Honeymoon next April...recommendation please?

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PStrangerX

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We would like to spend the first half of our week diving, and then 2nd half being beach bumming on a romantic beach and exploring the island. Not really into the party scene or AI inclusive resorts (like to get out and try local places).

I've read that Grenada and Antigua both escaped the hurricanes relatively unscathed. I found this previous thread comparing them: Antigua or St. Lucia? - which has better diving?

The posters there seemed to criticize Antigua's diving, but but it looks like there is now a local dive operator who takes people to better sites: Diving in antigua

Anyone got more recent advice? (I also read that Grenada has waterfalls you can hike to which gives it some points)

I have also heard that Aruba has good diving and escaped the hurricane.

Any and all recommendations appreciated! Thank you!
 
Grand Cayman would be a lovely place for a honeymoon and dive vacation, and they were also spared during the recent hurricanes. It is pricey and April is still the high season, but there are ways to control the expense, and excellent diving is readily available as well as other attractions and ammenities. And you can often get good deals on airfare and car rental is usually quite reasonable - but you have to drive on the left, but they have good roads.

If you don't want to drive, but still get out and enjoy the local venues, then you need to stay in the Seven Mile Beach area, and that is the most expensive area of the island. We generally stay away from 7MB and George Town, and that helps a lot with the costs and crowds, but we are usually not into a heavy dive vacation when we are on GC. We like to relax, enjoy the island, snorkel, shore dive, and maybe do some boat dives. That's because we usually take a 2 week vacation to the Caymans and spend the first week relaxing before traveling to one of the small Cayman sister islands for all-inclusive dive trip during the second week.

But since diving is not the primary reason for your trip, you should be able to find some pleasant and reasonably priced options for your Honeymoon.

Can you give us an idea about budget and what you like to do? That would help in making recommendations.

I've never been to Antigua, but I think that it is also pricey and that airfare is more difficult and expensive - but I am not sure about that and I don't know anything about the diving there.

I have been to St. Lucia and it is one of the prettiest Caribbean Islands we have visited, but it truly is a place where you should stay in an all-inclusive IMO. We ventured away from the all-inclusive on our own to look around and it wasn't a very pleasant experience, but it was a learning experience! After that we only took tours offered by the resort.

I wasn't overly impressed with the diving around St. Lucia either, the reefs were beautiful but overfished IMO; the phrase "a good environment for macro-photography" come to mind!

Congratulations on your upcoming wedding!
 
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I actually haven't quite worked out a budget yet. I think once we narrow down our choices, we will compare flights/hotels to determine what provides us our best value.

I have never been to the Caymans, so thanks for the heads up! Do you have a dive operator you like there?

We have 1 week for our honeymoon. Def don't want to drive, so if we did do the Caymans, I would stay in the 7 mile beach area then.



Grand Cayman would be a lovely place for a honeymoon and dive vacation, and they were also spared during the recent hurricanes. It is pricey and April is still the high season, but there are ways to control the expense, and excellent diving is readily available as well as other attractions and ammenities. And you can often get good deals on airfare and car rental is usually quite reasonable - but you have to drive on the left, but they have good roads.

If you don't want to drive, but still get out and enjoy the local venues, then you need to stay in the Seven Mile Beach area, and that is the most expensive area of the island. We generally stay away from 7MB and George Town, and that helps a lot with the costs and crowds, but we are usually not into a heavy dive vacation when we are on GC. We like to relax, enjoy the island, snorkel, shore dive, and maybe do some boat dives. That's because we usually take a 2 week vacation to the Caymans and spend the first week relaxing before traveling to one of the small Cayman sister islands for all-inclusive dive trip during the second week.

But since diving is not the primary reason for your trip, you should be able to find some pleasant and reasonably priced options for your Honeymoon.

Can you give us an idea about budget and what you like to do? That would help in making recommendations.

I've never been to Antigua, but I think that it is also pricey and that airfare is more difficult and expensive - but I am not sure about that and I don't know anything about the diving there.

I have been to St. Lucia and it is one of the prettiest Caribbean Islands we have visited, but it truly is a place where you should stay in an all-inclusive. We ventured away from the all-inclusive on our own to look around and it wasn't a very pleasant experience, but it was a learning experience! After that we only took tours offered by the resort.

I wasn't overly impressed with the diving around St. Lucia either, the reefs were beautiful but overfished IMO; the phrase "a good environment for macro-photography" come to mind!

Congratulations on your upcoming wedding!
 
Anse Chastenet on St. Lucia seems to fit your requirements. The break the budget resort is Jade Mountain - above it on the hill. There's other resorts on St. Lucia that will also work - these are just two I looked into once. Good diving also - I personally haven't heard that about Antigua - IIRC the resorts are located on the other side of the island from the best of it.

The Westin or the Marriott Grand on Grand Cayman also maybe. One advantage there is Red Sail Sports is onsite for diving and other water experiences - plus if you don't like them - there's about 2 dozen other dive operations that will pick you up there. In the heart of Seven Mile Beach which is georgeous. Maybe busier than you sound like you want.Also Cayman is very pricey - boat dives are over 2/$100 - offset by some really good shore dives and food is outrageous at any of the restaurants near the water - it's all imported and the CI$ is fixed at .80US$

Cayman diving is among the best I've done and that list includes many of the Caribbean dive destinations. Deep walls surround the island - in 2 places you can surface swim out to them and tehy've really embraced diving - Dive365Cayman.com lists 365 moored dive site options. IMO the best is the sites on the north wall/west bay area but I haven't dove the east end. Videos also of most of the sites to see what they're like.

There's also a lot of fun dives, the Kittiwake is a dive cleaned wreck in shallow water - it's a big boat but dropped deliberately so the top can be snorkeled. So shallow that recent rough weather moved it from vertical. Stingray City is the best 15' dive you'll ever do - get mobbed by rays for 45mins. And Turtle Reef on the north side may be the best shore dive - it's near the turtle farm so they occasionally get out and live there on the reef. There's a 60' deep mini-wall that's loaded with stuff and a tarpon cave to the south - move slowly and you can swim among them. We were there in late March/April and the weather was nice - sometimes in the winter the north is undivable.

My short list of goto dive operations is Neptune's Divers, Ambassador Divers or Wall to Wall. But there isn't a bad operation there - competition is too great. One thing to look for is the 6-8 divers max. operators - many have boats for twice that many. Makes for very comfortable rides. Many of the better sites are 10-15 minutes from the marinas and they all include van shuttle service from any resort/condo complex on Seven Mile Beach.

It or Provo in the Turks/Caicos are the most expensive places we've dove. In our case a LOB trip minimize the T/C expenses. Grace Bay Beach is one of the nicest I've ever seen but resorts on it know it. Also the best diving is about an hour by boat away so that often limits dives to 3/day - there's no shore diving there. It really is a stunning island though in most areas.

If it's re-opened before your wedding Little Dix Bay resort on Virgin Gorda is as nice as it sounds. I've not stayed there but had drinks at their bar. Also we dove with DiveBVI all week and several times went in there to pickup guests - turtles dove for the bottom when we did. Hotel guests can snorkel safely as there's only one boat channel in/out - the rest is shallow coral reefts. It's pricey though.

Nice diving there, snorkeling at the Baths etc. Better restaurants than you'd expect for a small island population - it's because there's a lot of large villas so that attracts money. It's a pretty unpopulated place - LDB has a catamaran (they'll pick you up at the Tortola airport with it) and will drop guests at private beaches only accesible by boat - no road - with a picnic lunch.

The island took a big hit during Irma also so IDK how the recovery is going. LDB was scheduled to re-open after renovations next week but they've had to delay that due to new damage. It's a Rosewood property so hopetully they have the resources to rebuild.
 
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I actually haven't quite worked out a budget yet. I think once we narrow down our choices, we will compare flights/hotels to determine what provides us our best value.

I have never been to the Caymans, so thanks for the heads up! Do you have a dive operator you like there?

We have 1 week for our honeymoon. Def don't want to drive, so if we did do the Caymans, I would stay in the 7 mile beach area then.

There are loads of great dive ops on GC, and although it may be convenient for the dive op to have a location on site at the hotel, that isn't really necessary on GC. That's because most of the dive boats are harbored in the west bay marina and they will either pick you up on the beach with their boat, or take you to the marina in a van. So you can easily dive with whoever you'd like. We have dived with several GC ops and they were all just fine, we especially liked the smaller boat and personalized service that we get from Cayman University Divers. But it is a very competitive market and a dive op won't last very long if they are mediocre.

Take a look at the Sunshine Suites across the street from the Westin. The SS is owned by the Westin and you can have full access to all the amenities of the hotel and beach if you are willing to pay a daily resort fee and walk across the street.

The SS also includes kitchen facilities. I know that you don't want to do a lot of cooking on your honeymoon, but eating out 3 times a day is very expensive on GC. It is easy to prepare simple breakfast and lunch meals and eat out once a day and that saves a lot of money.

If the SS is out of your budget, there are other options, not so close to the beach, but when you are doing comparison shopping, keep in mind that all Cayman rental properties add a 13% tax, and some charge resort fees or service fees. So be sure to check what is included in the listed price, so that you can compare apples to apples.

Red Sail is the dive op at the Westin, and they are a large op but they have big catamaran boats so I don't think that you have to worry about "cattle boats". They also offer a free sunset sail if you book a dive package with them. Unless someone is running a special sale or something, the diving costs are pretty consistent across the various dive ops.
 
...The Westin or the Marriott Grand on Grand Cayman also maybe. One advantage there is Red Sail Sports is onsite for diving and other water experiences - plus if you don't like them - there's about 2 dozen other dive operations that will pick you up there...

I've heard that the beach front at the Marriott (which was always tight) has almost completely disappeared due the recent tropical storms, but the beach at the Westin is still nice and wide.

If you are paying the high prices for the 7MB, I would be disappointed to find little or no beach! Here is a link to a discussion on TA about beach erosion at the Marriott with link to some pictures.

Marriott Beach Erosion?-- Does anyone know/have pics? - Grand Cayman Forum - TripAdvisor

OP, don't delay much longer in making travel arrangements. April is still high or shoulder season, and the widespread hurricane damage across the Caribbean this year has made the destinations that missed a direct hit even more popular!

Where are you located? Hawaii is another option to consider, many beautiful locations and good diving available, but it is also pricey.
 
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I've heard that the beach front at the Marriott (which was always tight) has almost completely disappeared
That doesn't surprise me, the condos just south of their built that circular breakwater some years ago to keep theirs from disappearing also .

So maybe not the Marriott now...
 
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