I would not recommend this company to anyone! Think about it, you have ONE DAY in port and you have tons of tour operators that will bend over backwards to make YOUR DAY as perfect and special as they can. This character not only ruined our day but lied (and continues to lie) about it.
"Andy" the owner of Antigua Reef Riders/WCT...has 5 inflatable's. The guide drives one, so there is room for 4 couples per excursion. According to their website, the morning excursion is from 9 to 12 and the afternoon is 12:30 to 3:30.
We paid our deposit and we were confirmed months before our cruise (for the morning) and then JUST before our cruise, Andy RECONFIRMED us for the morning excursion (since the afternoon was too late for our cruise.)
Imagine the surprise and disappointment that we had, after getting out of the cab with another couple from our ship (30 minute drive) and this character says "You're not scheduled this morning".
What upset me most was the way he lied about EVERYTHING. He said "I sent you an email telling you that your morning tour was changed to the afternoon, you must have gotten that". Well he sent it 3 days before. I explained we were on the cruise ship for 8 days by now and we did not have wifi access and he responded that is "Wasn't up to him to know how long we were on the cruise ship, he didn't pay attention to their schedules"...YET he reconfirmed us 2 DAYS before we left on the cruise because he knew we were leaving?!
He also said it was the fault of the cruise line for changing their time in port (which they didn't) and that he had three other couples that had booked before us and it was our problem because our ship changed its time in port (he said this 3 or 4 times.)
Well...he lied about all of that! Not only did our ship NOT change port times, the 3 other couples (who booked together) were FROM OUR ship AND they only decided to book AFTER we were confirmed and I posted information about this company on Cruise Critic. (never expecting he would overbook and bump us.)
I understand WHY he bumped us, the party of 3 couples booked all day excursions (more money). BUT Andy needed to cancel us BEFORE we left on our cruise (they BOOKED before we all left on the cruise as well.) I guess we were backup in case they cancelled?
I have to laugh at his assertion that we were being unreasonable about not wanting to cart our snorkel gear to the beach and sit and wait from 9am till 12:30pm for his afternoon session and miss our cruise ship leaving I might add. We live near the beach in Florida, if I had wanted to spend 3+ hours on the beach in Antigua before another 3 hour excursion, I would have set up an excursion for that...WE were so looking forward to snorkeling and riding out to the reef etc.
I do have a suggestion for Andy (though he doesn't deserve it) NEXT time, why not RENT a jet ski for the guide and that would free up an inflatable for the overbooked couple. I know it is MORE work on your end, but it just might save the day for an unsuspecting couple who is counting on YOU to make their vacation day special.
The best part of the day was that night on the cruise ship, where everyone got to tell everyone ELSE what a great day they had and how wonderful their particular tour was. As you can understand, we felt even worse about how ours didn't work out at all.
