Nancy Zupancic
Dunn's River Falls

Reading some previous posts on Cruise critic I could see that hiring one of the many private guides was the way to go. The ship’s excursions do not give good value for the half day and we always try to avoid them. I got in touch with some of the guides a few months prior. We decided to go with Peat Taylor and his son, O’Neil. Email: oneiltay@cwjamaica.com

The main tour consists of a visit to Dunn’s River Falls, the fern gully up on the mountainside, some shopping if desired. We stopped at a small school with a few 5 year old students, they were so welcoming and very sweet. We saw a typical Jamaican neighborhood and enjoyed Peat and Oneil’s commentary and singing. It was well worth the price and they met us right as soon as you got off the pier.

Dunn’s River Falls is very touristy but we really enjoyed it. I would stay clear of the market there as they are brutally pushy and really made my nephew uneasy. My advice is to stay polite and walk right past – do not make eye contact. We enjoyed lunch at a very beautiful restaurant called ‘The Ruins’. The food was great and the setting gorgeous. The Jerk (BBQ) pit really packed some heat. We really enjoyed the food and atmosphere and it was not that busy.

The morning tour (including the falls) is all included. Lunch is optional and you can be dropped of at the ship as it is very close by. In the afternoon, you could go either river tubing on the white river or horseback riding. We were supposed to go river tubing but the time got a little too close for us to do the activity and go shopping afterwards and make it back to the ship. We just settled on being dropped off at the shopping area near the pier.

The cost is US35.00 per adult & US25 .00 per child inclusive of admission to Dunn’s River falls and transportation cost to the other locations, no charge for children under 2 years old. We paid at the end of the tour. When I was originally booking the tour I enquired about a private tour. I believe what happens is Peat takes the larger bus and Oneil will take private guests in the van or if they are very busy you may get a contracted out driver. I would recommend you stick to the larger bus. This way you can get lucky and benefit from having both Peat and Oneil and meet other guests from the ship. As it turned out for our tour there was only one other couple besides our family on the tour.

If you are buying Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee (JaBluM), the price we were told to pay per pound was between $13 & $20. In most stores you will find it for more than $20. Bargain down and try to do your best. The best price we could get, even though we were buying 8 pounds, was $17usd per pound. The TajMahal is a main shopping mall near the cruise ship pier. The best store we were told was the one right in the middle of the parking lot. We found the coffee to be cheaper in another store. The name of this store was Reggae Jam and it was shop#7. I’m not saying this is the cheapest but it was the cheapest we could get at the time.

I had heard horror stories about Jamaica and was a little nervous about our stop here. The last time I visited there was back in the eighties and I really enjoyed it but places change. I heard Dunn’s River Falls was a horrible tourist trap and the locals harassed you terribly. I am happy to say we were all pleasantly surprised. Jamaica was one of my favorite memories of this trip and I think it was all due to the fact we went on a private tour and got out and into the countryside. I would really recommend others do the same.

The other ships in port today were the NCL Jewel, NCL Dawn and Westerdam

We had the best berth in this port and the Westerdam was berthed at the James Bond Pier. Sounds better but it is older and further out of the town. The two NCL ships tendered in to our pier.

In this port our starboard side room faced the port and it was a very beautiful port to look at.

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