I’ve been to Turks & Caicos, Barbados, St. Croix and Puerto Rico. All good. If they look into Puerto Rico, I highly recommend going to Vieques. It’s a smaller island off of PR, used to be a military base – gorgeous and not at all touristy. Not a chain store in sight, but several really excellent restaurants. Not having to deal with passports and customs is quite nice.
I also love St. John but warn that it is VERY expensive there in comparison to many other locations. For All Inclusive resorts, you can’t beat Cancun. I’ve stayed at many 4* that provided stellar service, beaches, pool and food. Other locations I’d look at include Playa Del Carmen, Tulum (gorgeous!) and Isla Mujeres (all from Cancun airport). Isla Mujeres is my favorite place of all of them, very quaint, gorgeous north beach, very inexpensive food and drinks, shorts and t-shirts attire at all but a handful of places, live music, good party scene if you want it.
I love St. John and Grand Cayman, but my D and SIL loved their honeymoon at Hamanasi in Belize, just as another suggestion to check out.
As much as I love Iceland, I can’t recommend it for someone on a budget unless they want to camp.
I’ve never been to Jamaica but I know several people who have had a delightful time at the inclusives places there. Sandals has gotten some good chatter (doesn’t appeal to me, but passing it along).
I have been going to St. John since the early 90s and I find it LESS expensive than many other places. Of course if you stay at Caneel Bay it is expensive, but there are so many lodging choices and inexpensive places to eat that are fun and not touristy that it isn’t all that bad. We rent a jeep for the week and go all over the island.
One of my young coworkers had an amazing honeymoon in St. Lucia. I’ve only been to a handful of islands and it was really long ago so I can’t really say. They all look appealing to me!
My married kid and spouse liked St. Lucia a lot. They stayed at an all-inclusive resort which had just opened and was offering great deals…but this was a few years ago. St. Lucia has a volcano and rain forest as well as beaches so the activities were a bit more varied than those on offer at most islands.
So I would not recommend this for honeymooners… but DS and a group of college friends enjoyed a budget camping trip on St John. Somehow they managed with a mix of checked bags for some (with all the camping needs and sunblock) and just backpacks for some of the others. Ah, to be young.
As for Caribbean travel, I was in the same boat as your DS. We are west coasters and have been to Hawaii plenty of times but never to the Caribbean. So have gone to Playa Del Carmen in 08/15 and Aruba in 01/16. I have spoken to a ton of people and have done a ton of research on most of the islands and so this is a small part of what I have learned.
First, yes, hurricane season is in June - Nov. Our PDC vacay in 8/15 was affected by heavy rains and wind. Aruba is south of the hurricane zone, which makes it a good choice. You should google the other islands which might be south of the hurricane belt and used that in your planning. Google hurricane belt maps, because the link was too long to put here.
Second, the Caribbean is now plagued by the Sargasseum Seaweed. This makes the beautiful beaches covered by seaweed that is 3 feet high and 15 feet wide which makes the beaches not white and powdery and makes the water not light blue. We were plagued by seaweed at PDC. So I looked up seaweed maps and forecasts and planned the Aruba trip to avoid seaweed. Here is a seaweed forecast map. http://seas-forecast.com/Pages/Forecast.php
I had another image of seaweed map in caribbean, but the link was too long, so google it.
Usually the west/north sides of many islands don’t get as much seaweed.
As for Aruba, it is a “desert” or drier and less humid island.
Amsterdam Manor Beach Resort is in a low rise area so more secluded and less crowded.
Holiday Inn or Hilton are in Palm Beach, a high rise area which is walking distance to many restaurants and activities.
We did tubing, ATVing, Snuba. You eat at restaurants with your feet in the sand or in the water.
For going up to the more hurricane areas:
I heard a lot of great things about Saint Lucia, (stay on the northwest side). It’s more mountainous like Hawaii and lots of good hiking. Roads are more rustic. Water is deeper drop off so maybe not as much of the extended long stretches of blue.
Bahamas in Nassau, while not strictly in the Caribbean, might work
Affordable places would be Jamaica in Negril which on the the northwest side which has all inclusive resorts and more affordable. And there is sightseeing outside of the all inclusive resorts.
The Dominican Republic in Punta Cana is affordable with all inclusives but smack dab in the seaweed zone and might feel dangerous outside of the all inclusive, I have heard… Many places in Puerto Rico seem to be in the seaweed zone, but you don’t need a passport and there are other non-beachy things to do…
Places not in seaweed zone would be Grand Cayman,Turk and Caicos but both are expensive.
Cancun is in seaweed zone, but the resorts are so mega huge that they basically have bulldozers clearing it out every day so might be ok.
I researched like crazy and picked Aruba and just got back last month and it was great!
Seaweed zone - who would have thought!!!?
I just returned from my 2-week timeshare in Grand Cayman, and part of Seven Mile Beach was hit with the seaweed. It was about 2 feet high and 6 feet wide, and it smelled. Employees were doing lots of raking and some heavy machinery was also brought in to haul a lot of it out. I understand that Seven Mile Beach doesn’t experience this very often due to the prevailing wind direction.
As an aside for anyone going to Grand Cayman, I have lots of activity and restaurant suggestions.
Wow, seeweed infiltration, who knew?!
Does anyone know whether the seaweed issue is expected to persist?
(I live at the beach in Southern California, and we had a major seaweed bloom one year in the 90s but it went away and hasn’t come back since. So perhaps it is/ was a temporary problem in the Carribean, too? Pretty disgusting though.)
We saw a layer of seaweed one on the beach in Rivera Maya 2 years ago… It was not too bad, but the resort still had to remove it daily.
Someone upthread mentioned Vieques (island of the coast of Puerto Rico)–my daughter and son-in-law went there for a destination wedding and loved it. The wedding was at the W Resort. There’s a bioluminescent bay on Vieques (water has a blue/green glow from the microorganisms) that they thought was amazing–they went back to see it twice.
The seaweed problem has been going on for about two years. It is not forecasted to go away. Different causes for the seaweed problem have been theorized but I don’t know if anyone knows the real reason. On some days it’s significant and huge; on other days there is no Seawood problem. They are exporting tons of seaweed. It will be there in June 2016. It has been changing the tourist landscape of Caribbean vacations.
I also recommend St. John. The beaches are gorgeous. We took a day cruise to British Virgin Islands and the scenery cruising through the Caribbean was incredible. At BVI, we spent a couple of hours in the Baths, a must see. (Remember to bring passport). We have been to Hawaii and this trip was just as beautiful and more laid back.
I have also been looking at Punta Mita in Mexico. This is not in the caribbean but the Fours Seasons Punta Mita is having a sale on travelzoo. Punta Mita is 45 minutes north of Puerto Vallarta and this looks like quite a luxurious vacation for honeymooners. I don’t know how easy it is to get there from Ohio though.
By the way, the seaweed information is quite a good idea. It would be a shame to go to a beautiful beach and not get to enjoy it.
Definitely check out in the Negril in Jamaica for a more affordable vacation
Wow, so good to know!
Just another reason to go to Hawaii. I second all the recommendations upthread for Kauai. Such a wonderful place and perfect in June.
Vacations per se are not really part of my life these days, but I do travel to visit kids and friends regularly. One D did an exchange on Martinique, which is a French Department in the Lesser Antilles. It is interesting as a part of France in the Caribbean, as well as for the volcanic beauty of the mountains and the history. I rented a car and we had an amazing time exploring the island. The beaches are not the beautiful turquoise of the Cancun area, but are nice enough, if thin. A little French is helpful.
On the way back, I ended up stuck in San Juan for a night, and the beach closest to the airport, where the big hotels are located, was wide and wonderful. Based on this one night, I’d return to Puerto Rico in a heartbeat, and one of these days when a true vacation is possible, exploring Puerto Rico, including Old San Juan and the islands of Culebra and Vieques is the destination.