Today in Florida, the temperature reached 85 degrees here at the end of October. But for many of you, the warm weather has faded and cooler temperatures are setting in. You may be starting to think about warm weather getaways and sunny places to escape the cold. The Caribbean is an excellent place to accomplish that task. And we were recently interviewed by the Travel Squad podcast about our experiences in several Caribbean destinations. This was a new experience for us, as we are usually the ones doing the interview. But on this episode, listen in as we are interviewed by the Travel Squad.
I'm Scott. And I'm
Melissa. And we
are the Sunshine Travelers our passion is travel and sharing our experiences with those who enjoyed as much as we do or those who want to learn more about travel or even those who just want to live vicariously through our travel stories no matter where you fall along that journey get ready to hear about our first-hand experiences as we visit some of the most interesting and amazing places on Earth.
Welcome to the Travel Squad Podcast, where adventure meets inspiration. We're your hosts. I'm Brittany. I'm Kim.
And I'm Jamal. Together, we explore international destinations, hike epic national parks, and share unforgettable travel experiences with you, one passport stamp at a time. Our mission is to inspire you to travel by showing you
mission is to inspire you to travel by showing you how you can make it work no matter your budget, schedule, or experience level. We bring you along so that you can
you along so that you can laugh, get excited, and start planning your own trip. So grab your ticket and your passport.
And don't forget your travel insurance.
And get ready to embark on a new adventure with us around the globe.
Hello, fellow travelers.
Hey, squaddies.
Welcome to this week's episode of the Travel Squad podcast. Today, we have two very special guests joining Melissa us, and Scott, the hosts of the Sunshine Travelers podcast. Today, we have two very special guests joining Melissa us, and Scott, the hosts of the Sunshine Travelers podcast. In
this episode, we talk with Scott and Melissa about their extensive knowledge of the Caribbean. Being that they live in Eastern Florida and are so close to this region, they have traveled to a lot of the countries and islands in the Caribbean and share with us their tips and best recommendations for traveling through this part of the world. One thing I
thing I really loved about this interview was learning about how they travel and hearing about the local experiences that they try to get out of every destination they go to. They're touring with local small businesses, going to local walking food tours and these hole in the wall places. And they really take the time to learn about the culture and immerse themselves in it. They're not just going to like the flashy commercial places of the world. And I think that makes such a difference in this interview, but also in their podcast, Sunshine Travelers podcast. It makes them really special and unlike other podcasts that are out there. So I'm really excited to share it with you squadies. We were on their podcast too. So you can go over there and listen to that. But with that, let's bring Melissa and Scott on to the Travel Squad podcast.
Scott and Melissa, welcome to the show. Thank you. We're excited to be here and chat with you guys.
Yeah, thank you for having us.
We're excited to have you on. It's been a couple months since we chatted with you all and we're on your show. And we're really excited because you two are a married couple. Together you run the Sunshine Travelers podcast. And we're going to get a lot more into that into your podcast and the two of you. But we like to start all of our guest interviews by going way, way back. And since you are a married couple, I want to ask, what is your first travel memory that the two of you, but we like to start all of our guest interviews by going way, way back. And since you are a married couple, I want to ask, what is your first travel memory that the two of you did together that really ignited your passion for traveling together?
That's an interesting question. If we go way, way back, early on, we did a lot of camping. So we didn't have a lot of money for travel and we had a tent and we would just pack that thing up and head off for the weekend and do a lot of camping things of that nature and one year we did the blue ridge parkway so we started up in virginia and then camped our way back down you know we always enjoyed that we don't go camping at all now but i would say that that was probably some of our earliest travel experiences was camping. I feel like that's a really great way to like camp and explore for cheap and travel
a really great way to like camp and explore for cheap and travel for cheap. Jamal and I kind of did the same thing when we were young. Like we do a lot of beach camping because we lived in California kind of near the coast. But it's a great way to travel for cheap and like really get to know each other because you can't escape that tent, right?
Yeah, that's true. And I think it's harder. So many more people camp. I think it's harder to just like pick up and go now camping without like making reservations and really planning ahead. But back then, we literally would decide on a Friday afternoon, hey, let's go camping this weekend. And I think even the weekend before the Blue Ridge Parkway trip he's talking about, we went down the Savannah and just camped because you could just, you know, find activities. We would typically stay, you know, in state parks and hike and, you know, just find everything that there was to do for the weekend without a lot of planning.
So camping was the spark. But just quick question, what was the fuel to take it to larger vacations? What was the next one up that it was like, all right, now we're really going to explore, go international, do things like that?
That started many years later when our kids were younger. I chose not to have jobs where I traveled a lot, but as they got older, I took on new jobs at companies that were global. So I had an opportunity to travel to all over the world. And, you know, as I would go, I would come back and tell Melissa about these different places I went. And most of that was just your typical work travel. You fly in, you go to the hotel, go to an office, maybe grab some dinner and then repeat the cycle again. Didn't see a lot of sites. And then as our kids got older, Melissa started traveling with me some. And we love to tell the story about one company. We had an office in New York and it had moved. And I told her, I said, you can come with me, but I'm just going to tell you the office is in the middle of nowhere and you're going to have to take a train or taxi or something to just get to anything. And when we got there, she like smacked me upside the head and was like, you're an idiot. She's like, literally three blocks away is Times Square. She's like, what do you mean you're in the middle of nowhere? But it was my experience because I walked from the hotel to the office and I passed nothing.
Yeah. So I had to teach him how like you look on Google Maps and then you like zoom it out and you like see, you know, what what is around you. So I still get on to him about that. But I think backing up, he didn't mention growing up. He went to Germany a whole lot. His brother was a German exchange student and then they just stayed in contact with the family. His mom also worked for Delta Airlines and were able to literally just hop on a plane. And so they would do that a lot for weekends, but he had traveled to Germany a whole lot. And so actually my first international trip, we had been married a couple of years or so, and our daughter was like one, and we decided to go visit that family in Germany as well. So that was actually, I got my passport, we got her passport. That was actually my first international trip was going to visit them in Germany as well. But then I would say the true wonderlust in
I would say the true wonderlust in us, the desire to get out and travel all the time like we want to do now, you know, not to be tied down in any way and just be free to go at any time. That started about five years ago. And I had an opportunity in between jobs to take some time off. And we packed our bags and headed to Europe for six weeks. And that right there just kind of set off that true Wunderlust inside of us of we want to do more of this. I think that that was really the start of it in what initiated everything. It's on my bucket list to do a long one or two
It's on my bucket list to do a long one or two month trip in Europe like that. That's really cool. Yeah, because it's really amazing because you really can see so many different places because everything
because it's really amazing because you really can see so many different places because everything is so close and flights are so cheap. And, you know, so we just kind of picked out a variety of activities, Mediterranean cruise, then we spent some time in Italy, then we went to Greece, we'd actually been invited to a friend's wedding, which was in the UK, you know, so just we had like a huge variety of things that within a six week period, you know, that we could see and still have time to relax and just chill out too.
Well, we'll have to have you back on just to talk about Europe because we really wanted to have you on to talk about the Caribbean. You two, in my eyes, are the experts on the Caribbean. You live in Amelia Island, Florida. And so last time we chatted, you said being in that location makes it really easy to get over to the Caribbean. And I've been listening to some of your episodes on different Caribbean locations. You haven't done a whole lot in the Caribbean. Britt and Jamal, you've done a little bit as well, but not a whole lot, right?
Yeah, and what we've done mostly has been cruises. We haven't had the opportunity to go to some of the Caribbean islands on their own solo. So we probably have very different experiences. So we can't wait to dive in to some of that and talk about that.
Yeah, the only place in the Caribbean that we've been to, we took a direct flight and spent time exclusively there and not on a cruise, was the U.S. Virgin Islands, which we absolutely loved too, but everywhere else has only been on cruises, and you know that. When you go on cruises, you're at port for maybe six to ten hours, so you get a little taste of it, but you don't really get to delve into it deep and enjoy a lot of the culture of the islands too. So we're really excited to hear all about your guys' experience on that. Yeah, absolutely. And we'll share a little
absolutely. And we'll share a little bit more about that in a second as we get into it. We
want to know everything, most underrated, most overrated, best food, best beaches. Well, what is your favorite Caribbean island? I think it has to be
it has to be St. John.
Yeah. In the
U.S. Virgin Islands. And that's a place that we've been to a couple of times because we like to snorkel and we've never found snorkeling quite to the level that you see in St. John. And so it just has always been one of those places that we keep wanting to go back to over and over again. And that's an easy one
easy one too, right?
You don't need a passport.
You need no passport.
The other thing about St. John is that as far as amount of accommodations, there's just not a whole lot. And so you're just not going to have crowds and crowds of people. I do think that sometimes when people are on the cruise ship, you know, it may dock in St. Thomas and people will do some snorkel tours and stuff like that to St. John. And it's funny because those snorkel tours end up in the same little bays that you can drive to and, you know, just snorkel off the beach. And so I think that's what we enjoy about it. It really is not crowded. And we just like to rent a car and just go beach hopping and snorkel until we are completely exhausted.
We loved John. St. We actually did some snorkeling too. And I love that there's a national park on John. St. And when we it was during COVID. went, So there wasn't a lot of crowds. There was no cruise ships coming into port. And it was amazing because we saw a few different turtles. And we actually got to see up close a turtle eat a jellyfish while we were snorkeling. And it was such an amazing
experience. Wow. Yeah. So the sea turtles, I think that when you get to snorkel with sea turtles, not in a situation where they're like enticing them to be around you, they're just doing their own thing. Like to me, that is just one of the most amazing things, like just so relaxing. So number two then, and this was somewhere that we actually visited earlier this year, I would say is Curacao.
Yeah, Curacao. I don't hear much about. Way
Way underrated, way underrated, I think. But before we go to Curacao, can we stay on the without a passport for just a minute? Because there are really some very underrated Caribbean locations that don't require a passport. So a minute, because there are really some very underrated Caribbean locations that don't require a passport. So if any of your listeners want to go somewhere and maybe they don't have a passport or it's expired or whatever the reason is, Puerto Rico has absolutely stolen our heart as well. You all were recently
recently there, weren't you? We were. And that was actually our second trip. The first time we went, we were going to St. John for the second time. And I had messed up and just not bought the flights ahead of time. So it can be pretty expensive to fly to St. Thomas. And I guess we should back up. If you want to go to St. John, you're not going to fly on to St. John. You have to fly to St. Thomas and then take a ferry boat or one of the hotel boats, depending on where you're staying, over to St. John. So that's probably important for people to know. So I had messed up and not bought the tickets. And Puerto Rico is super close. So I actually realized that JetBlue flies directly from Puerto Rico over to St. Thomas so we could get to St. John for fairly inexpensive. So we actually did like a round trip to Puerto Rico and then added that on for a whole lot more reasonable. Oh, that's a really good hack. Yeah. So of course he was like, okay, sure. Sure. Extend our trip from like a four or five day trip to the whole week. And he did have to. And I guess that was the other reason that we didn't talk about a few things that we did. He did have to work a little bit, right? So we had to be a little bit closer to the hotel, but we still had the weekend. We did some things like they have a national forest with a lot of waterfalls you can go to. We did stay on the beach that time. We stayed close to Old San Juan, which is a really neat city. I think it's underrated because people think, oh, the cruise ships go into it. We don't want to go to a cruise ship port, but I feel like it's very different from other cruise ship There's a fort you port. can go to go to a cruise ship but I feel like it's port, very different from other cruise ship port. There's a fort you can go to, but lots of great restaurants, a lot of culture there. So we recently revisited Puerto Rico as part of a travel creator conference. And so we were there for a whole week. This time we actually got to do some things like some tours. So we actually did a walking food tour in Old San Juan, which is right up our alley. We love finding hidden gem restaurants and then having people tell us about things. And what was funny about that is we went to four places that we had never even noticed and locals that I had asked, what are some recommendations? Weren't even on the radar. We got to do a tour for somebody with a whole day for the whole West Side. So highly recommend Puerto Rico. It has some really great beaches. We actually want to go back again. We want to do some other places like the island of Vieques and Cuba Libre. I don't think it's Cuba Libre. I think that's the drink, but something like that. But it's closer to those little islands or like closer to St. Thomas, St. John. So they have like more of that feel and that kind of water. But just the people there are so friendly. And so I think that's probably the key to Puerto Rico is to book some tours and be with some locals. And what company do you use to book your tours?
you use to
We'll have to share that with you so that you can share that with people because we actually met with a lot of local companies. Puerto Rico, they tend to be local operators. And I do think that some of them are on some of these booking sites, but a lot of them are just like reach out to us directly. They're small family owned businesses and they book through their website and stuff like that, which is interesting. But the food tour was a spoon experience. They are on Instagram. Fantastic. I think that was the best food tour experience that we have ever
done. And so two of your favorite islands have been ones that you can get to without a passport. Are there any other Caribbean islands that you would recommend for listeners that don't require a passport? St. Thomas
is another one. We haven't really spent any time there because we were always, you know, getting to St. John. But that's another one that I think is very popular. It is bigger than St. John, a lot more hotels. Of course, it does have, you know, the cruise ports and stuff like that. But a lot of people like that, too. We can't speak to that experience directly. But I will say if you are a foodie, St. Thomas and especially St. John are probably not going to be your favorite places because there's just not a lot of, you know, restaurants. I think it's more for, like you mentioned, the national park, some hiking, you know, if it's not too hot, the swimming and things like that.
you know,
Yeah, more for the nature. I mean, don't get us wrong, there's places to eat, so you're not going to starve when you go there, but it's not that unique culinary experience that you may be looking for if you're a foodie
traveler. You had mentioned earlier that Curacao, if I'm pronouncing it correctly, because I've always seen it on a map and I never knew how to pronounce it and you said it, but you said it's underrated. Tell us why it's underrated and people should go there. It's very
very natural. And so usually when you talk about Curacao, you have Aruba, Bonaire, and Curacao, the ABC islands. And if you've ever been to Aruba, you quickly find out that when you get there, I call it Panama City, Florida, right? It's got all of these places like Olive Garden and Longhorn Steakhouse and things like that. And don't get me wrong, if you like the beach and Longhorn Steakhouse and, you know, things like that. And don't get me wrong. If you like the beach and you just want to go and spend your time at a beautiful beach, that's Aruba.
I've also heard in Aruba, they have a beach where there's all these big pink flamingos and you can go and see them and feed them. And that's the only thing I know about Aruba. And that's the only reason I want to go.
Did you see that? There is. And we actually did go do that. So since you mentioned that, we will mention that because we do have a couple of tips. So that particular beach is actually owned by the hotel. It's the Renaissance Aruba. I think it has another name in there. And so the only way that you can go to that island where those flamingos are is to either stay the night or what we found out later well two other ways you can book a spa appointment and have access to that for the day because the spa is actually over on the island or you can buy a day pass the thing about the day passes though are they are limited in quantity and I think you can only buy like the day before and so I was just like I don't even want to hassle with that because if we want to kind of plan our schedule and stuff like that. So we actually ended up using points to book one night at that hotels to have access. We only ended up going the one day, but you could actually have access the day you check in and the day you check out. So that was a neat experience. Now, I think a lot of what you see on that is people having the Instagram pictures, right? And they have to take pictures with them. But you obviously don't have any control over where they go. There's two sides to that, too. There's an adults only. And then there's one that's family friendly. And of course, those flamingos are free to go on either one. By the time kind of we got there that next morning, they were already kind of like grumpy, right? The kids have been. And they were kind of like, you know, get away from me. But later in the afternoon, we were able to kind of like walk in the water. I mean, that wasn't really our goal to like, you know, take pictures with them and stuff like that. But it was neat. That was something that I wanted to do. And I said, I don't know if Averyb is a place that we'll ever go back to, right? We don't know until we go. It's just like, okay, we really want to go back here. So I said, let's plan to do this because we did have two or three people who said, oh, you need to do this. You know, this is a great experience to do that. So yes. I do want to go back
want to go back to Curacao though, because Aruba was very commercialized, if you will. And that's why I said it just looked like a beach in Florida or something like that, that you may go to. But Curacao, on the other hand, was much more authentic, I think, and has not been changed, has not been commercialized as much. And so you're going to find a lot more local culture there and more authentic experiences than you will in Aruba. And what brought you to Curacao? Did you go on your own
you to Curacao? Did you go on your own or was it a cruise ship stop?
We did it on our own. We were going to Aruba. So we had planned to stay like four or five nights in Aruba. And again, I said, oh, well, while we're there, we're so close. So yeah, I have a habit of doing this. Okay. So while we're
there, we're so
So while we're there, we're so close to Curacao. Let's do that. And actually, here's another hack for you is it's cheaper to fly to Curacao. Well, it was for us. We did Delta from Atlanta, well, from Jacksonville, but then through Atlanta, it was way cheaper for Curacao than Aruba. And then they have a little bitty flight, which those, I mean, to us, I mean, some people are like, no way, I'm not getting on the little bitty plane. Those are fun for us, very inexpensive. We could fly over to Aruba and then we actually flew back because getting out of Aruba, flying back to the U.S. can be like hours and hours of standing in line and customs, immigration, security, stuff like that. And we had heard that. So that was the route we took and it actually ended up saving us money. So that was why we went. I think I had seen it online and on social media, and it has a very neat Willemstad. Willemstad is the town. Cruise ships do go into that. They kind of park. It's a good walk for people to go into the town. And so I think a lot of people do like excursions on Curaçao, but it's got a European feel. Part of the Dutch Antilles, same as Aruba, but it really does have a bigger Dutch feel without feeling like a cruise port as much. They do have some of those shops, but like in the evenings, since we're not on a cruise, right, we have those restaurants. They have this famous bridge that they light up. They have like a fort where that's now turned into all these restaurants. So being there at night, not on the cruise ship, we just had almost like a European feel, you know, the restaurants that then bring out all the chairs out onto the sidewalk and they come out and serve meals. But then during the day, again, we love to snorkel. So we sought out these beaches that you can go snorkel at. There's a national park you can go to and see the different, you know, the blow holes and stuff like that. So one side of the island is swimmable and then the other side has like the really high surf that you can't swim on.
But you'll see a lot of people out there kite surfing, which is really cool as well.
Yeah. Sounds like best of both
both worlds. You're up and tropical.
Yeah. So we really enjoyed that. I had a feeling that when we were researching going to those two places, and then I know people love Aruba. Like there are people who go to Aruba every single year and absolutely love it. I mean, don't get me wrong. It has some of the long beaches, Palm Beach and Eagle Beach. And we did find some good snorkeling there as well. But just the feel and the, like I said, Curacao being more rustic and here's the thing is I had read there's a couple of places where you can actually see the flamingos possibly in the wild in the salt flats on Curacao and we did see that as well so I mean you don't get as close to them right but then you're thinking kind of the same as I mentioned with the turtles they're in the wild versus being their wings are clipped and they can't leave and stuff like that. And the same for Bonaire.
the same for Bonaire. We didn't end up going to Bonaire. It was going to be pretty expensive and we weren't going to have a lot of time to do it. But we have heard that there's a large natural flamingo population on Bonaire. And so a lot of people like to do that. It's the ABC Islands. Walsh That's ABC. going on myonaire. And so a lot of people like to do that. It's the ABC Islands.
Walsh ABC. That's going on my bucket list. And also, and all
and all of those three places are popular for diving. I'd say especially Curacao and then especially Bonaire. A lot of people go there. So if people like to dive, that's a place that is really good for diving. And I do want to mention, I know we said not as commercialized stuff like that. There is a Sandals Resort on Curacao that has recently opened. So if that's your thing, you could go. But in that case, you're really not going to leave the resort probably because everything's included, that kind of thing. And we just enjoyed, we rented a car, you know, we went all over. We did the nature things. There's the Blue Curacao, the liqueur. There's a distillery there. And so you get to go see that. So we did a cocktail class there. And, you know, and so that's just one of the excursions. We met some people that were on the cruise. You know, it's one of the excursions that you can do on curacao. So we really enjoyed that. Like we were almost sad to leave. Let me say one
one more thing about curacao. There is a shipwreck right off of the shoreline from snorkeling, you can see this old tugboat down under the crystal clear water. It's like 40 feet down or something like that. And all the amazing fish swimming around this tugboat. And that is a really unique experience you shouldn't miss. However, an interesting story is there was an oil rig that they had brought into the port and that they were refurbishing while we were there. And so literally you had to get in the water behind this giant oil rig. And so you're like, is this the right place? And matter of fact, the first time we went, we were like, we don't think we're in the right place. And so we didn't see the shipwreck. And then we decided to go back out again and try it one more time. And this time there were people swimming around it and we were like, that's where it's at. And it was a really neat experience. Yeah. Marriott
Beach, you're just like, this is strange. But there's actually a beach club there too. Not anything fancy, but chairs and a little restaurant and things like that. But if you Google on Google Map, Tugboat Beach, it'll come up easy and you can find it. But yeah, probably our very favorite snorkel place on Curacao. That was very neat. So many fish.
Well, I'm going to have to add that to my list. And Curacao just went up on my list quite a bit. I'm like, Jamal, what can we fit that in? Well, I'm
excited. We're going to have to add it to the list. Everywhere's on the list. But even though everywhere's on the list, I want to also hear where's the most overrated in the Caribbean, in your opinion. We're still going to go, but I just want to know what you think about that. What would you say is overrated? I'm going to say the Bahamas.
Bahamas. Yeah. I think a lot of people go to the Bahamas and they'd never even leave the cruise port. But I do want to say one last thing about ABC is it's below the hurricane belt. So since we're right in the middle of hurricane season, if you're looking for a Caribbean destination, you can make those plans because they aren't impacted by hurricanes.
Yeah. So that is important, right? Because you do have to think about for the Caribbean hurricane season. Let's go
go back to the rating. So talk about
the rating. So talk about the Bahamas. I think you would say specifically though, Nassau, right? A lot of people go to Nassau and that's their experience probably with the Bahamas. I think you would have a completely different experience in the Bahamas if you went to a smaller island or you were doing it like on a catamaran trip or something like that. I think that would be a completely different experience. Like I would compare that to going to Greece and only going to these places that are super popular and stuff like that. So a couple of, I guess, tips about if you go to the Bahamas, we actually did a walking tour with a local for a few hours that was very informative. She was fantastic. I mean, there's not a ton of things to see in Nassau, but she took us around, but really gave us a perspective, not just of historical, but what it really is like to be bohemian and like their history and, you know, what it's like to be there today and stuff like that. And then you would still have time to see the beach for a little while if you did it as part of a cruise, you know, ship that would be for a few hours in the morning, you could grab lunch. The other thing I would say about Nassau is just getting off the beaten path and going to, what was the name of that place where all the restaurants are? The Fish Fry.
Fry.
The Fish Fry, which is a bunch of restaurants. And I mean, that was fantastic. I was
was about to ask if you guys, when the Bahamas and Nassau particularly went to the Fish Fry, because when we were there, we did. And we ate some delicious conch fritters that Brittany and I still talk about to this day. And they were absolutely dynamite.
Yeah, cracked conch is definitely one of the things that you can't go to the Bahamas and not try, as well as their whole fish. They're known for their whole red snapper. Matter of fact, a lot of the restaurants that you go to, you go in, they have the fish there and you can pick out which one of the fish you want. And then they fry that up. It's a very light fry, so it's not like real greasy or whatever, but that's the other thing that I think that they're very well known for. And don't forget to eat at the poop deck.
What's the poop deck?
Yeah. So poop deck is actually a nautical term, but the restaurant there, that was probably one of the nicer restaurants that we went to. And the reason I say it's overrated is because that was a very expensive restaurant, even compared to, you know, we live on an island, we live on a destination place. And that poop deck restaurant was extremely expensive, but it wasn't like it was a five-star dining experience. But I would say it's probably somewhere in the neighborhood of $60 to $70 per person to eat there. Okay.
Yeah. So I think a lot of people's experience with Bahamas is that and then go into some of these private islands, right, from the cruise ship, which is just enjoying the beach for the day. beach for the day. So I think probably for the Bahamas, something that would be on our bucket list to do is to do, like I mentioned, do some kind of sailing trip or catamaran trip or something like that so that you could kind of go around and then see some different places. So I think you're either
think you're either going to come in on a cruise or you're going to go with the purpose of going to Atlantis. Now, Atlantis, we stayed there for three or four nights. It was very interesting and nice place, but it is away from everything. So it's designed almost like an all-inclusive where you almost don't leave. They want you to go to the restaurants there. They want you to do all of your entertainment there. They've got the casino. They've got the water park. But, you know, once again, it's pretty expensive to leave there and to get a taxi going somewhere else. So Jamal, I wanted
to go back to something that you mentioned earlier about we've only been on a cruise ship. And I think the cruise ship in the Caribbean experience is completely different from, and I'll say even completely different from our experience of a cruise ship in the Mediterranean. There we felt like they gave you these really long days to go out on these excursions and you had a really long time. So we also have done a cruise experience in the Caribbean. We've actually done three, but the last one we did, we got to go to Jamaica, the Cayman Islands and to Cozumel. And we, in that respect, we were a little bit disappointed because even in the Grand Cayman, and to Cozumel. And in that we, respect, we were a little bit disappointed because even Grand Cayman, for example, I think we got off the ship at like 8 or 8.30. It left at 2.30, which means you had to be back on the ship at 2. So I don't really know. Is it like because you can open the casinos and people can start gambling or people just aren't interested in doing or they don't feel like there's a lot of things to see? We could have spent a lot more time. And we literally on Grand Cayman, we packed as much as we could. We spent some time at the beach. We found a local place to have lunch. We went on a distillery tour. We like raced back. I mean, we had a little bit longer in Mexico. And I think y'all talk a good bit about Mexico too. But that was our first time on Cozumel. We did have more time there. We rented a car. We did enjoy the snorkeling. I think of all those places, funny enough, we enjoyed that the most because the other, we just felt rushed. The other experience was Jamaica and you just don't have time. And then that cruise port is, you know, the same as so many other ones, shops and things like that. So in that respect, I think we were a little bit disappointed. So just to let people know, like if you are going to do a Caribbean cruise and think you're really going to get to see things, I think you'll find it to be a little disappointing compared to a Mediterranean cruise where we literally say it's like a hop on, hop off, because you feel like you have been to those places. So I just wanted to throw that out there. Yeah. Well, I'm really glad that you did
Well, I'm really glad that you did because that was actually one of our questions that we had is if you would recommend going on cruises or solo. And I don't disagree with what you said about cruises. However, I will give the caveat, though, that if you know that going into it and you're going to islands where, okay, maybe the things to do are actually the stuff at port where you find a great excursion and you don't really want to spend a lot of time there. They can be very beneficial and nice for people, but if you want to enjoy it, be part of the culture, relax, snorkel more, you are right. You probably need to do it solo. Because when we did Virgin Islands solo, I mean, we were there a full week, island hopping back and forth between St. Thomas and St. John. We didn't go to St. Croix, but we loved it. And it was a completely different experience than we've ever had when we were on the cruises.
Right. And I totally, I totally would agree with that. So I would say just take a look at that and then choose those excursions wisely to kind of see what you're interested in, right? So if you want to experience, you know, something local, you know, try and book early like a cooking class or, you know, something where you're spending time with a local person. And we just unfortunately didn't. I don't know. We just didn't get that. So we were a little bit disappointed. The other two cruises that we've done were, like you mentioned, Bahamas. And, you know, you don't really do a whole lot. So, yeah. But there's a lot of
But there's a lot of people who just enjoy a cruise. And so Caribbean is great because it's close. You don't have that transatlantic flight that you have to worry about. You can get some really good deals on Caribbean cruises at times,, the cruise lines aren't going to run their ships right into the middle of a hurricane. So I think you can be pretty safe on that. You may not end up going where you thought you were going to go because they will change their routes if there's a hurricane in the route at that time. They don't cancel the cruise. They just change the route and go somewhere else. So you can get a surprise country.
can get a surprise country. It's like, yeah, you never know what you're going to get. It's like a grab bag of cruises. And I've mentioned this to people all the time. Sometimes the benefit of a cruise is the cruise itself, not even the destination. So I like how you had mentioned that. But since you confirmed the best way to go about it in the Caribbean is to do solo. You already kind of alluded to this, but it is relatively easy then to island hop from one place to the next and flights, it seems, from the way I understood it from you, are relatively cheap to do it that way.
like, yeah,
Yeah, I think that they really are. So you just kind of have to look to see what's available from the different places. But the bigger the airport, you're going to get some of those that go between them. And then like we mentioned from Aruba to Curacao to Bonaire, I think there was two, but the one that we used was called Divi Divi Air. And it literally makes that triangle. It goes from one to the other and back again several times a day, but super inexpensive. And then like I mentioned the other one. So yeah, you could do that and definitely split your time between the different ones. And there's also ferries that go between these islands as
also ferries that go between these islands as well. So if you don't want to do a little small island hopper plane, a lot of times you can take a ferry that goes between the islands. And that's an experience in and of itself too, to
to take the ferry. Yeah, it sure
it sure is. So I wanted to mention one other place. It's not somewhere I don't think that people think of as like, oh, I'm going to the Caribbean. This is where I'm going to go. But we really enjoyed it. High on our list is the country of Belize. So I don't know if you guys have been there. We've been to
know if you guys have been there. We've been to Belize, ironically, on a cruise. But my sister has been to Belize outside of a cruise. And of course, Belize City, the capital, she said is like, eh, whatever. But everywhere else in Belize, everybody that I know that's been there, including my sister, just raves about it, saying it's an amazing country.
Yeah, it really is. We super enjoy it. The people were super friendly. So I will say we went there in 2021. So kind of as things were starting to open back up, and I think they were just really thankful to like have us there and, you know, have us visiting and spending money and things like that. But we really enjoyed that. We did stay on an island. Well, we went, we did some things in the jungle for a couple of days and went to some of the Mayan ruins. We went to Yucatunich. But we spent the rest of our time on Ambergris Key. And there's a town there called San Pedro, did a food tour, super laid back. And there's no cars on that island. I mean, like delivery trucks and stuff like that. But if you want one, like it's golf carts. We did a day excursion, whole day excursion out to the Great Blue Hole. And we actually snorkeled it. It was snorkelers and mostly divers. But we got to snorkel the rim of it with a guy and stopped a couple of other places. So I think a lot of people don't think of that when they think of side as well and even go and explore up more in the jungle because that was just super relaxing. So put that on your list too, if people haven't been. We loved it.
we think of islands. And yes, Belize is not an island. It's in Central America, but it's right on the Caribbean Sea. So you get the vibes. But would you put that in the top three places for first-time Caribbean travelers to go? And if not, what are in your top three?
From ease of travel and the people, yes, Belize is super easy to travel to. So if you're a first-time traveler, I think it's a great place. Now, like I said, there's some question about whether it's considered Caribbean or not. And even if you Google it, there's lots of debates over whether it's Caribbean or Central America. And so just keep that in mind. But as far as the people, we have some great stories about being in Belize and things that you probably wouldn't have let people do for you in the US. It just seemed natural in Belize. We were trying to pay the guy for this excursion that we were going on, and he came into the bank and stood beside me at the ATM. And he wasn't being rude or anything. He was just there to help if necessary. But we said, if someone did that to you in the US, you would be clocking them upside the head, you know, get away from
me. Or most other countries, you'd be like really freaked out. So anyway, it was, yeah, like, we just felt like people went out of their way to like, try to help you and, you know, make your experience. Yeah, because we have another story. He left his phone in a taxi as we were trying to leave and like literally came running back, you know, bringing it. So I just feel like they went out of their way. So that really was easy. You fly in and out of Belize City. You can take a ferry over to some of those islands. I mean, you can rent a car. It's also fairly inexpensive. The other place that we stayed up in the jungle, they were like, listen, I got to come pick you up and take you back. And it was like way cheaper than we could even rent a car for, you know? And so we've actually recommended it to several people recently who haven't, including our daughter and son-in-law who are trying to come up with somewhere to go and they haven't traveled a lot on their own. We said, oh, this would be a great place to go. So you said where else would be good for first timtimers. Yeah, just two more quick off the
just two
more quick off the top. I mean, Curacao was easy to get to and was easy to navigate around. So I would put that there. And I
mean, I definitely think the Virgin Islands. That is because of not even having to have a passport, like that barrier to entry for people who want to start trying to explore new places, but, you know, don't want to have that hassle and that expense or whatever. I mean, that's a great place to go to.
But definitely, like I said, Puerto Rico, way underrated. And, you know, I didn't grow up around anyone from Puerto Rico and so didn't hear a lot about Puerto Rico growing up. So it just wasn't a place that was top of our destination list. And like I said, we really have a new found love for Puerto Rico.
Yeah. Let me add to that expense-wise. So if somebody wants to look for a place that would be the most budget-friendly or more budget-friendly, I think would be Curacao and Belize. Curacao was far cheaper than Aruba. Now we had gotten a special deal on our room in Aruba, but we talk about, we stayed in a really cute, like a boutique hotel that was almost like an efficiency, but our whole stay, which I think was three or four nights was less than one night would have cost in Aruba. So looking at those kinds of things too.
I have a quick question, selfishly. I went on a Caribbean cruise to Turks and Caicos and I loved it. Didn't see much, but we did a catamaran tour and then had all the rum punch we could drink and the snorkeling and it was so fun. I want to see more of Turks and Caicos. Have you two been there? Anything you would recommend if you have? We have
not. So Turks and Caicos is on our list. St. Kitts is on our list. I would love, because we will probably go back to St. John just because we just love it so much. I think we would try to pair it with a trip to the British Virgin Islands because it's so close as well. I'm trying to think. There's so many, right? That's the thing. We've barely scratched the surface. There are so many islands, but that is on the top of our list. What about Dominican Republic? We have not been to the Dominican Republic. I think, and especially here recently, places like Jamaica, Dominican Republic, I don't know that I could enjoy getting out because they have had all these safety warnings, right? We're not super big, all-inclusive people. We like to go out and see the island. They've had a lot of safety warnings, even in the Bahamas recently, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica. People do it. I know people road trip Jamaica and there's amazing things I see in Jamaica. I just don't know if I had to worry the whole time, right? And be nervous if I could enjoy it that
much. That might be a good one to do a cruise for. And that's where I went on my cruise, those two stops. And in Dominican, we went to this little monkey sanctuary with these tiny little monkeys jumping all over you. And we did this nature tour where you go down these natural waterfalls and you're with guides, of course, so that adds the safety and protection factor in there. Yeah. I mean, I think all-inclusive in one of those places is fine,
in one of those places is fine, too. And you can do excursions through the all-inclusive, so you can do some of those same things. But like Melissa said, we're just not all-inclusive people just because we like to get out and get off the beaten
path. Yeah. And I think those other places we talked about, Turks and Caicos, St. Kitts, St. Lucia. Oh, St. Lucia is definitely. And my sister has been and just loved it. I think some of those, though, are higher on the list that we would put ahead of those. So
St. Lucia had a real moment this last summer. Everyone was going there. Yes. Yeah. I thought you were
you were going to say just this past week because they won their first ever Olympic medal. Yes.
In track and field, she won. Yes. The year of St. Lucia. Yeah. But it absolutely looks beautiful, and we've seen some different shows about it and seen people go. So that is also high on our list. So I just think that taking all those things into account, we would visit those other places before.
And we kind of thought we would like to there's this one cruise itinerary that goes to a lot do, of those But then just after our I think we places. would just be we experience, spend 12 days and we didn't really get like, to see oh, those well, So I think we'll try to prioritize some or long places. weekend trips or something to go and visit some of those places.
to go and visit some of those places. Do you have any trips to the Caribbean currently booked for the future? We do not.
We do not. We have trips booked, but we're not going to the Caribbean. One of the things about us is, and we talk about this on our show, is that while we have our youth and our health, we've said we want to go as far as we can. And so a lot of our travel experiences are traveling transatlantic or in that direction. But we do try to work in like these Caribbean trips because being in Florida, it's easy to do just as kind of filler trips for
us. But we will say we also are not where we plan trips like way out in advance. It was last fall, I think September,
It was
we booked that trip and stayed in Atlantis and went to the Bahamas. And then right after that went on that cruise, but we booked both of those in September. So you never know with us. I like that. That's more my travel style too.
more my travel style too. You guys had kind of touched on weather earlier and you kind of mentioned hurricane season, but when would you say is the best time to travel to the Caribbean? Like that
Like that May to July timeframe is probably the best. Hurricane season was a little bit early this year. And so usually August is a decent time, but we've been in November going into December. And just depending on where you're at in the Caribbean, the waters may be nice and warm, but you do run the on where you're at in the Caribbean, the waters may be nice and warm, but you do run the risk of you're right at the end of hurricane season. And so it could have cooler waters going through there. I think Aruba
Aruba though, if you're talking about Belize, Aruba and Curacao, I mean, you're pretty good to go anytime because of how much further south that is. Yeah, close later.
close later.
Right. We were in both of those places this year in March and it was fantastic. So yeah, that would be a place that you could go then. I will tell you when we were in St. John last year in May, our son and daughter-in-law actually went to St. John for their honeymoon. And so when we were there, I actually talked to the guy and was talking about that was October, right? So hope they're not going to run into hurricane season. And he said, if you try to avoid September, September is historically their worst time. That was what he said. And they were fine. Like they had a great trip in October. But again, I mean, you never know, right? So I think trip insurance probably for a Caribbean trip where they get hit by hurricanes is going to be your best bet for hurricane season.
Well, I know you have episodes on your show about all these Caribbean destinations that you've been to, all of these transatlantic trips that you're taking. So let's talk a little bit about Sunshine Travelers and how you really got started. Because I'm always fascinated with what inspires someone to get on the mic and start telling their stories. Well, it was
it was that trip that we took where we went for six weeks to Europe. And because we got to see and do so many amazing things, and we posted all of that onto social media, and then as we would continue to travel after that and post stuff, people started coming to us and said, hey, we're thinking about going so-and-so. Have you ever been there? Do you have any recommendations? Or we would hear people say, you know, we wish we could travel like you guys do, but we wouldn't even know where to start. Like, do you use a travel agent? They were asking us all these questions. And then there's a third group that said, you know what? I don't care anything in the world about traveling. We'll let you guys do all of it, but we love living vicariously through you. And we just put those groups of people together in our heads and we were like, you know, we should do a podcast or something, a blog where we start capturing all of this so that we can share it with people. And that's really how it was born.
Yeah. And I would also add, so we started doing the podcast in April of 2023. And so right before that, we had some really great trips planned. So early in 2023, we went to the Galapagos Islands. We were going to go to London. And then we had trips to St. John and Puerto Rico planned. So we had like all these things planned. And so we were like, this would just be a great time, right? We could start sharing these things and start figuring out this whole process of doing the podcast. So that was really when we decided to say, okay, you know, we're going to commit to this. If we do this, we're going to do an episode. So we do an episode every single Tuesday. And a lot of them are destinations. We of course have guests. We like to interview people who have been to places that we are planning to go to get more information. And we thought, well, instead of just talking to people and getting these recommendations, let's get them on the podcast and just start talking about it. We did that with Aruba, for example, and got some really great tips and other places that we've been and then just topics that we're interested in. You know, things that we have found helpful for us, like how do we deal with jet lag? How do we pack? Like, for example, that six-week trip to Europe, we did use e-bag backpack. So it's a little bit bigger backpack, but we each had that one backpack because we didn't want to, yeah, one backpack for six weeks. And, you know, so how we did that because we had these ferries, we had all these planes, you know, we just didn't want to have to worry about- Wash clothes along the way.
Wash clothes along the way. Yeah. And so
Yeah. And so some, you know, just some things I think that people ask us, well, how do you do this? And then what do you recommend? Especially things like, am I going to need converters for, you know, the plugs? And what do you recommend? And what do you use? I mean, still like even this weekend, you know, just sharing that information is a lot of fun.
So one of our trips that we've got coming up is we're doing a safari in Kenya. And this coming weekend, we're actually interviewing the owner of the safari company. And so we're going to talk about what we can expect on the trip. And we like to do that. You know, we'll interview somebody. So take Aruba, for example. We interviewed somebody who's gone to Aruba a dozen times. They love Aruba. So before we went on our trip, we interviewed them. We talked about what are the things that we should do, where should we stay, and asked all those questions. And then after we got back, we gave our experience and what we would recommend and what we would do.
There's always learnings from your trips. And those are those valuable little tiny things that you're not going to find on Google or in a lot of blogs that might be outdated.
Yeah, and that's so true. And I think in the past, before we started doing this, you don't ever want to look at a trip and really say, oh, well, we messed up this, we should have done this differently, because you really do enjoy the experience, like whatever happened, right? Like nothing was catastrophic or whatever. But I think it also has changed our perspective to where we can really analyze it and say, hey, we could have done this better. But now let's share it with somebody else. Like here's a different way, or here's what we would do differently. And I think that's valuable information. Yeah. When we talk with
When we talk with people, they're always saying like they love our honest opinion because people sometimes just write about the highlights, but they don't talk about what you would do different or how you would change things. So I think that's really important for people to hear to really understand what the experience is like or what you're going to get out of it and to see if it's a good fit for them or their trip. Yeah. I can give you
you a great example of that. Our episode that just came out today, we're talking about the Greek islands and Santorini is one of them, right? And if you've ever researched pictures from Santorini, they're gorgeous of the sunsets and the white buildings and the cliffs, all that stuff, right? But when you're there and you realize that there's a thousand people trying to get that exact same photo at the same time, and they're like five, six, seven, eight rows deep trying to get that photo, that's a whole different experience. And we think people should know that. it is Yes, a gorgeous different experience. And we think people should know that, you know, yes, it is a gorgeous place, but if you're thinking you're just going to stroll down around sunset and take this gorgeous
picture, you're going to be sorely surprised. Right. Or like when you get off on the ferry and it's like herding cattle because you're at sea level, but you really got to climb the cliff and no one realizes that you got to climb the hill to get up there and do that. And we haven't been, but from Kim's experience, I know, but from Kim's experience telling us about it and everything that we've read. And so I really love that. And that's one of the great things about travel podcast, yours, ours, everybody's is that you can sometimes delve into those things that aren't going to make it in just a general review. When you do a quick Google search. It's going to get you to the nitty gritty of the real experience, the good and the bad, so they know what to
expect. Right. And I think the other thing too is instead of just reading it, and I get people like to see that. I like to skim things too and make lists and things like that. But when you're telling these stories and telling these experiences, and here's what you need to do differently, I think the story is so much part of it. But then the inflection that you have in your voice and, you know, that kind of thing that you can have these share and that passion, right, that you can really share. And we have said this so many times. this stuff is recorded like for our kids and our grandkids and these experiences because we enjoy hearing those experiences from like his dad or you know people who are good storytellers and things like that so those things are recorded but I think that is a big part of it for people who listen to podcasts who are into podcasts who want that advice you get a lot more emotion from it than just reading a blog post.
And you are making an impact on the audience because you all were recently a finalist for the Travel Podcast Award at right? TBEX, Congrats on that. That's huge. Thank you. Thank you.
that was exciting. Yeah, I mean, we've only been doing this for a year now. And so it was really an honor to kind of be in the same grouping as like Chris Christensen, the traveler, right? Who's been doing this since 2005, has millions of downloads. So it's an honor to be considered in that same group. And you guys know this
guys know this too, because y'all have been doing this for a while and, you know, people will ask you questions and come to you. And it's really neat when people do start coming to you or saying, oh, I saw that you posted this or I listened to your podcast episode and we took your advice and we changed something about our trip. And we hope that it makes that better, you know, because we have done things like in the Lafayette Coast, for example, we decided to use points and stay in Naples instead of taking Rick Steve's advice and staying in Sorrento. So I think that's what we hope to just be able to help people. We like to say, help people travel more and better. And
oh, by the way, take Rick Steves advice. He was right.
Sometimes you have to learn it on your own. Yeah. Well, your podcast covers so much. You guys have interviews, you have destinations, you have different topics that you talk about. But what is something special that your audience can expect from you and receive from your podcast? What sets your podcast apart from other travel podcasts? We talked a little bit about
a little bit about it, but it's just our authentic experiences. And if we like something, we're going to tell you we like it. If we don't, we're going to say we would have done it differently. And so you can expect that from us. But then also, we're going to take you to some off-the-beaten-path places. The example being Aruba is we didn't go there to just hang out at the beach, right? We wanted to find out what does Aruba have to offer other than just nice sandy beaches? It does have a lot, but most people don't find that because they never travel outside that little hotel zone.
Yeah. So I just think the local experiences, because we really do try to seek those out. And then also, of course, those stories, but then learning from local people. And then we just like to share those stories. And what would you say top
say top three episodes that new listeners should listen to first?
Well, the most popular ones are always about the Caribbean. So our most popular and downloaded episodes are about St. John and Aruba and now the Amalfi Coast. So I would say that those three very popular destinations. But then I would say some other ones are how to create or it's about creating a travel bucket list. It's about packing. I think the way that you pack makes your trip more enjoyable. If you literally have all this stuff, it's just miserable to get it there. And people talk about baggage fees and we still end up taking too much stuff, right? So packing more efficiently. So we have quite a few episodes that are really just tactical about traveling, which I think that's a skill too. And I don't think we realize that. I had a post recently and somebody said, oh, well, get out of practice or people who don't travel much, they take too much stuff because they don't have practice. But we found that after the pandemic, like our first after the pandemic, we're like, what is wrong with us?
I forgot one of those converters when I went to Greece and it was my first international after the pandemic.
Yeah. And so I think, I mean, I think that's true. So I think just trying to learn as much as you can. I think that's why we've put those episodes is because there are practical things, right? There's these enjoyable and there's a lot that goes into it, but you have to have those practical things too. Oh, and we have one about jet lag. I'm not sure if I mentioned that because I think jet lag is a big thing. So we sort of have a process that we do. So we have an episode about jet lag that I think is very helpful. I would say start with
say start with the travel bucket list because that really tells you where were we at when we started this. It was our very first episode. So it kind of gives you that mindset of where we were when we said we're going to go and do this podcast.
And I would say if people are interested in traveling to Europe, we do have a lot of episodes about Europe. So that would be helpful. The Mediterranean cruise, that six week trip, Italy, Ireland, Scotland, France.
We have one on Paris that we just did recently because we had a lot of people saying, hey, we're going to go to Paris, you know, either after the Olympics or for the Olympics. And we're like, well, we've never spent a lot of time there, but we can tell you a one to two-day itinerary of here's the highlights of what you should head while you're there.
Yeah. And then the other part of that, I'm not sure which episode, I think it's in like the Mediterranean cruise, one of the six week cruise. So we have been to the coast. So Marseille, Aix-en-Provence, Nice, Monaco, that area.
Dang it. I'll be listening.
And as we're starting to wrap things up here, guys, tell our audience where they can find your show, travel resources, anything else you want to tease to our audience about you guys.
So podcast, you can basically find wherever you listen to podcasts. So just search for Sunshine Travelers podcast, Apple, Spotify, their stream on YouTube, not video, but just audio, but in anywhere else that there are podcasts. Our website is sunshinetravelers.com. The podcast is also there. You can listen to it, find travel resources, experience. So we actually have links for like every single tour that we've done. We usually book those like on Viator, but every tour that we've done, I try to link those just because we do talk about them and then just lots of other resources, things that we have found helpful over the years.
And that's Travelers with 1L. So if you've got anyone outside the U.S. that's listening, we've had to explain that a few times that we spell it with 1L.
Yes. And then Instagram and other social media, we are Sunshine Travelers Podcast with 1L.
Squatties, definitely go over to the website because you have put so much time and energy into creating resources. You have itineraries on there and I've been filming out your website quite a bit and it's super helpful. Yeah. Thank you
you for mentioning that. We do. We have put some itineraries out there, especially for the road trip ones. I mean, everything like from, you know, where we stayed and tours that we booked. And it's nice because Scott has organized them to where you can edit them for your information and then just have like a day by day for people who like that. Yeah. And
I would say join our mailing list because we put a lot of stuff for free to the people who are on our mailing list. And so a lot of those resources will distribute them through that way from time to time. You have a subscriber out of
a subscriber out of me. Yeah. And just go to the website and you get our free ultimate packing list when you subscribe. So you get a freebie right away. So that's just on the most of the pages on the website. I love
it. Well, we really appreciate having you guys on. It was a pleasure. And thank you for joining us today. Yeah. Thank
you so much for having us. It's always a pleasure to talk to you guys. You're welcome back anytime. Sounds great. It is always so fun for us to talk about travel with other people. And in this case, it was very fun being interviewed based on our experiences in the Caribbean by another travel podcast. We'd had the Travel Squad on our show in episode 65, where we talked to them about the dynamics of group travel. And they provided ideas on how to get that group trip out of the group chat. And they provided ideas on how to get that group trip out of the group chat.
And if you aren't looking to travel as far as the Caribbean this Florida has winter, some excellent options that will give you the Caribbean-like weather a little closer to home. Where is your favorite place that you like to escape the cold during winter? Send me an scott email, at sunshinetravelers.com, and let me know. We are always inspired by your travel stories.
