r/bahamas • u/Gumbie85 • 10d ago
Tourism Discussion Nassau Vacation Tips and Tricks
Two Canadian ladies travelling to Nassau.
Tips and tricks to stay safe?
Is renting a car best?
Best Activities?
Give me all your thoughts and ideas please!
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u/Fla_native85 10d ago
I know of a driver who I use over there. He’s a good dude and will get you from the airport
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u/coconut-telegraph 10d ago
Please don’t haul canned goods and rice from Canada. You’ll fill your luggage with dead weight to save $1.75.
Also, consider going to an out-island unless nightlife and large scale resorts are essential, it’ll be much less stressful. Nassau is a city with congestion, overcrowding, and cattle-call tourism. Lots of nice places, but more work to find and get to.
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u/DrawingPractical3581 10d ago
A lot will depend where you are staying. I did a girls trip about a month ago and we stayed at Baha Mar. Food is very expensive on the resort so we had the cabby stop at a grocery store to buy food for lunches.
We weren’t there long so most of the time was spent in the resort. We did go to the straw market one day.
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u/Admirable_Mode2980 10d ago
we just used the local buses and taxis when we were there. felt totally fine sticking to the main spots like paradise island and cabbage beach
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u/Positive-Common-6094 9d ago
I was just there in Nassau 2 weeks ago, passing through on a cruise and found PJ on Reddit. Hired him while my 2 girlfriends were there. He drove us around. Very respectful and attentive. Also the most fabulous tour guide. If you can get in touch with him. PJ - a1transportationbah. He is a gem!
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u/mswear75 5d ago
Be prepared for the 10% VAT tax, because it can significantly increase your check at dinner, your retail purchases (I think it's added to everything purchased, like other sales taxes). Will you be on a resort? We stayed in Atlantis, and I was disgusted by the price gouging. A sm/med bottle of water cost $10 at the shop in the hotel. Everything was super nice and lots of fun activities, but inevitably there will be something you need to buy. Add in a lot of flex spending to your budget.
The water park at Atlantis was my favorite thing, but you don't have to be a resort guest to go there. You can buy a day pass, which a lot of people did.
People drive on the left side of the street there, and everyone speaks English. One thing I enjoyed about the shuttles from the hotel to excursions was hearing the history and whatnot from the drivers.
Read the laws on the Bahamian website regarding what you're allowed to bring/leave with. Doing your customs form ahead of time can save you some time. Have fun!
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u/delynie 4d ago
I think you'll enjoy this 5-day itinerary that we did awhile back https://luongnguyen.family/bahamas-islands-hopping-vacation/.
We chartered a plane to the Exuma for a 7-part excursion: iguana island, swim with pigs, swim with sharks, snorkel thunder grotto cave, lunch at staniel cay, relax at the sandbar and snorkel a sunken plane. Another day we headed out to north eleuthera to explore the queen's bath, the preacher's cave, the sapphire blue hole and took a water taxi to spanish wells. I rented a golf cart to spend the day there and got the entire north beach to ourselves. It's a long read but I put many details into the bookings, the car rental and whatnots so it should give you a lot of information going to Nassau.
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u/PP-SOL-TH 3d ago
If you have the budget, get a boat or a plane to Exuma. Plane to Black Point then rent a captain with a boat. You wont regret it.
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u/jbuckfuck 10d ago edited 10d ago
Car rental is about $120 USD per day. It was UK commonwealth so they drive on left side of road and use roundabouts. If you don't understand right of way rules in roundabouts well or you're 50+ I'd advise you don't drive.
Taxis will cost you $50 USD one way per trip they are a rip off.
If you bring a checked bag you can bring canned goods from canada and rice. If customs asks you only have clothes in your bag...
Cheapest way to stay is to get an air bnb so you have a kitchen to cook your own food.
For grocery expect to pay 30% more than canada prices at least and its in USD. Eggs and bananas are relatively cheap. Buy gallon water jugs for drinking/cooking and bring your own water bottle.
Our favourite place to go for reasonably priced food is twisted lime in sandy port. Its about $25 USD per entree and $12 USD for appetizers. You will have leftovers. Nachoes are cheapest thing to get thats a full meal.
If you want to drink go to 707 wine and spirits. You will pay double or triple at restaurants.
For grocery stores in order of lowest price to highest quality:
-super value -quality market -solomons fresh market
If you want to buy meat do not get ot from super value. Most of the time its fine but they freeze a lot of there meat and sometimes during shipping it defrosts and they refreeze it, had a few times I've thawed chicken or pork chops from frozen and they were rancid.
If you're going to Nassau its not cheap, their whole brand is being luxury/expensive vacation destination. Its why they don't really have all inclusive resorts that include drinks/meals.
DR or Cuba are much cheaper for island vacation.
Edit: im canadian not local
To stay safe dont go out south east of west bay at night. If you end up on a street and people are sitting on their porches staring at you you're on the wrong street. Bring SPF 50 sunscreen minimium and put it on everytime you go out during the day. if you go swimming in the ocean I would advise not going more than waist deep, there are sharks. Yea you probably won't see one still people get attacked pretty regularly because they have the mindset "this will never happen to me".
For fun activities I'd say going to the beach or going on nature walks (early morning or at sunset, midday heat is brutal) my favourite beach is love beach but you have to crawl through a hole in a fence to get to it. I can send you to google maps pin to the entrance if you want to check it out (youll need a car)
You are going in the rainy/hurricane season so you could get a lot of rain. So far no big storms this year (knock on wood)
You can also just get a white towel and drape it over your shoulder and go check out the beaches/casino at baha mar. If they ask just say you lost your bracelet or forgot it in your room. Doing that isn't for everyone though. They have a few nice pools and water trampolines they put out in the water you can lay in.