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Martha Brae is a scenic river just outside Falmouth, Jamaica. The section you can raft runs for about three miles and runs through mainly wooded areas as it winds its way north west. Tours will drop you at the Marth Brae Rafting Village and take about ten minutes from the cruise port.
PRE-RAFTING
If booked as a cruise excursion, the mini-buses will pick you up from the car park within the security enclosed port compound. The signs for the excursions are all prominently displayed and are broken into numbered groups; making it easy to find your tour guide. The minibus will take around ten to fifteen minutes to drive out of the port area and up into the hills to the Martha Brae Rafting Village.
Here you can enjoy your welcome drink which is a fruit punch (you can add rum to it for an extra charge) and enjoy the peaceful gardens. These include a herb garden which purports to contain marijuana amongst other herbs and spices. Once your trip is ready to begin you will be given a buoyancy aid, whilst mandatory to take onto the raft, there was no requirement to wear it, and directed to the embarkation point.
Here each group of two people is assigned the next raft available and you will begin your tour.
THE RAFT
The rafts themselves are made almost entirely from Bamboo, lashed together with metal wire. They are around 30 feet (9m) long and a raised platform holds a seat for two about three-quarters of the way back. Cushions are provided for you to sit on and the raft was very stable, from getting onboard to all the way downstream.
The raft captain uses another long piece of bamboo to control the direction of the raft as well as to ensure it makes adequate progress down the river. They will also point out interesting features and provide information about the area. This, of course, is completely dependent on which raft captain you end up being assigned.
The rafts themselves are made by groups of raft captains who each help the others out when their raft is at the end of its life. We were surprised to find out that the rafts only last about 3-4 months before they have to be replaced.
THE RAFT RIDE
The raft is carried by the current but also punted by your raft captain, who makes sure you don’t run aground on some of the shallower parts of the river, hit the bank, or indeed, other rafts. Our raft captain overtook a couple of rafts on our tour, but we didn’t feel he was rushing, just making better use of the currents.
You then spend between an hour and an hour and a half enjoying the ride down the Martha Brae River, this is dependent on the flow of the river at the time. On our visit, the river was running quite fast due to a large amount of rain the night before. The peacefulness of the tour and just sitting back and enjoying the scenery, was excellent and our raft captain used the time to inform us of interesting parts of the river, tell us about Jamaica, but also leave us to just enjoy the ride. The balance was just right.
THE END OF THE RAFT RIDE
As you get to the end, your raft captain will show you some of the things they make in their spare time to supplement their income. For our raft captain, these were gourds which he had hollowed out, dried and then carved images onto. He demonstrated their strength by hitting one much harder than I would have risked! We purchased a small one that took our fancy as a souvenir of a memorable trip.
On the way back to the cruise terminal there is a brief stop at some shops for the obligatory souvenir shopping and the guide may point out some sights of Falmouth. Our attention was drawn to Usain Bolt’s school and the place where James Bond escaped by running across the backs of crocodiles in “Live and Let Die”.
As you reenter the secure area around the port, you’ll need your ship access cards as security will check that everyone is on a cruise ship before allowing them access to the port area.
HOW TO BOOK THE TOUR
This tour can be booked as an excursion through any cruise line that visits the area or book with your preferred tour provider such as Get Your Guide or Viator. As always, if you book through a third party, make sure you will be back in time to board the ship, it won’t wait for you.
For Royal Caribbean, from your reservations page on the website or through your Crown and Anchor account, you can goto to the excursions section and find this tour. You can enter the number of tickets you want to purchase and your tickets for the excursion will be in your stateroom when you board the ship.
WHAT TO BRING WITH YOU
There isn’t a lot of room on the raft for personal belongings, so you should bring as little as possible and leave backpacks and bigger bags on the minibus or back on the cruise ship.
Things to remember to bring are:
- Your ship access card and government-issued photo identification
- Water: The ride lasts over an hour and it can be very warm, so best to stay hydrated.
- Camera! You’re allowed to bring cameras and phones and there will be lots of opportunities for photos and videos.
- Insect repellent: The river is a natural home to bugs which might see you as lunch, so bug spray is worth bringing.
- Sturdy/grippy shoes to walk onto the raft, they are not flat and are often wet as the main body rides low in the water.
CHECK-IN
You need to arrive at your assigned meeting point within the port compound around 10-15 minutes before your tour is due to depart. Check your excursion tickets to identify the precise meeting point for your tour, once in the vicinity, all the tours are well signed and you should find “Martha Brae Rafting Tour” quite easily and be able to make contact with your guide.
WAS IT WORTH IT?
We feel this tour is a good value for what you get. It was well organised and the guides navigated their way around a problem with a tree that had fallen across the road well so that we would not miss out on our excursion.
Our raft captain was skillful and chatty, whilst also allowing us time to just enjoy the experience.
Have you done the Martha Brae Rafting excursion in Falmouth, Jamaica?
We’d love to hear about it. Tell us about it in the comments?
If you have any questions, or there is anything we haven’t covered, please feel free to leave us a comment and we will do our best to answer.
The map below shows all the tour stops described above in relation to the Falmouth cruise terminal.
Other Tour and Excursion Options for Your Day in Port in Falmouth, Jamaica.
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