Here's my review of the Beach Express excursion on Tortola, again booked with Disney. Both of our excursions were in the morning. We were able to go back to the ship after each and have lunch then hang out at the pool/ride Aquaduck.
I decided unpacking and laundry could wait, plus I worry I will forget something if I wait too long. First up, Beach Express in Tortola:
We had about a 5 min walk from the ship to the place where we got on the bus. The buses in Tortola and St.Thomas were both open sided with roofs. There were a couple of steps to get into them. They held around 20 people. I felt very safe in them. We had families with toddlers on our buses on both islands, they seemed comfortable with holding their kids in their laps. The beach in Tortola is on the other side of the island. Because of this we had to drive on some winding roads that went up the island and then down. The roads were very narrow, and the cars coming the other direction would come very
close to the bus. I only saw one stop sign and light on the entire way to the beach. I wouldn't want to drive there, but our driver did a great job. I don't think we went over 35mph, we saw lots of cars/trucks zipping by. Our tablemates did the excursion that was a driving tour of the island along with a beachbreak. They are seasoned cruisers and said they felt queasy on their excursion because they weren't expecting the winding roads. I get motion sickness. I take Bonine every morning of the
cruise and had no problem on the drive, the drive wasn't scary or anything, so don't let my saying they were winding roads scare you. No one on our bus was bothered by the drive. Our tablemates were probably driving around a lot more than us though. As soon as we got off the bus, our hostess Pam was there to greet us. She gave us info about where everything that was included was located. We brought our own water bottles, so we never went over to get our free water/juice that was included. When you get off the bus there are some tents set up that had food for sale and some merchandise. We didn't buy any food since we had just had breakfast and were going to eat lunch on the ship afterwards. I don't know what kind of food they had, but it smelled really good. I also never went to see what kinds of things they were selling, but did see t-shirts as I walked by. I talked to Pam later in the day. This had been a beach that locals used. There were no bathrooms or anything. But after the hurricane, they decided to use this for ship excursions, so right now they are using temporary facilities. She said they are trying to get the govt. to build facilities there so they can continue to use this for ship excursions. Hard to describe the bathrooms. They were on a platform. 2 for men and 2 for women. Although they weren't in a permanent building, they weren't port-a-potties either. They were clean and big enough for parents to go in with kids who might need help. I'm a germaphobe and felt ok using them. The showers were next to the bathrooms, out in the open. They had great
water pressure for washing the sand off. Everything was running on generators. We had about 60-70 people on our excursion. They showed us where our beach chairs were. It was just us and another separate group. Don't know what ship the other group was with, but it was much smaller than ours. There was about 20 feet separating our chairs from theirs. We rented a umbrellas for $5. They had
pool noodles and kayaks that were included. There was a water trampopline that was $5 for kids and $10 for adults. My dh and dd did it. There was only 1 other family who did it. One of the employees was on it at first, but then my dh and the other dad were on it with the kids and made sure they were all safe on it. My dd was disappointed at first at the beach because it was nice, calm waters. She wanted to have strong waves, but was happy as soon as she saw the trampoline. The company that rented the umbrella also had some stuff that could be rented, I didn't look to see what they had. Pam made sure to tell us to go get the noodles and Kayaks that she had that were included and not to rent them from the other company. The water was clear and warm. The beach was lovely, slightly smaller than family beaches on CC. We could see other islands in the distance. My dd had water shoes, but didn't wear them. Sand/shells about the same as on CC. There was a slight decline going down from where we got off the buses to the beach, but not too terrible to walk. If someone is in a wheelchair or walker it might be difficult. We were there for a little over 3 hrs. The first 2 hours was just us and the other group. I did notice locals coming the last hour we were there, but it never felt crowded and everyone was really friendly and nice. The locals that came went to another part of the beach. If we do another EC I would book this again. Pam made sure to let us know when we needed to be back on the buses.