A part of cruising is also to visit places like West and East Carribean, Hawii which are famous for their nice and world class beaches and historical places. You can either opt to take Shore Excursions arranged by the Cruise line for a good price or plan your itinaray by researching which can save a lot of money compared the earlier option.

Carnival Ecstasy goes to famous ports Cozumel and Progreso. Many times, lot of cruise lines have schedules which can take 7 ports on 7 days, a port a day. That would be hectic but you can still have fun if you plan it out. You better do your own research about the places your cruise is going to take and plan your day around it.

The only downside of arranging your own plan is that you will only have 8 hours to do anything, you gotta plan in such a way that you return back to catch your cruise on time.Cruise own wait for you. If you went with cruise arranged excursions, they will wait for the group to come back.

We visited 2 ports Cozumel and Progress on Carnival Ecstasy. I planned my 2 days in advance and it worked well. The Carnival Shore Excursions were not recommended by many veteran cruises for lot of reasons. They are expensive, crowded, time limitations and you can't spend time alone. Thats why I choose to do my own. For you benefit, here the Excurions Price list for Carnival Ecstasy for Cozumel and Progreso.

Let me share my plan. First Port Cozumel, (Cozumel Map) we decided to check out beautiful beachs so we choose the beach which is recommended by many cruisers, Paradise Beach. We spent the whole day relaxing, playing some fun games like volley ball, tree climing, taking beach rides and experiencing the thrill of our life time. We went Kayaking together (all 3 of us with my toddler son). We also tried Water Jet Skiing and had a blast. Food and Service was great. I would strongly recommend checking out beaches which are not public. You can also take snorkling, Scuba diving by paying them seperately from this beach.

Here are some useful flyers and pamphlets for Parks and Fun places which collected that might help your trip.

Cozumel Cozumel Chankanaab Park Cozumel Wonders Cozumel Playmia

Progreso(Progreso map) is our 2nd port. We didn't have concrete plan but I do wanted to visit a ruin historic place. We just went to town, took town tour which wasn't that great as we expected. Then we took a cab for $40 roundtrip to a near by ruin called Dzibilchaltun. It was hot when we reached there. We just check out some old temples and got back in town again. Had our lunch and had cooling Tender coconut for $2 which I strongly recommend. We took the bus and boarded the ship back on time.

Progreso Dzibilchaltun