Best place for shopping in eastern carribean?

[Thechamp555]

Hi, I'm leaving this Sunday on the Solstice for a 7 day eastern Carribean and me and my wife are wondering where is the best place within these 3 locations for shopping (San Juan, P.R.\St-thomas\St-Martin) ?

 

 

The would include clothing, gold bracelet, rhum and cigars ...

 

 

Thanks a lot for the information ! ;)

 

 

Germain

Quebec

Canada

[melgray13]

They are all pretty good ports for shopping.

 

San Juan probably has the most variety.

 

There is a terrific chocolate store in St Martin, not to be missed. It will be featured in your cruise shopping guide.

 

In St Martin, both sides of the island offer a bit differnt items.

 

I personally, prefer St Martin to St Thomas for shopping.

 

Enjoy!

[emileg]

St. Thomas, St. Thomas, St. Thomas, St. Thomas and St. Thomas! Especially for jewelry. While Cardow's and Diamond International have attractive stores with beautiful displays, one can successfully bargain at stores a little of the beaten track. We always go to Magnum for jewelry. In addition, A.H. Riise is great for liquor and Lladro.

 

St. Martin is attractive too, but on a less extensive scale. The reason St. Thomas became such a shopping mecca is because of the extra amount U.S. citizens can buy duty and tax free that is not as liberal outside of the U.S. Virgin Islands.

[desperatewifeandmother]

I would reccomend St Maarten for Jewelry but San Juan for the Rum & Cigars-There is lots of selection. IMO St Thomas is a little over rated the deals are there but its overwhelming because there is so many jewelry stores and its extremely busy, unless you really know what you are looking for, you may not get the deal you think your getting. As a Canadian the extra duty-free does'nt apply to you anyway.

Happy shopping

[srpilo]

Overall, personally I'd say St Martin ..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Srpilo

[Lsimon]

St Thomas and St. Martin would be the best. I'll go with srpilo and say St. Martin would be the preferred place. Large range of items. My wife always wants to shop there.

 

In St. Thomas we frequently do full day excursions (usually a day sail or trip to St. John) and don't have time to get downtown. The shopping by the port is OK but not as nice as downtown.

 

St. Martin shopping is nice and we usually either just go downtown there or head to the beach and leave time for a shopping stop downtown Philipsburg.

[TBear416]

St. Martin, Philpsburg gets my vote. I save all my shopping for St. Martin.

[packedandready]

I'm looking for cheap T-shirts, like the 3 or 4 for $20 you can get in Mexico. Is St Martin still the place?

 

We'll be in:

St Martin

St Thomas

Barbados

St Kitts

Dominica

[Lsimon]

I'm looking for cheap T-shirts, like the 3 or 4 for $20 you can get in Mexico. Is St Martin still the place?

 

We'll be in:

St Martin

St Thomas

Barbados

St Kitts

Dominica

 

I think so - there is a straw market near the center of front street and the vendors there will probably have the type of deals you're looking for. Less likely in the shops with more overhead - although like the other places their merchandise might be nicer quality.

 

We've never done much shopping in St. Kitts.

 

Barbados always seemed a bit more upscale. Shopping in downtown Barbados didn't feel like a tourist oriented island at all - more like shopping on a mainland downtown area. The port store didn't seem to have the inexpensive stuff.

[ORV]

One rum suggestion I would make is to go to the A. H. Riise store in St Thomas and buy their private label rum. It has a little straw hat on it(at least it did 3 or 4 years ago). I bought a bottle and wish I had a case of it. At the time it cost around $20 a LT and is worth every penny of it.

 

My rum taste would run more towards Flor De Cana, HC, Ron Barrilito, Pyrat, Appleton etc as opposed to Bacardi and Capt Morgan.

[Thechamp555]

I'm a Rhum lover so tks for the sugegstion. Do they have Apppleton rhum on the solstice ?

 

 

Germain

[Island_Chica]

We've been to St. Maarten on many land-based vacations. I can recommend a locally made rum called Ma Dou Dou (funny name, but I'm serious), which comes in a hand-painted bottle in many different flavors. It makes a nice gift. My favorite is the banana vanilla, but you'll find all types of flavors. It is available at most of the downtown liquor stores and they will give you tastes.

[tn1728]

Hi Champ,

 

DH and I are also on this cruise! I like San Juan for Coach purses( for some reason their factory store is much better than the ones in the states). Dooney Burke also has a big shop there, and a Ralph Lauren store is across the street. These are all in Old San Juan, not a bad walk from the pier. In St. Thomas we will buy rum at AH Riise, to take advantage of the higher limits of duty free ( I think this is still in effect). In St. Maarten there is a great little liquor store near that chocolate shop in an alley of shops that has great prices, so we might buy some vodka there, depending on how much room we will have left in our suitcases! I also like to browse on the main street in P'burg at all of the linen shops for tablecloths, etc. We usually don't buy any expensive jewelry on any of those islands.

 

Theresa

[bellybutton530]

St. Martin, Philpsburg gets my vote. I save all my shopping for St. Martin.

 

Me too.

 

Try a store called Gulmohar's for your cigars. They have a walk-in humidor which protects the flavor of the cigars. Their prices on liquor aren't bad either.

 

Gulmohar's is located on Front Street, next door to the Casino/ It is WORTH the walk....

[birdcat]

St. Thomas has a special advantage for buying alcohol. You are allowed one liter of duty free liquor per adult without paying additional taxes, UNLESS you purchase it in St. Thomas, where the limit jumps to four liters, so you can buy one liter duty free in San Juan and four more in St. Thomas without additional cost.

 

As for place, I agree that AH Riise's private label rum is delicious. It is called "Calypso Island" and over ice on a hot day it's great! I like the coconut flavor and find it better than Malibu for a fraction of the cost. They also deliver right to the ship so no need to carry 8 bottles (assuming two adults) back and the cruise line delivers it to your cabin the night before disembarking.

[phoenix_dream]

All three shopping places have their pros and cons - my personal favorite is St. Maarten. It is smaller than San Juan or St. Thomas, but has a little bit of everything. Don't buy cigars so can't comment on that. San Juan shopping to me seems a little too much like shopping back home (if the streets were cobblestone and the stores were half nice and half........well.......not-so-nice.) You also don't get the duty free advantage in PR. We normally don't buy much liquor anymore, since we can no longer carry it on the airplane, but I would recommend you check liquor prices at home carefully before you go. We found that often, with some exceptions such as rum or local liquors (or tequila for Mexican ports), prices were not much cheaper - and certainly not cheap enough to go through the hassle of transporting.

[Thechamp555]

Hi Theresa,

 

you seems to know a lot about these different location ..! Thanks for the advice and hopefully we'll meet on the ship !

 

Germain

Quebec

Canada

[Infi]

St. Thomas for jewelry, St. Maarten for everything else (okay, maybe a little jewelry there too ;)).