Thomas I've used both Blue Island Divers (http://www.blueislanddivers.com) and Aquamarine (http://www.diveaquamarine.com). I liked the service better with Aquamarine, but Blue Island gets you to all the wreck sites. Either will pick you up at the port.

St. Maarten I've used Octupus Diving (http://www.octopusdiving.com). When I was last there they only had the shop on the French side, and it was a bit of a hassle. Now they have a location right at the port. I'm sure they will do a great job for you.

I've been to St. Lucia, but we did not dive. However, what I saw makes me regret that we did not. It looks great.

So, of the islands on your list, I'd rank them as:

1) Barbados

2) St. Kitts

3) St. Thomas

4) St. Maarten,

St. Lucia is probably high on the list, but I just don't know.

Harris

Denver, CO