BASSETERRE | ST. KITTS

The island nation of St. Kitts and Nevis may be one of the smallest countries but it sure is beautiful with plenty to explore.  The capital of Basseterre is located on St. Kitts  and happens to be also where the port is located.  Separated by only 3 miles, across a small channel called, The Narrows, both islands are easily accessible during a day trip.  We made it a point to visit both during our excursion.

ARRIVING IN ST. KITTS & NEVIS

As I mentioned, you arrive in Basseterre which is on the larger island of St. Kitts.  This was the first stop on our cruise that we saw another cruise ship in port.  Just after we arrived, the Royal Caribbean Freedom of the Seas arrived and parked right across the dock from us.  It was a much larger ship than the Carnival Fascination that we were on and we were concerned that the island would be super crowded.  That turned out to not be the case, at least for us, which may have had something to do with the excursion that we chose.

EXCURSION IN ST. KITTS & NEVIS

We wanted to see both islands so we chose the Catamaran Fan-Ta-Sea & Nevis Beach Break that was offered through Carnival for $125 per person.  We arrived at 8:00am and the excursion left shortly after that and didn't return until 3:00pm so we only had a little over an hour in the afternoon to explore the port.  Luckily, there were plenty of shops just off the ship to pick up my souvenir magnet (I will explain more about my souvenir magnet obsession in another blog).

SHITTEN BAY SHIPWRECK & SNORKEL

The catamaran picked us up right in the port and despite there being two ships in the port, there was only around 20 people on our excursion.  The boat was quite big so there was plenty of space to spread out for the sail to Shitten Bay.   When we arrived in Shitten Bay, we anchored just off the shore and the crew informed us of a partially sunk ship on the beach that we could explore.  We snorkeled around for a bit before I decided that I wanted to get an aerial view of the island, so I launched the drone.  The island was beautiful from the air and you could see the salt pond that was just on the other side of where we had anchored.  There was also a smaller pond that was a brilliant pink color.  Lunch was served.

PINNEYS BEACH | NEVIS

After lunch we crossed The Narrows and arrived at Nevis.  Pinneys Beach was located right next door to the famously beautiful Four Seasons Resort.  We were given a couple hours to lounge on the beach or check out the small bars/restaurants that were located on the beach.  Chairs and umbrellas were for rent on the beach at $10 for a pair for the duration of our stay.  We opted to rent a set and used it as our base as we played in the water and explored our small slice of paradise.  There were so many seashells that I was able to collect enough to fill one of our glass jars at home.  It already had shells from beaches all around the world, now it included one more.

I flew the drone once more as we were getting ready to leave to capture the beauty of Nevis from the air.  The sail back was a lot of fun as the crew turned up the music and everyone joined in on another dance party, similar to our Barbados excursion.  As we passed by St. Kitts, we decided that we would try and get a taxi to take us to Timothy Hill so that we could check out the view.

TIMOTHY HILL | ST. KITTS

We found a taxi and asked her to take us to the Timothy Hill Overlook and bring us back.  We made sure that she knew we only had a limited time.  It was only a 10-15 minute ride and she waited while we took our photos.  I don't think that the time of day that we were there did justice to the spot.  Timothy Hill overlooks a narrow portion of the island where the Caribbean Sea is on one side and the Atlantic Ocean is on the other.  I have seen other photos where the difference is much more apparent than it seemed to us.  Either way, it was a beautiful view and we made it back to the ship in time.  Back on the ship, we once again made our way to the rear deck to watch the island fade into the distance as the sun set and we sailed for our last stop - St. Maarten.

OUR CARNIVAL CRUISE

We were on the 7-day Southern Caribbean cruise aboard the Carnival Fascination (September 2, 2018 - September 9, 2018) out of San Juan visiting St. Thomas, Dominica, Barbados, St. Lucia, St. Kitts & Nevis, St. Maarten and finally returning back to San Juan.  Click on any of the links above to find out more about what we did in each of our ports of call or visit my Instagram.