The Barbarians will be touching in Nassau for one day on a cruise this August. If we do nothing there, it won’t be a loss; this is a relax-and-stay-mildly-drunk cruise, not a tourism one. Is there anything exceptional to see there that isn’t tourist traps, Chinese-made souvenirs or generic Caribbean sights? We have another day on a semi-private island that’s all beaches and surf, so we can skip that.
ETA: Any one who suggests we go see the hurricane can consider themselves slapped, right now.
If the kids like waterparks you can get a daypass to the Atlantis resort on Paradise Island. Unless your ship is in port for at least 8 hrs I wouldn’t bother though, it’s about an hour each way from the docks.
It is a tourist trap but it’s a fun one 
Senor Frogs and their Bucket of Beer.
In my opinion, Nassau is nothing but a beach & a tourist trap straw market. BTW, the straw market will open minutes before your ship arrives & will close the minute you leave.
Does the semi-private island have a name? Is it part of the Bahamas too?
Stay aboard ship. It’s cheaper and less annoying. Nassau is one of the few places on Earth that I never wish to see again. More crooks, swindlers and operators in a few square blocks than I have ever encountered anywhere else, and I grew up in Bridgeport.
I plan to have a bucket of beer near me at all times on board. The deck waiters quickly come to learn that I make unhappy faces if there isn’t at least one cold one deep in the ice, and work hard to keep me smiling. And dozing.
Yeah, I’m aware that the native markets open only when a ship docks. The one thing we do **not **cruise to do is shudder “shop.”
Great Stirrup Cay. As I understand it, the cruise lines bought it as a group and turned it into a beach day resort with a really, really enormous dock and shore-based tender services. So we can get in a Bahamas beach day without having to do it in a third-party tourist trap.
With a lack of anything to see - and I am mildly interested in the colonial/pirate era history of the region - we will probably just stroll off, have a snack somewhere and stroll back to my refilled bucket o’beer.
We cruised Hawaii and Europe as much to see things as to do the floating resort thing; this is an overdue vacation for resting up and relaxation and there are hardly any good choices of destination cruise out of the northeast anyway. A side jaunt to KSC in Florida is the only planned activity… especially now that Nassau promises so little.
Oh wait - I had one good thing happen at Nassau. I was able to buy some duty-free gin to refill my 1-litre water bottle. (The vermouth is in the mouthwash bottle; my only issue was with obtaining proper olives.) That alone shaved at least a hundred dollars off my bar tab.
I haven’t ever found DFS prices to be all that great, except in the sense that ultra-premium brands are down to only about 50% of what I’d never pay for them.
We’re usually exempt from onboard bottle restrictions, though, so I might consider some… dietary supplements if they’re really well priced.
One night in Nassau and the world’s your oyster.
Hah - is that the market beside Senor Frogs where every single booth has the same “Coach” and “Gucci” purses and the same “Rolex” watches?
Yeap. And some hand-woven straw crap made in China with a pseudo-Rastafarian slogan inexpertly “embroidered” on it.
Actually, I’ve been on the lookout for one of the high-quality Daytona knockoffs. Maybe that’s the place to find one.