Nassau cruise port guide

Nassau, The Bahamas · from NassauThings, the offline iPhone guide

Where ships dock

All-aboard is in ship time. Check the daily programme and be back at the gangway 30 minutes early.

Top places near the pier

Walking times come from the app: straight-line distance plus 30% for streets, at an easy 4.5 km/h. Places further than an hour on foot show the distance instead.

1. Pirate Republic Brewing Company

   2 min walk · Bars & Nightlife

   Nassau's craft brewery taproom on Woodes Rogers Walk, a block from the cruise port, with the local beers on tap and the pirate story on the walls.

2. Junkanoo Museum at Nassau Cruise Port

   3 min walk · Museums & Culture

   A museum inside the cruise terminal devoted to Junkanoo, the Bahamas' Boxing Day and New Year's street parade: towering crepe-paper costumes, goatskin drums, cowbells and the story of how the festival grew from the days of slavery into the…

3. 

   Nassau Straw Market

   3 min walk · Markets & Fish Fry

   The covered craft market on Bay Street: hundreds of stalls of straw bags, hats and baskets, wood carvings, shell jewellery and T-shirts.

4. Athena Café

   3 min walk · Restaurants

   A Greek-Bahamian family restaurant upstairs on the corner of Bay and Charlotte Streets since 1960, with a balcony over the Bay Street crowds.

5. 

   Pompey Museum of Slavery & Emancipation

   4 min walk · Museums & Culture

   In the 1769 Vendue House on Bay Street, where enslaved people were once sold, a small, powerful museum on slavery in the Bahamas and the road to emancipation in 1834.

6. Señor Frog's Nassau

   4 min walk · Bars & Nightlife

   The big, loud party restaurant on the waterfront beside the cruise port: margaritas in yard glasses, music and a view of the ships.

7. 

   Rawson Square

   5 min walk · Forts & Landmarks

   The small square at the head of Prince George Wharf, the first thing you walk into off the ship, with the bust of Sir Milo Butler, the first Bahamian Governor-General.

8. 

   Parliament Square

   5 min walk · Forts & Landmarks

   Three pink colonial buildings around a statue of a seated Queen Victoria: the House of Assembly, the Senate and the old Colonial Secretary's office, used since the early 1800s.

9. 

   Bay Street

   5 min walk · Shopping & Souvenirs

   Nassau's main street, running along the harbour from the British Colonial hotel to the Paradise Island bridges: duty-free jewellers and watch shops, liquor stores, cigar shops, souvenir stalls, restaurants with balconies and the Straw…

10. 

    Christ Church Cathedral

    6 min walk · Forts & Landmarks

    Nassau's Anglican cathedral, built in 1837 on the site of the town's first church (1670), with a tall stained-glass east window and memorials to the colony's governors and sailors.

11. 

    Pirates of Nassau Museum

    6 min walk · Museums & Culture

    A walk-through museum on the pirates who ran Nassau as their republic in the early 1700s — Blackbeard, Anne Bonny, Mary Read, Calico Jack — with a full-size replica of the sloop Revenge, a recreated harbour-front tavern and the governor…

12. Café Matisse

    7 min walk · Restaurants

    An Italian restaurant in a 19th-century house behind Parliament Square, with a shaded courtyard garden — the calm lunch downtown.

13. 

    Nassau Public Library

    7 min walk · Forts & Landmarks

    An octagonal pink building on Shirley Street that was built around 1797 as the town jail; the cells are now full of books.

14. 

    Government House

    9 min walk · Forts & Landmarks

    The pink-and-white Georgian mansion on Mount Fitzwilliam, official residence of the Governor-General since 1806, with a statue of Christopher Columbus on the steps facing the harbour.

15. 

    National Art Gallery of The Bahamas

    12 min walk · Museums & Culture

    The national collection of Bahamian art in Villa Doyle, a restored 1860s mansion on West Hill Street: Amos Ferguson's folk paintings, Brent Malone's Junkanoo canvases and the contemporary artists who show at the biennial.

Ready-made port days in NassauThings

Each is a timed plan in the app, starting and ending at the ship (23 in all for this port).

• Downtown on Foot
  Junkanoo, Parliament, pirates, rum and the Queen's Staircase — all within 15 minutes of the ship
• Three Forts & the Fish Fry
  Fort Fincastle, Fort Charlotte, conch salad at Arawak Cay and the marching flamingos
• Paradise Island by Water Taxi
  Across the harbour to Cabbage Beach, Marina Village and the Cloisters
• Cable Beach by Jitney
  Three miles of sand for $1.50 each way, and conch fritters on the way home
• Atlantis Day Pass
  Aquaventure's slides, the marine habitats and Cabbage Beach — timed to beat the queues
• Blue Lagoon Island
  A private cay by boat: hammocks, kayaks and the dolphin encounters

Getting around: what the app tells you

Paradise Island by water, not by bridge

The water taxi from the end of Prince George Wharf crosses the harbour to Paradise Island in about 15 minutes, with the best view of the ships and Nassau's waterfront. Fares vary by operator — agree the price for the round trip before you board, and note the last return sailing.

Agree the fare — and ask 'per person or per car?'

Nassau taxi fares are fixed by zone, not metered, and the posted rates are for two people. Ask for the total for your group before you get in, and whether the Paradise Island bridge toll is included. For a half-day tour, agree the price, the stops and the return time up front.

Get NassauThings for iPhone

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Coming soon to the App Store · About NassauThings