Blue Hole and River Tubing from Falmouth

[KyleDefends]

My wife and I just returned from our cruise on the Celebrity Reflection.  We were only permitted to leave the port area if booked on a Celebrity sponsored shore excursion.  We did the Blue Hole and River Tubing excursion and since there is so little recent information I thought I would write a quick review.

 

We gathered for the excursion at the entrance to the port area.  The tour was operated by Chukka Tours.  We were in a nice Toyota van.  There were 19 people in our group for the day.

 

Our first stop was the Blue Hole.  It's important to know that this was over an hour drive from the port in Falmouth.  If you've ever been to Jamaica you know that an hour drive can be quite an adventure!  There's lots of passing and near misses with other vehicles.  As we got off the "main road" and headed towards the Blue Hole the road became extremely narrow with lots of twists and turns.  One young girl did get car sick.

 

Once we arrived at the Blue Hole we were passed over to a guide for the specific location.  Water shoes are a must and you do want to leave the sunglasses behind.  We walked to our first jump to a very gorgeous waterfall.  We jumped off the platform twice and then proceeded to a swing.  We did the swing once and the Blue Hole was over.  The specific place we went seemed crowded and the overall experience was a little short.  I wish we had a little more time to just swim around and enjoy the beauty because the location really is stunning.  The guides were professional and helpful and we did enjoy the experience.  I watched enough videos before we left to know that we really only saw a small portion of the Blue Hole.

 

We boarded the van and headed a short distance to the River Tubing.  Chukka had a new set of guides for the tubing portion. We were outfitted with our life vests and helmets and had the opportunity to purchase drinks for the float.  We made it to the river and off we went.  The tubing was relaxing with a couple of rapids thrown in.  There were a couple of different locations where people were selling rum punch in the middle of the river.  Reports from those who got one (or more) were that the drinks were pretty strong.  The vendors didn't need paid right on the river but they met us at the van and made sure that they were paid.  The final rapid actually got me and threw me off.  I scratched my arm up a little bit on the rocks but it wasn't a big deal.  We had a great time and would definitely do this again.

 

Our final stop was at Appleton Estate Plantation Smokehouse for lunch.  This was a pretty nice restaurant where we were all fed delicious jerk chicken, beans and rice, and coleslaw.  Water was provided and drinks were available for purchase.  This was a great lunch stop for the tour and we really did enjoy the food.

 

If anyone has any specific questions feel free to ask.

[willde]

23 hours ago, KyleDefends said:

My wife and I just returned from our cruise on the Celebrity Reflection.  We were only permitted to leave the port area if booked on a Celebrity sponsored shore excursion. 

 

Was that local/port policy, or Celebrity's somehow??

Stopping in Falmouth on Disney Fantasy in June and have been looking at vendor options for excursions...

[KyleDefends]

Willde,

 

I don't know for certain if this was Celebrity's policy or not.  We were permitted to do our own thing at other ports so I would assume it was the local port.

[Cricket551]

Hello! We are planning on being Jamaica Aug 2023.  This is on my moms bucket list! Anyway I didn't realize that it mattered which port you stopped in to make going to the blue hole accessible!  We are porting at Montego Bay(8am-4pm). We really wanted to go to the blue hole and do the tubing, like you did!  I have reached out to a couple of tour operators, one responded saying he did not recommend  this due to driving time and another said I could book with them.

 

 Reading your review its sounds like you had a similar drive.  What hours were you in port? Did you worry about timing? I don't want to cause myself stress over missing the ship, just trying to understand fully my options!

Thank you