Caribbean Islands & Excursions Aboard the MSC Divina {Review} #MSCDivina

I received a complimentary cruise for myself and family in exchange for sharing my honest opinion.

So our recent cruise on MSC Divina took us to three islands in seven days. Honestly I thought three was prefect. We had previously been on a different cruise and did five stops which was nice since we saw a lot, but I will say I really enjoyed all the days at sea just relaxing this time. Our cruise was a Caribbean cruise and we visited: St. Maarten, British Virgin Islands, and Great Stirrup Cay (a private island in the Bahamas.) All the cruises are different but honestly they are somewhat similar with their stops if you visit the Caribbean (I mean you can’t get that different when you are talking about beaches.)

So since we didn’t have a big budget we decided to just do one excursion. Honestly when we cruised pre-kids, we did tons of excursions and it was overwhelming and I felt rushed. We booked our one excursion right on the ship as they offered a special for a family of four to tour the island via a bus and spend a few hours at a private beach for about $100. This was worth it to us and while the tour was kinda lame it was a great price for the enjoyment we got that day. My kids had never swam off a beach before and their faces were priceless. My boys who are somewhat scared of water were like fishes! Thankfully we had one lifejacket with us and then a friend loaned us one because there was no where to rent them – so do bring your own if your kids need them! Oh and where the boat dropped us off was no where near a beach so we would have had to take private transportation or an excursion to get to one. Lunch was not included but we had snacks with us.

For the other two stops we made we did not book excursions. At Tortuga we ended up just walking the island ourselves, but my boys complained of being hot and tired so we headed back to the ship. Here there were tons of locals offering cheap tours and private beach stops but we were on our own this day and I didn’t feel comfortable doing this. The other blogger I had met took advantage of this and paid $60 for her family and had a blast, I guess you live and learn! Oh and lunch was not included here either but we had brought snacks with us and went back to the ship in time for lunch.

Finally our third stop was Great Stirrup Cay in the Bahamas. You really don’t need an excursion here unless you really want to do something specific. You get dropped off right on the beach and that was perfect for us. My boys could not believe all the sea life on the rocks and in the water such as hermit crabs and little fish. My 7 year old was pretty freaked out by all the fish so we stayed very shallow and played in the sand. The island though was beautiful. Here for lunch they set up a BBQ style lunch line which was free and included in your cruise cost.

You can pre-book your excursions which doesn’t save you any money but it does guarantee your spot in case it sells out. Booking them on the ship is as easy though as talking to a rep at the excursion desk. Oh and towels were provided for us from the ship to bring to the islands so you don’t need to bring your own.

So a recap on the islands and excursions:

Bring lifejackets for kids

Towels provided

Bring a beach bag for towels and snacks

Bring sand toys for kids, but actually our excursion hosts brought a bunch to the one beach

Bring comfortable shoes if you walk around yourself

Be careful of buying tours from locals but then again so many people swear they only use locals for tours and never book excursions

Don’t overwhelm yourself and try to enjoy and relax. You don’t have to disembark either, you can stay on the ship and swim or just chill out!

Take lots of pictures! We actually brought our good camera and a waterproof camera.

Here is a You Tube slideshow I created of all our pictures:

Since I have so many pictures to share, I figured I’d break down our cruise into separate posts, so if you want to read more about our cruise experience read my other cruise posts and check out my YouTube slideshows I made of the MSC Divina!