Serenade, Southern Carribbean -- best snorkeling ports?

[MrsPete]

We're looking at doing a back-to-back on the Serenade, and I'm looking at excursion options. EVERY island has some type of snorkeling trips, but we don't want to do that at every stop. Which islands have the best, must-not-miss snorkeling?

 

Bridgetown, Barbados

Castries, St. Lucia

St. John’s Antigua

Phillipsburg, St. Maarten

St. Croix, US Virgin Islands

Charlotte Amalie

Basseterre, St. Kitts

Oranjestad, Aruba

Willemstad, Curaco

[workingboy]

I have done the trip where you snorkel with the turtles in Bridgetown and have loved it both times.

[RlrCstr]

For St. Croix go to Buck Island.

I used a private company called BigBeard, highly recommended on here,

and it was one of the best days I have had. They provide all the gear.

The all day tour also has a yummy bbq as part of it.

[Sue L]

Curacao, by far, near the sunken tug which is a underwater national park. Beautiful. Any of the excursions that say they go to the sunken tug.

[sadie8]

I second snorkeling with the sea turtles in Barbados. We sailed with Silvermoon - wonderful day!

[tiggyfrank]

What did you see at Buck Island? Keep hearing conflicting reports, some say nothing to see now since the reef is dead. Confusing! :)

[khm1]

We're looking at doing a back-to-back on the Serenade, and I'm looking at excursion options. EVERY island has some type of snorkeling trips, but we don't want to do that at every stop. Which islands have the best, must-not-miss snorkeling?

 

Bridgetown, Barbados- Do a catamaran trip with snorkeling with turtles. Book privately for the best price and experience.

Castries, St. Lucia- Beautiful sightseeing here, I would skip the snorkeling.

St. John’s Antigua- I have done a catamaran snorkeling excursion here, it was pretty good. If I went back, I would probably just go to the beach.

Phillipsburg, St. Maarten- Snorkeling is not very good here at all, IMO. I have been to this island 5 times.

St. Croix, US Virgin Islands- sorry, never been here

Charlotte Amalie- Go to Secret Harbor, good snorkeling to the right, near the rocks. It is better than Coki or Sapphire IMO. They also have a GREAT restaurant and facilities.

Basseterre, St. Kitts- Never been here either, but am going in Jan, '11

Oranjestad, Aruba- Not good snorkeling IMO, great beaches though!

Willemstad, Curaco- Did a privately booked snorkeling trip here with Curacao Actief. Wonderful snorkeling!

 

In summary, if I were lucky enough to go on this B2B, I would probably go snorkeling for sure in Curacao, Barabados, and maybe St. Thomas. Good luck!:)

[polodad]

Aruba, the Jolly Pirate snorkel, swing trip is awesome, even the bus ride is fun. One of our best excursions ever.

[sandinmypants]

We go on the Serenade in three weeks, only on the first part of your itinerary. We are big snorkelers, our main goal is to snorkel each island. We want to get the most out of our cruise without breaking the bank. After EXTENSIVE research on multiple websites and after emailing with several people, here's what I've found out:

 

St. Lucia - there's a lot to see ON the island, but there is also good snorkeling at Jalousie Beach. We're taking a tour with Spencer Ambrose because he will tailor it a bit more to us than Cosol will, spending less time doing things like stopping to see a big snake (:rolleyes:), we wanted to see the volcano, waterfall, gardens, and then head right to the beach, with a water taxi return so we can maximize our snorkeling time. Jalousie Beach is only approachable by water taxi apparently. This is the only day we're doing an organized tour, and this isn't a ship's tour. It's my understanding that the snorkeling at Jalousie is fantastic!

 

Barbados - I understand there is wonderful snorkeling at Accra/Rockely Beach. There's a man-made barrier reef 150 yds. off-shore at the eastern end of the bay, with lots of sea life. If it's a calm day you can do both the inner & outer reefs - they're very different.

 

Antigua - this is the only day that we may not be snorkeling - the beaches that offer so-so snorkeling just don't sound that appealing otherwise.

 

St Martin - we're going to head to le Galion beach - we really want to get away from the crowd at Orient & Maho (Sunrise bar isn't for us), and the snorkeling sounds reasonably good there - at least worth bringing along the equipment.

 

St Croix - Cane Bay sounds like a winner in several categories. This is where divers go to dive The Wall, snorkelers can swim to it if they're strong swimmers, or you can get transportation to Cane Bay and a boat will take you out to snorkel The Wall - it's around $25pp. There is also a restaurant there that sounds absolutely fantastic called eat @ canebay, you can google them. I'm looking forward to it, I love good food!

 

I want to say that we haven't done any of this yet, but I'm one of those OCD vacation planners - and I'll be back here in about four weeks to let you know how it all went. We prefer to avoid ship's excursions, and just like to do our own thing, winging it but with a plan, if you know what I mean! We prefer a natural-type of beach with facilities like restrooms and at least one place to eat/drink - but we try to avoid places with motorized water sports/vendors on the beach, when possible. The amount of planning I've spent on figuring out where to go/what to do on each of these islands has just been unbelievable - I hope we're not disappointed! :D Whatever you decide to do, I hope it's enjoyable!

[Cruising Lions]

We did the Silvermoon in Barbados and it was great. Stay away from Buck Island as we experienced dead coral and not many fish. Paddles in Antigua was good. In St Thomas, Captain Nautica was my favorite of all trips. Jolly Pirates in Aruba was ok, but nothing to write home about. Snorkled throgh Sandals in St Lucia and it was very good. Aslo went to the Jalousie and it was very good.

[Miss Vickie]

We're looking at doing a back-to-back on the Serenade, and I'm looking at excursion options. EVERY island has some type of snorkeling trips, but we don't want to do that at every stop. Which islands have the best, must-not-miss snorkeling?

 

Bridgetown, Barbados

Castries, St. Lucia

St. John’s Antigua

Phillipsburg, St. Maarten

St. Croix, US Virgin Islands

Charlotte Amalie

Basseterre, St. Kitts

Oranjestad, Aruba

Willemstad, Curaco

 

 

Barbados - Silvermoon offers a great experience, good shore snorkeling at Folkstone

St Lucia - great snorkeling at Anse Cochon, we use Island Divers usually

Antigua - adventureantigua.com offers great tours, with very good snorkeling - always the best day of our cruise

St. Maarten - we've never found good snorkeling there (we're avid snorkelers) and we've looked

St. Croix - our first trip there will be in 2012, can't help you there

St. Thomas - go to St. John - we like Cinammon Bay and Waterlemon Cay

St. Kitts - been there but have never snorkeled there

Aruba - Baby Beach good for novices, Boca Catalina has good shore snorkeling

Curacoa - Jan Theil beach was a good place to spend the day, with easy snorkeling.

[MrsPete]

Thanks, all! This was exactly the type of information I was hoping to garner, and I see quite a bit of agreement among the posters. It looks like most posters agree upon Barbados and Curaco (first stop and last stop) as best.