any experience with Aruba Kayaking ?

[highmark55]

Hi Everyone,

We will be in Aruba in Jan. 08 and I am looking into a day of kayaking with "Aruba Kayaking". Does anyone have any experience/knowledge of them ? positive or negative would be helpful.

 

Thanks,

Jan

[amc40]

Jan

 

We are thinking about doing the same excursion in late Jan. I would love some input too!

[flamingo21401]

I have kayaked in St. Thomas, Antiqua, Key West, Panama and Haiti. Although it started out on a bad note when there was no one to meet us when we got to the site. We were a group of 6 from the ship that eventually were met by a group of 6 from the local hotels. The kayaks were the sit on top type. They encouraged us to go with a tandem kayak instead of 2 singles because of the strong current and winds. I suspect they didn't want to have to load twice as many kayaks. There were two guides. No facilities and were told to leave 'anything we didn't want to get wet in the bus (eg. passports & $$$)' and they would store it for us somewhere. We picked out vest, paddles, fins and a bottle of water. The life vest were very uncomfortable with well worn zippers that didn't always work. We got instructions about flipping over and getting back into the kayak twice. Which just served to make us more nervous about falling off. We kayaked for about 40 minutes and got to a small beach. We the rested for about 15 minutes before we then were given masks & snorkels for a snorkel trip about 200 yards off shore. Were were warned repeatedly about fire coral. We saw some interesting coral and fish. Then back to the beach for our fruit (everyone got an orange) and the 40 minute kayaking back. Except the 6 of us from the ship went one way with one guide and the 6 from the hotels went in another direction. So there wasn't anyone following up the last kayakers in case of a problem. We finally had to tell the guide to slow down. The whole experience left me dissapointed & feeling bad that I talked my friend into this particluar trip. I think if you have a choice of where to kayak and this is your first time you might want to go somewhere else.