Cosol Tours

:o:oI apoglgize I somehow had the wrong tour in mind , I was thinking Royston from St. Kitts We have done Cosol a few years back , no complaints other than its a long day

Alright, I have my anti flame suit on so I'm going to give a different point of view.

We were on Miracle this last week and did Cosol tour and HATED it!!! The water, soda and for those who drank rum punch and beers were plentiful, I didn't drink but might have enjoyed the tour except for a few things.

The first place we stopped was for bananas, people were giving out sugar cane and other things, if you took anything they wanted tipped, so ok we tipped no biggie, but then............. our first of VERY LIMITED bathroom stops, charged a dollar to use the rest room. So many people with their hands out this tour, we felt nickled and dimed to death.

The island is beautiful but the tour is by bus and they drive very fast on up and down ground, felt sorta like a roller coaster ride. Trying to get pictures as they sped by was very hard, and often frustrating.

We got off the bus and onto a dive boat to the beach, we were allowed on the crappy side of the beach, the nice side was for the hotel guests, it was rocky, and those without water shoes suffered. Also it rained the whole time, which is not their fault, but they dropped us off at a beach with little shelter in the rain, came back an hour later to get us.

When asked if someone could just stay on the bus instead of go to the beach, the answer was no.

Perhaps we got a new driver? I cannot even remember the name of our driver, but it was not Cosol, and not anyone who's picture has been posted here.

I guess we were lucky in the long run, I heard that someone else on our ship was on the same tour in a different bus and it was so roller coaster like that there was people throwing up :(

Anyway I'm usually all about the private tours, had a WONDERFUL time with both Bernard in St Martin and Thenford Gray was outstanding, but I really did not enjoy Cosol, and most of our group felt the same.

Different strokes...

Cheers, Carole

@Schwabob:

Hi,

Just wanted to let you know, I really enjoyed your pics. Brings back memories of Cosol's tour we did back in 2008. LOVED it and, actually, trying to book another cruise with St. Lucia as a port so we can do it again.

Thanks for sharing!

We were also on the Miracle - and took Cosol's tour. We had Cosol himself as our driver. I have to tell you, this was actually our second tour with Cosol. We did the tour when we were on the Victory in 2010, and were so pleased, we wanted to do it again. There are plenty of stops - with people trying to sell things - but all you have to do is say NO, and they leave you alone. We found this to be true for all of the islands we visited. Cosol makes plenty of stops for "scenic" pictures, and is always in touch with all of his drivers. He is very proud of his island, and makes a special effort to make sure his passengers are comfortable, and have a great time. Unfortunately, it was pouring rain when we got to the volcano, so we decided not to go through. A great time was had by all in our van.:)

We were also on the Miracle - and took Cosol's tour. We had Cosol himself as our driver. I have to tell you, this was actually our second tour with Cosol. We did the tour when we were on the Victory in 2010, and were so pleased, we wanted to do it again. There are plenty of stops - with people trying to sell things - but all you have to do is say NO, and they leave you alone. We found this to be true for all of the islands we visited. Cosol makes plenty of stops for "scenic" pictures, and is always in touch with all of his drivers. He is very proud of his island, and makes a special effort to make sure his passengers are comfortable, and have a great time. Unfortunately, it was pouring rain when we got to the volcano, so we decided not to go through. A great time was had by all in our van.:)

Hi Sue!!!! Glad you guys enjoyed the tour, it may simply have been the driver of the van. We just didn't feel the tour like so many have. It was pouring a LOT which probably didn't help, but we were not thrilled with something they have no control over, the up and down and around of the roads. Our driver was not very personable either, he didn't really mention where to get the drinks and to watch out for the aggressive vendors, it was hard to tell who was involved in the tour and who was just out to make a buck.

All in all we enjoyed Bernard in St Martin and Thenford Gray much more.

Maybe would have had a different point of view if we had Cosol!!

<3 Carole

Alright, I have my anti flame suit on so I'm going to give a different point of view.

We were on Miracle this last week and did Cosol tour and HATED it!!! The water, soda and for those who drank rum punch and beers were plentiful, I didn't drink but might have enjoyed the tour except for a few things.

The first place we stopped was for bananas, people were giving out sugar cane and other things, if you took anything they wanted tipped, so ok we tipped no biggie, but then............. our first of VERY LIMITED bathroom stops, charged a dollar to use the rest room. So many people with their hands out this tour, we felt nickled and dimed to death.

The island is beautiful but the tour is by bus and they drive very fast on up and down ground, felt sorta like a roller coaster ride. Trying to get pictures as they sped by was very hard, and often frustrating.

We got off the bus and onto a dive boat to the beach, we were allowed on the crappy side of the beach, the nice side was for the hotel guests, it was rocky, and those without water shoes suffered. Also it rained the whole time, which is not their fault, but they dropped us off at a beach with little shelter in the rain, came back an hour later to get us.

When asked if someone could just stay on the bus instead of go to the beach, the answer was no.

Perhaps we got a new driver? I cannot even remember the name of our driver, but it was not Cosol, and not anyone who's picture has been posted here.

I guess we were lucky in the long run, I heard that someone else on our ship was on the same tour in a different bus and it was so roller coaster like that there was people throwing up :(

Anyway I'm usually all about the private tours, had a WONDERFUL time with both Bernard in St Martin and Thenford Gray was outstanding, but I really did not enjoy Cosol, and most of our group felt the same.

Different strokes...

Cheers, Carole

LOL no Flames here , I dont disagree , We went a few years back found it hot LONG and tiring , I dont have the best health and you are right bathroom breaks were at a minimum so I never drank anything till the end of the tour. Now it was an ok tour, I agree with you on the beach as well must have been the same one.

We just came back from St Lucia and went on our own this time to Pigeon Island National Park , much nicer beach and we enjoyed our day a LOT more.

We just came back from St Lucia and went on our own this time to Pigeon Island National Park , much nicer beach and we enjoyed our day a LOT more.

Do you mind me asking how you got there and if there was good snorkeling?

LOL no Flames here , I dont disagree , We went a few years back found it hot LONG and tiring , I dont have the best health and you are right bathroom breaks were at a minimum so I never drank anything till the end of the tour. Now it was an ok tour, I agree with you on the beach as well must have been the same one.

 

We just came back from St Lucia and went on our own this time to Pigeon Island National Park , much nicer beach and we enjoyed our day a LOT more.

Hi Steve, We would like to go back to this island to get a different point of view, thanks for the heads up about Pigeon Island National Park, I will definitely look into it next time.

I'm know many people enjoy Cosol, it was just too much bus time, driving around ALL day was just not for us.

Cheers, Carole

Took this tour in April this year. Two words that come to mind are "AWESOME", and "WOW". If I had it to do over again, I would not hesitate to go with Cosol Tours! .... :D

My wife and I went on Cosol's tour around St Lucia on October 13th, 2011. We were from the cruise ship Emerald Princess. We can honestly say......forget the rest, Cosol is simply THE BEST! From the moment we stepped on the bus with the rest of the passengers, Cosol treated us all to a truly magnificent and memorable day. We saw so many lovely places on the beautiful island of St Lucia, and had a great time. Nothing was any trouble for Cosol, and he's the friendliest man you could wish to meet. His knowledge of the island and his genuine openness shine through like a beacon light. The value of the whole package was top notch, and nothing was skimped on. There were plentiful supplies of food and drinks, both alcohol based and non-alcoholic. To anyone visiting St Lucia and wishing to take a tour, I would unreservedly recommend Cosol's tour. I'm confident that you won't find one anywhere near as good, let alone better. All the other passengers on our bus enjoyed themselves, and they all remarked upon that fact. The other drivers, including Cosol's brother, all seemed affable men and I spoke to other people on the other buses and they were all fullsome in their praise of the tour. I honestly didn't see any of the negatives that you've mentioned, and I would reckon that judging by Cosol's natural personality that children in families would be well catered for too on the tour. I'm sure if you take the tour, you will thoroughly enjoy it. All the best!

While I appreciate your response, this kind of thing is exactly the problem. This is your only post on these boards. I don't want to insult you personally, maybe you are really just happy about the tour, but I know that if I was a tour operator I would be trolling this site and have 100 different identities giving awesome reviews of myself, so I have to be skeptical.

Alright, I have my anti flame suit on so I'm going to give a different point of view.

We were on Miracle this last week and did Cosol tour and HATED it!!! The water, soda and for those who drank rum punch and beers were plentiful, I didn't drink but might have enjoyed the tour except for a few things.

The first place we stopped was for bananas, people were giving out sugar cane and other things, if you took anything they wanted tipped, so ok we tipped no biggie, but then............. our first of VERY LIMITED bathroom stops, charged a dollar to use the rest room. So many people with their hands out this tour, we felt nickled and dimed to death.

The island is beautiful but the tour is by bus and they drive very fast on up and down ground, felt sorta like a roller coaster ride. Trying to get pictures as they sped by was very hard, and often frustrating.

We got off the bus and onto a dive boat to the beach, we were allowed on the crappy side of the beach, the nice side was for the hotel guests, it was rocky, and those without water shoes suffered. Also it rained the whole time, which is not their fault, but they dropped us off at a beach with little shelter in the rain, came back an hour later to get us.

When asked if someone could just stay on the bus instead of go to the beach, the answer was no.

Perhaps we got a new driver? I cannot even remember the name of our driver, but it was not Cosol, and not anyone who's picture has been posted here.

I guess we were lucky in the long run, I heard that someone else on our ship was on the same tour in a different bus and it was so roller coaster like that there was people throwing up :(

Anyway I'm usually all about the private tours, had a WONDERFUL time with both Bernard in St Martin and Thenford Gray was outstanding, but I really did not enjoy Cosol, and most of our group felt the same.

Different strokes...

Cheers, Carole

Thanks for offering your perspective.

I just went to trip advisor went back 4 pages and didnt see a bad thing said:confused:

You have to sort by rating to see the poor ratings, because as I said there is an inordinate number of 5 star reviews by reviewers with only 1 review on the site.

Kyrisong1 is incorrect. As has been said on here repeatedly, you are not restricted to only one side of the beach, you can use the whole beach. it is a public beach. It is just that the free sunbeds are on one side and the hotel sunbeds on the other. We sat on our towels on the so-called hotel side. No problem. Even if you use the free beds, that doesn't mean you have to go in the water on that side, you can just walk over to the other part.

I have to say Ive only read the last few posts as I havent come on here since my cruise on the emerald princess on 9th october began.

We only took one tour with princess, that was in barbados their 4 x 4 which was good fun.

This was our first cruise and i picked our excursions by recommendations given on the roll call for our trip.

Cosol was the one I chose for st lucia by looking at these recommendations and trip advisor.

I have to say it was the highlight of the tour for me my husband and two friends who were on the same cruise.

It was really well organised, i get car sickness and didnt suffer at all on this trip. We went to some amazing sights, had lots of stops to take photos, we were extremely well looked after, the taxi by boat was a fantastic experience, the beach we went to was wonderful, the atmosphere was fantastic, food and drink plentiful and lovely, and i had to say it was actually one of the best days ive had in my life never mind the cruise.

St Lucia is a beautiful island and i would recommend this tour to anybody visiting there.

Really wish we could do it all over again

oh and we werent on cosols bus we were on bumpys bus, he was a great guide, really informative

I have to say Ive only read the last few posts as I havent come on here since my cruise on the emerald princess on 9th october began.

 

We only took one tour with princess, that was in barbados their 4 x 4 which was good fun.

 

This was our first cruise and i picked our excursions by recommendations given on the roll call for our trip.

 

Cosol was the one I chose for st lucia by looking at these recommendations and trip advisor.

 

I have to say it was the highlight of the tour for me my husband and two friends who were on the same cruise.

 

It was really well organised, i get car sickness and didnt suffer at all on this trip. We went to some amazing sights, had lots of stops to take photos, we were extremely well looked after, the taxi by boat was a fantastic experience, the beach we went to was wonderful, the atmosphere was fantastic, food and drink plentiful and lovely, and i had to say it was actually one of the best days ive had in my life never mind the cruise.

St Lucia is a beautiful island and i would recommend this tour to anybody visiting there.

 

Really wish we could do it all over again

 

oh and we werent on cosols bus we were on bumpys bus, he was a great guide, really informative

This post fully endorses my original post, and really provides an excellent illustration of the quality of the tour. Perhaps, a certain recent sinister-minded contributor should take due note of it?

I have to say Ive only read the last few posts as I havent come on here since my cruise on the emerald princess on 9th october began.

We only took one tour with princess, that was in barbados their 4 x 4 which was good fun.

This was our first cruise and i picked our excursions by recommendations given on the roll call for our trip.

Cosol was the one I chose for st lucia by looking at these recommendations and trip advisor.

I have to say it was the highlight of the tour for me my husband and two friends who were on the same cruise.

It was really well organised, i get car sickness and didnt suffer at all on this trip. We went to some amazing sights, had lots of stops to take photos, we were extremely well looked after, the taxi by boat was a fantastic experience, the beach we went to was wonderful, the atmosphere was fantastic, food and drink plentiful and lovely, and i had to say it was actually one of the best days ive had in my life never mind the cruise.

St Lucia is a beautiful island and i would recommend this tour to anybody visiting there.

Really wish we could do it all over again

oh and we werent on cosols bus we were on bumpys bus, he was a great guide, really informative

Totally agree with everything you’ve said, we were with you on three of the tours on the October sailing. Cosol in St Lucia and Rosevelt in St Kitts were the highlights of our port tours. Cosol has a very organized system of handling his other drivers who have pax booked through him.

Our lunch stop was fantastic, I wish I had tipped the woman who prepared all the food at our lunch stop. She must have been cooking all night long. The Blue Van that followed us had diet Coke and water available along with the beer and rum punch.

We highly recommend Cosol as a tour guide in St Lucia.

My group of 34 celebrated our friend Virginia's 50th birthday with Cosol last week. We range in age from 17 to 60. Not one person in my group had a single complaint. They are all still raving about our excursion in St Lucia. I bet this is the first time that the blue van ran out of Piton beer since many folks were very well hydrated that day (if you know what I mean). A few of us do not drink alcohol so there was plenty of Coke, bottled water and Sprite left for us.

Recognizing that people have different expectations, I can only say that every single one of my friends had a wonderful and memorable day - especially Virginia and Tamara who were in Cosol's van. My driver was Baptiste, aka "oops", who answered every one of our questions, no matter how silly. I suppose the only negative is having to pay $1 to use the restroom, but since these were situated in people's homes, I can understand why.

When are you going. We booked for Jan 19 012. Very excited! Pam

We have Cosol booked Jan 13, 2012. Sorry we will miss you. What ship are you on?

When are you going. We booked for Jan 19 012. Very excited! Pam

We have Cosol booked Jan 13, 2012. What ship are you on?

We have returned today 13/11/11 from our caribbean cruise P&O Azura A124a, we did the Cosol tour on thursday 10/11/11, we were lucky enough to have Cosol himself driving our bus, what a top bloke he made our day (and cruise) to be honest , what everybody says about Cosol tours is right it is 1st class, and i would have no problems going on one again or advising others to book this amazing day out

Leighton & sara

We just returned from the Carnival Miracle a few days ago and hands down Cosol's tour was the best excursion we've done in all 6 cruises. Certainly everyone will have (and is entitled to) their own opinion, but here was our experience:

Our driver's name was Bumpy (named for the way he walked as a child, not the way he drives ;)) and he was a fantastic tour guide. He gave us plenty of time at each stop for pictures. Yes, some of the stops were short but we never felt rushed. Bumpy even carried a machete in his van to clear any roadside weeds that blocked our view! He was in frequent contact with Cosol to make sure we were on schedule with the rest of the vans.

The food was surprisingly good. Breakfast was a buffet of local foods such as fried "piton fish" (my fiancé hates fish and he could not stop raving about how good this was), fish cakes with banana ketchup (which was good but did not taste like banana or ketchup to me), banana bread, coconut cake, and about 10 other items prepared by an island woman. Lunch was the fresh baked "drumstick bread" which is so named because it is the shape and size of a turkey leg. It was crusty on the outside and soft on the inside, and still hot from the oven. We put cheese into the slice in the side and it melted into a delicious treat. I'm not sure what kind of cheese it was but it tasted like white cheddar maybe?

And as others have said, the blue van followed our caravan to provide ample drinks at every stop. Cosol's homemade rum punch was really good and different from any other I've tried (and in response to another poster, no I did not get drunk or buzzed, and I still think this was the best excursion we've ever taken.) There was also Piton beer, several kinds of soda, and water. Cosol joked that if there were any drinks left in the coolers at the end of the day then we each had to pay $20.

We did encounter locals at every stop trying to sell souvenirs, but a simple "no thank you" was all it took for them to move along. We did not find them to be pushy.

Many bathrooms on the island do charge $1, however Cosol informed the entire group of this before we left the port and gave us time to use the free bathrooms there. He and Bumpy also pointed out the free bathrooms at our various stops. I used the bathrooms at both Jalousie Beach and the volcano and they were free. However, if you need more frequent bathroom breaks, you may end up paying for them.

I personally found Jalousie Beach between the Pitons breathtaking. I would not call the side Cosol Tours uses the "crappy" side, although I do agree that there were a lot of rocks in the water. However, there were fish everywhere and the snorkeling was nice. The beach does not offer many amenities but Bumpy made sure we took extra drinks with us from the blue van.

If you suffer from motion sickness, this may not be the tour for you simply based on the mountainous terrain of St. Lucia. If you have small children, this may not be the tour for you because a good portion of your time is spent driving and/or looking at scenery. But for most cruisers this is the ideal excursion. At dinner after we left St. Lucia, all of our tablemates wished they had done the tour with us. And whenever we return to the island, we will do the tour again.

We returned from our cruise on the Jewel of the Seas and were on St. Lucia for my birthday on Nov 4. We had a group of about 78 from our ship and Cosol himself did our van. I have to say everyone raved and raved about how good this tour was. At the stop for food, Cosol even presented me and another fellow in our group a birthday cake for us to take back to the ship! I have to say he and his drivers made this the best birthday on a cruise ever! I would never hesitate to recommend this tour.

I keep trying to get to the Cosol tour site and the web page comes up but says the Account has been suspended? Does anyone know what has happened?

thanks,

Denise

most likely, he hasn't renewed his domain registration - or has missed payments and the domain holder has suspened his page for the time being. Happened recently with several companies here in St. Lucia- even our news channel hadn't renewed their domain registration - that was kind of funny. Hopefully he will get it straightened out very soon - not good for business if he doesn't have his page. Does his email not work also?

Yes...I tried this am and Account has be suspended. I hope this is fixed soon as I may have to book another tour?:( Any suggestions?:confused: Thanks for the info.... Pam

Yes...I tried this am and Account has be suspended. I hope this is fixed soon as I may have to book another tour?:( Any suggestions?:confused: Thanks for the info.... Pam

I will plan on Spencer Ambrose Tours...he had a lot of good comments on both Trip Advisor and Cruise Critic for St. Lucia....hope this helps :p

his email is, cosol966@hotmail.com, dont no what has happened to website, but i would not book with any body else personally, email him book it that way i did he replys quickly,