POST 27 – CRUISE CONCLUSION: DAYS 37-38 (23-24 January 2026): OUR CRUISE “BEST & WORST” and SPECIAL POST “THE CARIBBEAN INDIGENOUS”.

This is the final post of our cruise and a special one since it features two things:

The Best & Worst experiences of our cruise with all 11 countries and 9 territories ranked for you.

A short explanation of the indigenous ethnic peoples that occupied these beautiful Caribbean islands before Europe came along.

 CRUISE BEST & WORST

Bundy (Nicholas Thomas Drinias) and Yiannis (John Golfin) achieved the following on their 32-day Cruise of the Caribbean from 23 December 2025 to 24 January 2026:

·          Visited 11 UN Countries.

·          Visited 9 Territories.

·          Hired 20 different cars, half right-hand drive, half left-hand drive, half driving right, half driving left.

·          Made a total of 24 ship disembarkations with Yiannis being first off ship and on land in 23 landings.

Here is our ranking of all the islands we visited and the reasons why:

Here are the Best & Worst experiences of our cruise:

SPECIAL POST: THE CARIBBEAN INDIGENOUS.

Ever wonder who occupied the Caribbean Islands before the Europeans came along ? Who were they ? Where did they come from and What did they look like ?

The Caribbean was originally home to various indigenous cultures and ethnicities, many of which migrated from South America between 5,000 and 2,500 years ago.

 

The four main cultures that existed before European contact were: The Taíno, The Kalinago (Caribs), The Arawak (Lokono) and Ciboney.

 

It is the Kalinago that dominated and survived in the largest numbers until today, mainly by intermarriage with the colonial Europeans. The modern term  “Caribbean” is derived from the Kalinago nickname “Carib”.

 

The key characteristics/differences between the four main cultures of the Caribbean are summarised in the table below:

Today, descendants of these groups continue to live across the region, with the Kalinago Territory in Dominica serving as the only remaining reserved indigenous territory in the islands. Cultural revitalization movements for the Taíno are also active in Puerto Rico, Cuba, and the Dominican Republic. Here is what they look like:

We hope you enjoyed every second of our Caribbean Cruise as much as we did. We arrived back into Miami at 7am on Sat 24 January 2026. Disembarkation was very fast with no issues. We cabbed it back to our original apartment because we had no internet for Uber. We made it into our building using the buildings internet and were met by my brother Nick at 9am. Patsie joined us soon after and we enjoyed a nice coffee and croissant nearby. Afterwards we walked along the waterfront and spent the rest of the day swimming on Miami Beach. Tonight, we planned to attend happy hour drinks and watch a drag show at “The Palace Hotel” whose caption is “Every Queen deserves a Place”…

 

Tomorrow, we fly to Havana, CUBA for a 15-day tour of the entire island. See you there in our next post !!!

END OF LAST CRUISE POST