Types of Caribbean Cruises

If you decide to book a Caribbean cruise, you will need to choose between itineraries that run from the western, eastern and southern islands. Each route will offer a variety of scenery and cultures, and each port of call will allow you the opportunity to experience different activities and sights. Every itinerary will undoubtedly include a few islands that you are familiar with, and a few others that will be brand new for you to explore. The ships will dock at a variety of these ports throughout the length of your Caribbean cruise so that you can disembark and enjoy the sights and sounds of the various Caribbean cultures. You can also opt to spend some of your time on the ship itself, and with so many wonderful activities and so much delicious food, you will not be disappointed in your decision to stay onboard at times.

Booking your Caribbean Cruise

If you have decided that a Caribbean cruise is the choice for your next vacation, the next step will be to select the cruise line that you want to set sail with. Nearly every cruise line will offer trips to the Caribbean, and many will be fairly similar in the ports of call that they stop at and the types of activities that will be available. You can choose a Caribbean cruise based on the recommendation of a friend, or on your own desire to explore a particular cruise line for yourself. Perhaps you will make your selection based on the advice of the travel agent that you hire, which is a preferred method for booking a Caribbean cruise, especially if you are a first time cruiser. This professional service will not only be able to make all of your arrangements for you, they will also have advice on what to pack and how to prepare for your journey. Whatever ship and itinerary you decide to take, you will most definitely enjoy the vacation of a lifetime. Bon voyage!

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Shop Smart

The first step to finding a cheap ticket to the Caribbean paradise is to plan the timing, the location, and the type of vacation that you will choose. Timing means not going at the absolute peak, but also not going at the absolute slow time. While hordes will make the prices skyrocket because of a lack of supply, dwindling crowds will make the trip expensive per ticket to cover total costs of the tourism industry. The first sacrifice you can easily make to bring down the cost of Caribbean travel is to share your beach with a few other people. Say a hotel needs X amount of dollars to cover their overhead. They will charge that amount, divided by the number of people they have paying for rooms. Let the other tourists pay some of the overall cost too. Location is just as important as timing when you are planning your Caribbean getaway. The popularity of different cruises and different beaches rotates, so just do a few quick searches or make a phone call to your travel agent to find out which resort is charging a little less this year. Finally, be aware of the type of vacation you are taking. Eliminating a tour guide and choosing all-inclusive options will bring the overall costs down.

While You Are There

The next set of sacrifices you should make in order to find budget Caribbean travel will be a little more difficult to make, but well worth the effort. You will spend an incredibly smaller amount of money if you are willing to choose an all inclusive trip to the Caribbean and then be satisfied with those amenities that are included. Once you have reached your destination, there will be tons of merchants trying to make some more money off of you. Their prices will be high though, and it is best to eat the food included in the price you paid initially. Also, only participate in the extra side trips and activities provided by your travel dealer. The other trips offered once you are there will seem like a lot of fun, but they will not stack up to what you will be charged for them. The easiest way to spend more on a vacation than you plan to afford is to add extra fees and expenses once you are there. Especially in the Caribbean, there are plenty of opportunities to keep spending money, even if you already have paid for a complete and fulfilling vacation.

Even though it is popular, Caribbean travel is definitely still exotic and exciting. If you are going to make it there, go with a little preparation and knowledge about what to expect. Doing a little research and buying smart will save you enough money overall to make your trip more than worth what you paid. Also, don’t forget to enjoy the simple parts of the vacation that never cost any extra. Look at the deep blue water and bask in the gorgeous sunlight. Enjoy the islands!

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• Children’s rates
• Restaurant
• Convenience store
• Laundry service
• Baby-sitting
• Nearby shopping
• Nearby tennis
• Nearby banking
• Air conditioning
• Ceiling fan
• In-room safe
• Beachfront
• Bar
• Children-friendly
• Cribs
• Daily maid service
• Pool
• Nearby water sports
• In-room kitchens
• TV available
• Telephone in a room
• Bath tub
• Private balcony
• Fax available

 
Morne Fendue Plantation House in Grenada
 
What’s old is new again as Grenada’s historic Morne Fendue Plantation House adds not, not two, but thirteen new guest rooms. Since 1974, the Morne Fendue has been welcoming visitors where they can enjoy overnight accommodations at this glorious estate. Each room offers cheap Caribbean travel accommodation for two guests with enough comfortable space to go around and a generous queen-size bed and modern bathroom facilities. What’s more, the rooms also offer access to the estate’s grand kitchen. But the highlight of each guest room is definitely the extensive balcony that overlooks scenic Mt. St. Catherine and the majestic sea where you can get excellent sunset views of the cheap Caribbean travel destination of Grenada.
 
Nevis and St. Kitts
 
For cheap Caribbean travel accommodations in the islands of Nevis and St. Kitts, try the following places:
 
Jonathan’s Villa Hotel at Mount Lily, Nevis offers seaside charm and great secluded spots.
 
Yamseed Inn at New Castle, Nevis is a quaint little inn, offering comfortable accommodations for a reasonable price.
 
For guest houses, try Al’s Cottage at Farm’s Estate in Charlestown, Nevis. You can also try Meadville Cottages, Cabindish Villa, Pinney’s Village Complex, and Central Cottage – all of which offer cheap Caribbean travel accommodations at convenient distances from the most happening places in the region.

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• Free shore excursions
• $400 onboard credit and pre-paid tips
• Free oceanview upgrades
• Onboard amenities package worth $200 or more
• Free round-trip airfare

 
Cruises-n-More.com
 
Another great source of Caribbean travel package cruise tours is Cruises-n-More. Offerings are updated daily so be sure to check their inventory of Caribbean travel packages often to get the latest offerings from them. The site even allows you to choose a cruise that is close to your home or choose one by destination, month, cruise length, and cruise line. At Cruises-n-More, everything is right at your fingertips.
 

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• Single supplement waived for single parents traveling with children
• Welcome cocktail party just for single parents and their children
• Movie night on Thursdays exclusively for children with single parents
• A second cocktail function for single parents only

 
After-“tax time” Relaxation
 
Guests staying at Biras Creek Resort in Virgin Gorda can write off their worries as well as their deductions at the end of this tax season. How so? Well, you see, in honor of the season’s close, the Biras Creek Resort is offering an extremely rare Caribbean travel deal by way of a special “tax relief” promotion. Now, here’s one tax return you can surely smile about.
 
This “tax relief” Caribbean travel deal consists of the following:
 

• Oceanview suite
• Bottle of wine with dinner
• Yoga sessions for two
• Swedish massage for two each night

 
And all this at a clever cost of $1040. And if you decide to stay for four nights or more, this Caribbean travel deal may even include a free sunset sail aboard the resort’s yacht, plus complimentary airport transfers.
 
Cayman Brac Special
 
Ideally suited for families, Divi Tiara Beach Resort in Cayman Brac sweetens its already sweet family Caribbean travel deals by offering a special family package for their Family Week. So make your family vacation easy, fun, and affordable this summer by getting one of Divi Tiara Beach Resort’s Family Week Packages for seven nights beginning at $399 per adult. If you got kids 12 years and under, they get to stay and eat for free!
 
This Caribbean travel deal includes:
 

• Accommodations
• Breakfast daily
• Round-trip airport transfers
• Daily two-tank dives
• Kids Stay and Eat Free special

 

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• Anguilla
• Antigua and Barbuda
• Aruba
• The Bahamas
• Belize
• Barbados
• Bermuda
• Bonaire
• British Virgin Islands
• Cancun
• Cayman Islands
• Cozumel
• Cuba
• Curacao
• Dominica
• Dominican Republic
• Grenada
• Guyana
• Guadeloupe
• Haiti
• Honduras
• Jamaica
• Martinique
• Montserrat
• Puerto Rico
• Saba and St. Eustatius
• St. Barthelemy
• St. Kitts-Nevis
• St. Lucia
• St. Maarten and St. Martin
• St. Vincent and the Grenadines
• Trinidad and Tobago
• Turks and Caicos Island
• U.S. Virgin Islands

 
 
 
 
 
Activities
 
There are many exciting activities available to you throughout the Caribbean. In fact, this is one of the reason why Caribbean travel and life is so popular among visiting tourists. Because when you are on the islands, it doesn’t matter who or what you are – the islands always have something to offer for everyone.
 
Caribbean travel and life offer all-inclusive resorts where you can enjoy everything for a single price. One of the popular places that offer all-inclusive Caribbean travel and life is Sandals, located in the Castries area of the Caribbean Island of St. Lucia.
 
The resort offers two properties – St. Lucia Regency Golf Resort and Spa, a couples-only resort of over 200 acres of rolling hills and a beautiful half-mile beach, and the Sandals Halcyon, another couples-only resort. Sandals Caribbean travel and life all-inclusive packages are geared towards awesome beaches, a great scuba-diving program, water sports, and fitness centers.
 
If you like casino gaming, Caribbean travel and life offers you that as well. Head on over to Belize, Puerto Rico, Jamaica where the groovy beats of the island makes for an excellent island-flavored nightlife. Play a game of chance and feel like you’re in Las Vegas as you pit fortunes with the house and maybe win a few chips here and there over a round of roulette. Then quench your thirst with a few glasses of sparklies as you laugh and talk and socialize to your heart’s content.
 
Besides fun and socializing, Caribbean travel and life also offers you a chance to get closer to nature. The Caribbean offers several eco-tourism where a guide takes you into the deepest rainforest reservoir where you can experience first hand some of the rarest and oldest species of flora and fauna found on earth.
 
Other activities you can enjoy in a Caribbean travel and life include:
 

• Children’s programs
• Cuisine
• Golf
• Health and fitness spas
• Meeting and conventions
• Participation sports
• Sailing and charter boats
• Scuba diving
• Spectator sports
• Water sports
• Weddings and honeymoons

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There is a crescent-shaped string of jewel-like islands that rise out of the Caribbean Sea between Puerto Rico and Trinidad and Tobago, blessed with irreproachable beauty, consistently sun-kissed days, soft white sand beaches and an eden-like quality equally suited to romantic getaways and adventure trips. Taking a preeminent position among this distinguished group is St. Lucia, known as the “Helen of the West Indies”; it is indeed the face that could launch 1,000 ships or, more accurately, attract them.

For its modest size, just 43km x 22km, St. Lucia is bedecked with every possible temptation to attract the discriminating holidaymaker. From its welcoming atmosphere and friendly residents to its extreme natural beauty, there is little wonder that St. Lucia is a favourite of the luxury cruising sect. Offering up far more appeal and pleasure than can be enjoyed in a brief cruise stop, St. Lucia is now a featured resort destination of Transat Holidays.

St. Lucia lies facing the calm, soothing equatorial Trade Winds and, as a result, enjoys consistently warm, fair temperatures with little or no humidity. Its landscape is at once dramatically spectacular and humbly subdued. Its most notable landmark is the twin Pitons that soar from sea level to more than 2,600 feet before dissolving into lush green valleys, thick rainforest and large banana plantations. These peaks are physical evidence of the underwater volcanic activity that produced these magnificent islands and continue to breathe great pockets of warm water, ideal for snorkeling and diving or just soaking in natural hot springs. Another must-see is the world’s only “drive-in” volcano, found in Soufriere.

If an artist was commissioned to paint the perfect beach, the beaches of St. Lucia would surely populate the canvas: Dazzling ivory-white sand shaded by great, towering palm trees and surrounded by a seemingly endless palette of every shade of blue and green. It is on such a beach that you’ll find the all inclusive 4 star Coconut Bay Resort and Spa. In addition to all meals and drinks and a full roster of daily activities and evening entertainment, this fabulous resort features a supervised kids’ club and several large swimming pools, including one that is adults only.

Transat Holidays offers weekly winter Toronto departures to St. Lucia; contact your travel agent for full details.

Credit: www.newscanada.com

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Here, you will find some great Caribbean vacation travel cruise offers that are guaranteed to give you the best value in cruise traveling.

A Seven-Night Dream

Dreams become reality when you find yourself floating through warm, welcoming waters of the Caribbean on one of several Caribbean vacation travel cruise ships. Enjoy the sun, sand, and surf of a picture-perfect island during brief land excursions in any one of your ports of call and spend the day indulging in duty-free shopping, diving in clear blue waters, or exploring Mayan ruins.

With the coming of the cold months, the Royal Caribbean, one of the leading cruise lines on the islands, is offering many fantastic Caribbean vacation travel cruise offers to its visitors who opt to book early. One of these is the seven-night dream Caribbean vacation travel beginning at $478 per person, the cruise and featuring fabulous inside cabins where you can get excellent views of the dazzling ocean.

The Mariner of the Seas, which departs from Port Canaveral, Florida and takes you to four different ports of call where you can go on brief land excursions – Labadee, Hispaniola; Ocho Rios, Jamaica; George Town, Grand Cayman; Cozumel, Mexico – before you cruise back to Port Canaveral in Florida.

The Voyager of the Seas lets you start your Caribbean vacation travel cruise fun in Miami, Florida, and making brief stops in Hispaniola, Jamaica, Grand Cayman, and Mexico. The ship offers you four kinds of room accommodations, ranging from $549 to $2,049.00.

Other midsize ships mean a more spacious and comfortable Caribbean vacation travel cruise, with all the service and amenities you’d expect, but no waiting in long lines for meals or port of calls.

Three-Night Enchantment or Four-Night Excitement

Few places on earth are more conducive to relaxation than the islands of the Caribbean. Perhaps, it’s the light, tropical breezes that gently soothe the soul. Or the warm waters and warm receptions tat await you on every shore. One thing is certain: aboard a Celebrity Caribbean vacation travel cruise, a Caribbean vacation offers something for everyone.

But if you want your Caribbean vacation travel cruise to be brief but enchanting, the Caribbean vacation travel cruise offers several short cruises for your pleasure. You’ll find short Caribbean vacation travel cruises, just three nights long, out of San Juan, Puerto Rico, for as little as $289 per person.

Or consider a bit longer, western Caribbean vacation travel cruise, four nights starting at $349, on the Enchantment of the Seas. Take a four-night Western Caribbean vacation travel cruise aboard the Century for only $330, starting from Miami, Florida. The cruise provides you with all the amenities you could ever wish from, from shipboard accommodations to ocean transportation, meals, beverages, and entertainment aboard the vessel.

Photo credit: Kim Beardsmore

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But traveling to a hot destination like the Caribbean can be quite expensive, and for this reason, many people balk at the idea of a Caribbean travel. Indeed, why spend so much on a single vacation when you could visit much cheaper vacation destinations? Never mind if these places don’t even come close to what a Caribbean travel entails.

Ah, but what if we told you that there’s a much better way to spend a vacation? What if we told you that you can go on a Caribbean travel vacation without having to spend a lot of your hard-earned money?

A Caribbean travel for less! Now, there’s a thought.

Below are four chic hotels where you can keep the island flavor high and the prices at a bare minimum while on a Caribbean travel vacation:

Flash and Glamour – Anguilla

The most northerly of the Leeward Islands in the Lesser Antilles, Anguilla is an island known for the flash and glamour of many of its resorts. For this reason, the island is a popular Caribbean travel destination for many visitors who want to bask in the compelling charm, romance, and excitement that the islands are known for.

Rendezvous Bay Hotel & Villas may not have all that flash and glamour, but it lacks in that department, the hotel makes up for its location and fantastic rates (starts at $130 while villa costs $275). This Caribbean travel resort hotel offers 46 rooms, all sitting directly on 50 palm-laden acres of fronting a 1 ½ mile long sugary sand beach. The resort has been recently renovated, offering white tile floors and simple rattan furnishings, and is divided among a dozen low-rise buildings.

Another worthy hotel group is Ku, its name meaning “sacred place” in the Arawak Indian language. With room rates starting at $295, this 27-suite hotel overlooks Shoal Bay East and are South Beach-chic, with minimalist white décor, air conditioning, and full kitchens.

Honeymoon Favorite – Antigua

Located just south of another popular Caribbean travel destination of Barbuda, Antigua markets itself as a luxury Caribbean travel escape. Its many hotels and resorts located around the coastline are all favorites when it comes to honeymooning while on a Caribbean travel.

While you don’t have to be on your honeymoon to enjoy Antigua’s island charm, the Cocobay Resort’s location on a hillside facing the Caribbean Sea makes for a very romantic atmosphere. The idyllic hotel is made of 47 Creole-style cottages in soft pastel hues with rates that are very affordable at $240.

Hybrid Beat – Bahamas

If you want a decidedly patrician vibe during your Caribbean travel vacation, then the Landing, a seven-room inn on Harbour Island is exactly for you. There are no televisions, no phones, or Internet connections – things that distract you from the sheer beauty of the beach a few blocks away. And for only $240, you can get one of the bay-view rooms, which offer the best views of the harbor and comes with crisp white linens, terraces, and four-poster beds.

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