Aruba kayak tours for cruise passengers

Cruise passengers have one problem everyone else on this coast does not: a hard deadline with a ship attached to it. Everything below is written around that. If you take one thing from this page, take the arithmetic in the margin section, because the tour is the easy part and the timing is where people come unstuck.

The timing problem, stated plainly

Ships calling at Aruba berth in Oranjestad, and most of them give you a working day rather than a whole one. You are not planning a holiday, you are planning a window, and you are planning it against an all aboard time that is earlier than the departure time printed on your itinerary.

Our tours run 2.5 hours. Add travel each way, add a 15 minute arrival buffer before departure, add the time to dry off and get back. That total, not the 2.5 hours, is the number that has to fit inside your window.

Which departure fits a cruise call

1:00 PM, the one that fits most calls. Half of the cruise calls scheduled at Oranjestad between September and December come alongside at 8:00 AM, and close to half do not sail again until 10:00 or 11:00 at night. That is the shape the afternoon departure suits. You clear the gangway, have the morning in town, take the half hour drive down the coast, paddle for 2.5 hours and should be back at the terminal by around 4:00 PM. Read that against your own printed all aboard time before you book, because a small number of ships do sail in the afternoon.

8:30 AM, only on an early call. It is the calmest water of the day and the coolest air, and on a ship that is alongside by 7:00 and lets you off promptly it works well. Coming off a ship that berths at 8:00 you cannot be at the ramp for 8:30, and 8:00 is the commonest arrival hour on the schedule, so read your own arrival time before you book it rather than assuming the early slot is the safe one.

4:30 or 5:00 PM, when your ship stays late or overnight. The sunset departure is our best tour, and a late sailing is what makes it possible. Reckon on being back at the terminal by around 8:00 PM from the 5:00 PM, so a 9:00 PM all aboard or later is the one to look for. A great many Oranjestad calls do sail at 10:00 or 11:00 at night. Read the sunset kayak page first.

Getting from the terminal to the meeting point

Both of our meeting points are south east of Oranjestad along the coast road. Sea Glass Island tours meet at the ramp beside the Flying Fishbone restaurant in Savaneta. Lagoon and reef tours meet at the Mangel Halto beach sign in Pos Chiquito.

A taxi from the cruise terminal is the simplest option. It is about 14 km down the coast road, and half an hour each way is the number to plan with rather than the sixteen minutes a map will quote you. Agree the return with your driver before you get out, or take the number, because these are quiet stretches of coast and not places where cabs circle looking for fares.

If you have hired a car for the day, both meeting points are easy to find and easy to park at. If you would rather not drive, door to door pickup and return is $110 per vehicle round trip, per booking and not per person, added at checkout.

Build your margin like this

Work backwards from your all aboard time, not forwards from your arrival.

Take the 2.5 hours of tour. Add roughly half an hour of travel in each direction. Add the 15 minutes we ask you to arrive early, because departures cannot be held for late arrivals. Add fifteen minutes at the end for rinsing off and gathering your things. That is somewhere around four hours door to door.

Then add an hour of slack on top of it that you do not plan to use. Traffic, a slow tender, a queue at the gangway, and the general tendency of holiday mornings to run late all come out of that hour. If those four hours plus the extra hour do not fit inside your window, this is not the call to do it on. Do not answer that by tightening the plan.

The honest disclaimer

We are an independent operator, not a ship excursion. That means two things you should know before you book rather than after.

First, a ship is not obliged to wait for an independent tour, and no promise from us changes that. Build the margin.

Second, we cannot hold a departure for a delayed arrival, because there are other guests on it. What we can often do, if you message us early on WhatsApp at +1 786 971 2221, is move you between the morning and afternoon slots when there is space. Tell us as soon as you know, not as you are getting into the taxi.

Cancellation is free up to 24 hours before departure. Inside 24 hours it is not refundable, which is another reason to book the departure with the most room around it, and on most calls that is the 1:00 PM.

What to bring off the ship

Wear your swimsuit under your clothes, because the meeting points are a boat ramp and a beach sign, not a facility with changing rooms. Bring a towel, a hat, sunglasses with a strap, reef-safe mineral sunscreen, water shoes or sandals that stay on your feet, and enough cash for the taxi both ways.

Leave anything you would hate to lose in your cabin. There is no locker at either meeting point. The full list is on our what to bring page.

Where to next

Pick a route with Sea Glass Island or Mangel Halto, check the numbers on the prices page, read the weather policy, or look at Sea Glass Island Aruba for the crossing itself, or Savaneta to see where you are headed.