Funtime4me Posted January 4, 2022 #1 Share Posted January 4, 2022 Hi all, I'll be in arriving in the port of curacao on January 23, 2022 from 8 AM - 8 PM and looking for suggestions on what to do. I couldn't find any recent posts since cruising has re-opened. Please share your ideas. TIA, Jenny 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
canadianbear Posted January 4, 2022 #2 Share Posted January 4, 2022 We’ve been a few times. All independent tours either pre-booked or picked up at the dock from local vendors. We’ve done Irie Tours which included National Park, cliff jumping (if you wanted to) Fisherman’s Wharf where you could snorkel with turtles, and Mari beach for relax or snorkel. We also did another independent snorkel excursion with Curious2Dive. We chose this one because I didn’t feel like a boat ride yo snorkel & jump off a boat which we usually do. Another one was Ben Tours which was a 2 hour bus tour and included a stop at the Curacao liquor place with free samples. Very interesting with a great driver telling us about the sites we saw. All were very good tours. Plus we always had time after to walk around the port area over the bridge. I have mobility issues at times but found the walk ok with resting spots at times. Hope this helps a bit! 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruiseapril Posted January 13, 2022 #3 Share Posted January 13, 2022 (edited) Our suggestion is to take a taxi to the Avila Beach Hotel - have lunch there and walk back slowly to the center of town. E-mail before you go. Edited January 13, 2022 by cruiseapril adding Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MNtwins Posted March 13, 2022 #4 Share Posted March 13, 2022 We just did Odyssey of the Sea cruise on February 26th and did a private excursion with Gone Caribe. It’s a married couple who own it and we had the wife, Jessica showing us around. Just an awesome experience. I had given them an idea of our interests and they put together a wonderful itinerary. We enjoyed the lovely sights of the island on our way to the west side of the island. We snorkeled with the sea turtles in their natural environment at Playa Piskado, stopped at Santa Martha Bay, great stop at Playa Porte Marie for lunch, snorkeling and swimming. On our way back to port we did a stop for flamingo watching, then made our way to town and did a little walk on our way to the locks, Queen Emma floating bridge and the Rif Fort with Jessica sharing information along the way. it was my favorite island and we couldn’t of asked for a better private tour with Jessica from Gone Caribe. We got to meet Jessica’s husband, Joseph when we stopped for lunch as he had another group out as well, that we had met the day before and they said Joseph was amazing as well. You can’t go wrong. if you get a chance to visit this beautiful island I would highly look at booking a private excursion with Gone Caribe. I had actually first heard about Gone Caribe right here on Cruise critic. Sincerely, Joyce 4 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare crewsweeper Posted March 14, 2022 #5 Share Posted March 14, 2022 Thanks for this Joyce. I'm contacting them to see what we can line up DW would like to see flamingos and the only thing I've found was at the Marriott Resort in Aruba. We typically just walk over to Punda and walk around the shops and have a bite at the Iguana Cafe (which isn't all that good). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
home-mom Posted March 16, 2022 #6 Share Posted March 16, 2022 We've booked a room at the Renaissance by the port. Just gonna chill at the resort for the day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jacpedigo Posted March 16, 2022 #7 Share Posted March 16, 2022 On 3/13/2022 at 8:34 AM, MNtwins said: We just did Odyssey of the Sea cruise on February 26th and did a private excursion with Gone Caribe. It’s a married couple who own it and we had the wife, Jessica showing us around. Just an awesome experience. I had given them an idea of our interests and they put together a wonderful itinerary. We enjoyed the lovely sights of the island on our way to the west side of the island. We snorkeled with the sea turtles in their natural environment at Playa Piskado, stopped at Santa Martha Bay, great stop at Playa Porte Marie for lunch, snorkeling and swimming. On our way back to port we did a stop for flamingo watching, then made our way to town and did a little walk on our way to the locks, Queen Emma floating bridge and the Rif Fort with Jessica sharing information along the way. it was my favorite island and we couldn’t of asked for a better private tour with Jessica from Gone Caribe. We got to meet Jessica’s husband, Joseph when we stopped for lunch as he had another group out as well, that we had met the day before and they said Joseph was amazing as well. You can’t go wrong. if you get a chance to visit this beautiful island I would highly look at booking a private excursion with Gone Caribe. I had actually first heard about Gone Caribe right here on Cruise critic. Sincerely, Joyce Thank you so much for posting this! I've just booked a tour with Gone Caribe to swim with the sea turtles next week! We hadn't been able to find any tour operators with availability for our port date (though maybe HAL Rotterdam's recent swap of Aruba and Curacao port days helped with this. We were supposed to be in port with them both days!). They've been great in communication, so far, and I can't wait to tour with them! ~Jacquelyn Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare crewsweeper Posted March 17, 2022 #8 Share Posted March 17, 2022 22 hours ago, jacpedigo said: Thank you so much for posting this! I've just booked a tour with Gone Caribe to swim with the sea turtles next week! We hadn't been able to find any tour operators with availability for our port date (though maybe HAL Rotterdam's recent swap of Aruba and Curacao port days helped with this. We were supposed to be in port with them both days!). They've been great in communication, so far, and I can't wait to tour with them! ~Jacquelyn We just got confirmation for April 13th. DW wants to see flamingos and then we're heading to a beach for lunch and Punda for shopping (and a beer at The City). Very responsive and loved how they give you maps to the meetup point and all the details. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slyfox16 Posted March 18, 2022 #9 Share Posted March 18, 2022 Thanks for the information. Can we ask how much was the tour with Gone Caribe and how long was it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare crewsweeper Posted March 21, 2022 #10 Share Posted March 21, 2022 $210 for 2 of us. 9A-2P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreenIdScorpio Posted April 9, 2022 #11 Share Posted April 9, 2022 We will be visiting on Harmony OTS in November and are hoping to book a Turtle/Snorkeling trip with Gone Caribe! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare crewsweeper Posted April 14, 2022 #12 Share Posted April 14, 2022 On 4/9/2022 at 12:04 AM, GreenIdScorpio said: We will be visiting on Harmony OTS in November and are hoping to book a Turtle/Snorkeling trip with Gone Caribe! Book them. Jessica and Joseph are very accommodating . We had a great time with Jessica yesterday. More on the fly vs set destinations. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreenIdScorpio Posted April 14, 2022 #13 Share Posted April 14, 2022 We actually just booked a custom turtles & snorkeling tour — so excited! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jacpedigo Posted April 21, 2022 #14 Share Posted April 21, 2022 Our group of ten (aged 36 to 88) had a wonderful time on our private "Gone Turtles" tour with Gone Caribe! Jessica was great at communicating and provided a detailed map and photos of when and where to meet. Joey, her husband, was our guide for the day and was so fun and charismatic! We had a great time visiting Shete Boka National Park (the normal overlook for turtles was having too much sargassum growth to be enjoyable, so this was substituted) and our highlight of snorkelling with the turtles at Playa Piskado was the highlight of the entire 10 day cruise! Jessica made arrangements for us to travel in a large taxi van so that we could all ride together and were provided detailed information about Curacao on our drives through the entire day. After snorkeling with the turtles for just over an hour, we drove to a nearby cliffside, local restaurant and had a table reserved for our group during what appeared to be a busy lunch hour. We got to sit right next to an area set up to attract iguanas and a cliff-jumping platform, which one member of our group used after dining. The food and company were great (we also loved our driver, Lika!). We paid $90US/pp, as we had a group of 10 and were given a discount. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gr8tfulscott Posted April 23, 2022 #15 Share Posted April 23, 2022 we use gone caribe 2 days before covid shut down..... who knew......Jessica was great and we spent the y day touring and swimming. You cannot ask for a bettert tour guide and company. ham booked again for may but RCCL has just changed itinerary and time in port. so it's up in the air at the moment. Highly Recommended!! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vacation44 Posted April 24, 2022 #16 Share Posted April 24, 2022 On 4/14/2022 at 7:01 PM, GreenIdScorpio said: We actually just booked a custom turtles & snorkeling tour — so excited! Please report back your experience as we are looking to do the same in February. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreenIdScorpio Posted May 8, 2022 #17 Share Posted May 8, 2022 Can do! So excited for the great reports coming in about others who have taken them. We opted for a customized tour — both turtles and great snorkeling…can’t wait to see what they have in store for us! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sparetiming Posted December 18, 2022 #18 Share Posted December 18, 2022 On 3/13/2022 at 9:34 AM, MNtwins said: We just did Odyssey of the Sea cruise on February 26th and did a private excursion with Gone Caribe. It’s a married couple who own it and we had the wife, Jessica showing us around. Just an awesome experience. I had given them an idea of our interests and they put together a wonderful itinerary. We enjoyed the lovely sights of the island on our way to the west side of the island. We snorkeled with the sea turtles in their natural environment at Playa Piskado, stopped at Santa Martha Bay, great stop at Playa Porte Marie for lunch, snorkeling and swimming. On our way back to port we did a stop for flamingo watching, then made our way to town and did a little walk on our way to the locks, Queen Emma floating bridge and the Rif Fort with Jessica sharing information along the way. it was my favorite island and we couldn’t of asked for a better private tour with Jessica from Gone Caribe. We got to meet Jessica’s husband, Joseph when we stopped for lunch as he had another group out as well, that we had met the day before and they said Joseph was amazing as well. You can’t go wrong. if you get a chance to visit this beautiful island I would highly look at booking a private excursion with Gone Caribe. I had actually first heard about Gone Caribe right here on Cruise critic. Sincerely, Joyce Can you please tell me where you stopped to see flamingos? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MNtwins Posted January 31, 2023 #19 Share Posted January 31, 2023 There is a pull off near a pond and the flamingos are there. They are not in captivity. Just roaming. I had seen others post about this so asked if we could stop. You are not up real close to them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
soccer2010 Posted May 12, 2023 #20 Share Posted May 12, 2023 On 3/15/2022 at 9:58 PM, home-mom said: We've booked a room at the Renaissance by the port. Just gonna chill at the resort for the day. it looks like it's a quick walk from the cruise port ... what's the beach like there? Does it include a chair at the beach? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
home-mom Posted May 14, 2023 #21 Share Posted May 14, 2023 On 5/12/2023 at 4:10 PM, soccer2010 said: it looks like it's a quick walk from the cruise port ... what's the beach like there? Does it include a chair at the beach? It’s a man made beach. I’ll see if I can find my pictures. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
home-mom Posted May 16, 2023 #22 Share Posted May 16, 2023 On 5/14/2023 at 5:11 PM, home-mom said: It’s a man made beach. I’ll see if I can find my pictures. This was from the restaurant next door. You can see the man made beach on the right. It was only a 5 minute walk from ship. We rented a room for the day but they also had day passes available. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
janetz Posted May 16, 2023 #23 Share Posted May 16, 2023 Headed there in January We have rented a SUV and have the whole day to explore With the rental comes a map, and GPS Just making a list of what we want to see and do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cruising_Tim Posted July 25, 2023 #24 Share Posted July 25, 2023 Going to be in port from 8am-8pm and am looking for a suggestion for a catamaran cruise for the day. Please and Thanks!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sunkey1 Posted July 25, 2023 #25 Share Posted July 25, 2023 On 5/16/2023 at 2:18 PM, janetz said: Headed there in January We have rented a SUV and have the whole day to explore With the rental comes a map, and GPS Just making a list of what we want to see and do. We're doing the same thing in October - looking forward to having the freedom to come and go where/when we want. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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