What do you like about St. Maarten?

I'm having difficulty choosing an itinerary for our cruise next June, 2017, for our son's 21st birthday. We are a family of three and love the typical white sand, blue water beaches. Shopping is a plus and we love just being in a beautiful place! Here are my choices:

All leaving from San Juan...

Itinerary One: St. Thomas / Curacao / Aruba / St. Kitts

Itinerary Two: St. Maarten / St. Kitts / Antigua / St. Lucia / Barbados

Itinerary Three: Bonaire / Curacao / Aruba / St. Maarten

So what do you like about St. Maarten? What sets it apart from the options above, and which Itinerary would you choose?

Thanks for your opinion! :D

I'm having difficulty choosing an itinerary for our cruise next June, 2017, for our son's 21st birthday. We are a family of three and love the typical white sand, blue water beaches. Shopping is a plus and we love just being in a beautiful place! Here are my choices:

 

All leaving from San Juan...

 

Itinerary One: St. Thomas / Curacao / Aruba / St. Kitts

 

Itinerary Two: St. Maarten / St. Kitts / Antigua / St. Lucia / Barbados

 

Itinerary Three: Bonaire / Curacao / Aruba / St. Maarten

 

So what do you like about St. Maarten? What sets it apart from the options above, and which Itinerary would you choose?

 

Thanks for your opinion! :D

St. Maarten has the advantage of two personalities plus the great beaches common to other islands. Of the other islands, St. Kitts strikes me as having little to offer - while St. Thomas is the most crowded and least attractive island - it's only asset is its proximity to St. John.

No. Three: the ABC group plus St. Maarten strikes me as best.

St. Maarten has the beautiful beaches you desire!

Itinerary Three would be our choice! :)

St. Maarten has the advantage of two personalities plus the great beaches common to other islands. Of the other islands, St. Kitts strikes me as having little to offer - while St. Thomas is the most crowded and least attractive island - it's only asset is its proximity to St. John.

 

No. Three: the ABC group plus St. Maarten strikes me as best.

I'm starting to lean more towards three, have you been to all the islands? Is it relatively easy to find a nice beach, bar, chairs, and umbrellas for the day? Expensive?

St. Maarten has the beautiful beaches you desire!

 

Itinerary Three would be our choice! :)

I'm starting to lean more in that direction. If you look at my signature line, we've stuck with your typical eastern caribbean / Bahamas itinerary, as well as going to western caribbean. We are really looking for something different in terms of being nicer, would you classify the ABCs to be nicer?

Itinerary 3 would be my choice, although they're all pretty nice! We love the ABC islands and find the snorkeling on BonAire to be amazing. St Maarten is one of our favorite places. The people are friendly, the beaches are amazing and I love the coconut smoothies at The Coconut Hut near the pier.

Itinerary 3 would be my choice, although they're all pretty nice! We love the ABC islands and find the snorkeling on BonAire to be amazing. St Maarten is one of our favorite places. The people are friendly, the beaches are amazing and I love the coconut smoothies at The Coconut Hut near the pier.

Coconut smoothies.... yummy! Thanks for your input! What do you like most about Aruba and Curacao? The beaches? What sets them apart?

Coconut smoothies.... yummy! Thanks for your input! What do you like most about Aruba and Curacao? The beaches? What sets them apart?

Aruba has miles of beautiful beaches and Curaçao had a great old Dutch colonial city - really worth wandering through after crossing the floating bridge.

Aruba has miles of beautiful beaches and Curaçao had a great old Dutch colonial city - really worth wandering through after crossing the floating bridge.

I'm assuming, from what research I have done, is that the islands on itinerary 3 are nicer than the others? Would you agree? Also, does Curacao have nice beaches or is more or a city atmosphere?

Aruba has gorgeous beaches. I also love the Atlantic side where Baby Bridge is. The people are very friendly and the main street is really pretty. The architecture is nice. We always go have a beer in a place with an upstairs/outside balcony. So nice! Curacao, again, has really nice architecture. We have only been there once, but we really enjoyed it and are looking forward to another visit in March! Don't miss the coconut smoothie on St. Maarten! :-)

I'm assuming, from what research I have done, is that the islands on itinerary 3 are nicer than the others? Would you agree? Also, does Curacao have nice beaches or is more or a city atmosphere?

Curaçao has some beaches, but not as great as those on Aruba or St. Maarten. Bonaire had great snorkeling opportunities, and St. Maarten has great beaches, two cultures, and fantastic shopping .

The four islands on itinerary 3 are, in my view, the best of the Caribbean. There are, of course attractions on other islands, but the other itineraries just do not compete.

I'm having difficulty choosing an itinerary for our cruise next June, 2017, for our son's 21st birthday. We are a family of three and love the typical white sand, blue water beaches. Shopping is a plus and we love just being in a beautiful place! Here are my choices:

 

All leaving from San Juan...

 

Itinerary One: St. Thomas / Curacao / Aruba / St. Kitts

 

Itinerary Two: St. Maarten / St. Kitts / Antigua / St. Lucia / Barbados

 

Itinerary Three: Bonaire / Curacao / Aruba / St. Maarten

 

So what do you like about St. Maarten? What sets it apart from the options above, and which Itinerary would you choose?

 

Thanks for your opinion! :D

St. Maarten is my favorite Caribbean island, though I am not sure I can express why. The port itself is inviting. It is an easy walk to downtown with

many shops to browse and purchase from. My favorite is the Belgian Chocolate Box...which now also has a cruise port store. The public transportation is easy to use, efficient and inexpensive. The plane landings at Princess Julianne airport adjacent to Maho beach is an amazing sight. Orient Beach is an outstanding beach. My first visit to St. Maarten, I took a tour that traveled both sides of the island which gave a nice overview.

I have been to all of the islands you listed above except Curaco. I will be sailing itinerary numbers 2 and 3 soon, both from San Juan. In my opinion the beach at Barbados is my favorite. The packed white sand, the colors of the water which starts as clear on the beach and then changes three (I think) various shades of blue. I was at Palm Beach in Aruba and I think it pales in comparison to the beach in Barbados.

I would choose option number 2. Besides the reasons given for Barbados and St. Maarten, the Pitons on St.Lucia was an enjoyable experience. I was not as impressed with St.Kitts but there is history (Brimstone Hill) and beaches to be explored on that island. I hope to have a better experience next time in Antigua than my first but I am very certain it will only be a beach day.

Curaçao has some beaches, but not as great as those on Aruba or St. Maarten. Bonaire had great snorkeling opportunities, and St. Maarten has great beaches, two cultures, and fantastic shopping .

 

The four islands on itinerary 3 are, in my view, the best of the Caribbean. There are, of course attractions on other islands, but the other itineraries just do not compete.

The best beaches in Curacao are further away from the port. Best snorkeling we have experienced so far - Bonaire is a port on our next cruise- has been in Curacao at Grote Knip and Little Knip with both of these beaches being at least 45 minutes to a hour from the port

Don't miss the coconut smoothie on St. Maarten! :-)

Hey ... so where is this coconut smoothie??? And is it non-alcoholic?

Thanks!

Jeff aka Recovery Dude

Hi Jeff! YES it is non-alcoholic and delicious! If you are walking back to the ship, it's on the right side almost on the pier. It's called "Coconuts", I think. They stand out front and offer samples all day long. In March we had an overnight in St. Maarten, so we got one on each day! So so good!

I'm having difficulty choosing an itinerary for our cruise next June, 2017, for our son's 21st birthday. We are a family of three and love the typical white sand, blue water beaches. Shopping is a plus and we love just being in a beautiful place! Here are my choices:

 

All leaving from San Juan...

 

Itinerary One: St. Thomas / Curacao / Aruba / St. Kitts

 

Itinerary Two: St. Maarten / St. Kitts / Antigua / St. Lucia / Barbados

 

Itinerary Three: Bonaire / Curacao / Aruba / St. Maarten

 

So what do you like about St. Maarten? What sets it apart from the options above, and which Itinerary would you choose?

 

Thanks for your opinion! :D

Maho beach where the airplanes fly just over the welcoming crowd on the beach for kids your age would be a highlight for St. Maarten to me and it is very close ( 5 min by taxi or 15 -20 min walk ) to the wonderful Mullet Bay beach and these two beaches together make for a great day. Of course St. Maarten also has great shopping as well.

I'm not a huge fan of St. Kitts but there is some shopping by the port that we enjoyed and we went to a really nice place that we walked to from the port called Palm Court Garden on one of our two visits. It was a private residence with a pool, food and drinks for purchase. We loved our day there. Since you would have 5 ports on cruise number 2 you could make it a shopping day and spend time on the ship enjoying the empty pools there.

St. Lucia has lots to offer cruisers. The beaches aren't the best though. Great place for a catermaran trip by the pitons and the snorkeling is good. It's a beautiful lush island but I would do an excursion of some sort.

Barbados has wonderful beaches and some fun beach bar's. It's a great place for a beach day or to swim with turtles.

Antigua is another island with beautiful beaches but the snorkeling is not that good.

Number 3 seems like a Dutch cruise so since I love St. Maarten and variety, I would choose number 2.

The only island that I have never been to out of all of these islands is Bonaire.

Aruba has awesome beaches. In Curaçao we went to a beach that had great snorkeling and diving from the shore but was a long taxi ride from the pier and we walked the town which was cute. St. Thomas has St. John which takes some effort to get to but it's a beautiful island with great beaches.

If all of these itinerary's leave from San Juan they would be on different cruise lines. Cruiseline and even ship is another thing to consider when choosing a cruise.

My second choice would be number 3 and if the cruiseline was more to my liking I would not hesitating choosing that cruise.

Nice problem to have ;):)