Limiting beach and sun on island/tropical cruises

Family of 4 kids are 8&10. We have crusied Baltics, Western Med, New England/Canada and without kids Alaska. We are looking at a week in early November so the Alaska and Canada options are out.

All but ME are pale red heads and I don't tan very well anymore either. Plus the kids tend to overheat easily. So not just sunburn worries :(

Would Belize, Roatan etc locations be interesting enough to explore and see sites where we aren't just exposed to blazing sun all day? We normally crusie on NCL.

We like animals, archaeological sites but they are quite adventurous enough yet for zip line/extreme sports!

Temps look to be low/mid 80's.

I would think beach/private island type stops at most they could be out 2 hours with at least 1-2 sunscreen applications even during that time!

Hate to avoid an entire crusie region without really understanding if there are alternative activities that would be good for the non sun worshippers! We enjoy the pools late in the evening! They love the kids club every night and sea days.

I'm not a beach bum. I usually look for tours of the ports and haven't been disappointed yet.

Cave tubing in Belize would probably be good. Pretty calm, smooth ride and mostly in the shade. Some of the ruins might be good too, but you would want to find out how long you would be in the sun. The one we did in Costa Maya had a fair bit of shade, and our tour guide was good about standing in it to tell us about things and then let us wander around before gathering back in the shade. We did it early in the morning which also helped. I think you can find things to do, just may not be full day things :)

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Another nice cruise to consider for kids is the 10 day Panama Canal partial transit on Princess. It visits Cartagena (which is a really gorgeous city if your kids can handle city touring), the Panama Canal, Aruba (which is also lovely, and has Philips Animal Garden, which lets you feed a lot of nice rescue animals), Grand Cayman Island (feed stingrays, turtle farm), and Costa Rica (not the nicest part of Costa Rica, but you can still get to a rainforest). It was a very nice cruise and easy for us to get to since it leaves from Ft. Lauderdale. Cartagena is quite warm, but certainly worth it - it was one of the most beautiful cities I've visited! My signature line has more information in the review.

Get a guidebook on your ports...there is more to the Caribbean than beaches! Find out what there is to do in each place, and plan to do those things! Do use plenty of sunscreen, even when you're NOT at the beach...Caribbean sun is VERY strong!

Remember that ANY water oriented activity will be hours in the sun...so you need to find other things that will interest you! Libraries have guidebooks, so you can learn about the places you're going!

Get a guidebook on your ports...there is more to the Caribbean than beaches!!

Or, for more current information without the expense of trouble of finding a guide book, she could just Google the ports she's considering. :) I see the "get a guide book" advice trotted out on CC a lot, and I just don't understand it. More information can be found online (and much more quickly!) than in even the best guide book.

Or, for more current information without the expense of trouble of finding a guide book, she could just Google the ports she's considering. :) I see the "get a guide book" advice trotted out on CC a lot, and I just don't understand it. More information can be found online (and much more quickly!) than in even the best guide book.

Its pretty much the same person giving the guide book advice every time. I agree they are out of date as soon at they are printed except for the more general information!

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