First time poster interested in living in the Caribbean for 3 to 6 months
 

Right so I'm a 24 year old student due to graduate in May but I feel I've only seen a very small portion of the world thus far so instead of going straight into full time employment I want to spread my wings a bit and travel/live abroad for a few months.

The first place that came to mind was somewhere in the Caribbean. Even though I have made this thread in the Barbados forum (it's more active than the caribbean forum) I'm open to all the Caribbean islands. (particularly Jamaica, Barbados, Bahamas, St Lucia)

The reason for me making this thread is because I am a total novice when it comes to travelling abroad for pro longed periods of time, so I don't have any clue on the whole process of things.

So what I want to know is...

What islands would you guys recommend for what I want to do?

What kinds of costs am I looking at?/Is living in the caribbean cheap?

Is getting a job in the caribbean hard?

What are the best options for accommodation?

What would I need to do in terms of getting a visa and stuff?

Any information you can provide in this thread would be greatly appreciated, thanks. :)

Re: First time poster interested in living in the Caribbean for 3 to 6 months
 

Hi Belvedere and welcome to the forum

You have asked a number of questions that have been covered in this forum extensively in other posts and have also asked very general questions..I would suggest you have a read through many of the previous posts and all your general questions should be answered ...if there is anything specific that we can help with then you will probably get a better response

Briefly however, you haven't identified what type of work you want to do, a visa to work in Caribbean is very difficult to get nowadays, cost of living all depends on what island you select and where on the island ..just like the UK, you cannot get a visa to work unless you are employed by a company that sponsor your job and this can take a long time and unless you have a skill that is not easily available on your chosen island then the company will not be allowed to employ you. When you review previous posts you will see many people with long careers and multiple skill sets that are struggling to identify work opportunities...please note that as this is the Barbados forum then most feedback will be based on this island however I would say its probably the most difficult of the islands to be on long term ...good luck and enjoy reading through the multitude of posts and threads related to your questions

Dips

Re: First time poster interested in living in the Caribbean for 3 to 6 months
 

Benson: if you don't have any professional experience you might be best setting your sights on working as a bartender or similar. If you are a qualified PADI diver, then you could apply to scuba operators in pretty much any of the islands. I really wouldn't fuss too much about which island you choose - just GO!

I live on Grand Cayman (see below), but I'm not going to urge you to come here instead of any of the others. One's as good as the next, for your purposes. Nor should you worry about wage-rates: they will always be commensurate with the cost of living. For accommodation, you would share, of course.

Re: First time poster interested in living in the Caribbean for 3 to 6 months
 

Actually after reading Gordon's point I see your post a little differently if what you want to experience is some of the world then why not look at going to the Caribbean for 3 months on a visitors visa and having enough cash to see you through that period...that would be a different question all together as to costs etc....

Re: First time poster interested in living in the Caribbean for 3 to 6 months
 

Yeah I think that would be more beneficial to what I want to do, what exactly is a visitors visa and what does it entitle me to?

@Gordon thanks for your input, I just looked into Grand Cayman, it looks beautiful. Definitely somewhere I could see myself staying for a bit, what are the locals like?

Re: First time poster interested in living in the Caribbean for 3 to 6 months
 

My personal blog contains quite a lot of incidental information about Cayman - though no photos. However, mine is just one blog among many that cover the Caribbean. I suggest you check out as many blogs as you can about islands with tourism industries - Barbados, BVI, St Vincent, St Lucia, Jamaica, Bahamas, etc. (Bahamas is not in the Caribbean, but it's close by - and might even be the best choice for you, since the country has many islands.)

As long as you have an air-ticket out, visas aren't usually required.

Re: First time poster interested in living in the Caribbean for 3 to 6 months
 

Maybe if you were more specific on what you would want from your visit we could suggest which island might be best to try first..to be honest I was in Cayman a few months back and was shocked at how expensive everything was even compared to Barbados which everyone thinks is expensive...all the islands are different with some being more built up than others some having rain forests and hilly ground and others being flat, Barbados is a party island but then again visit St Lucia for the month of May and the Jazz festival brings big names performing in the past like R Kelly, Earth Wind and Fire and many other.

A visitors visa is not applied for in advance basically you will get a period of time you can stay at the airport and then apply for extensions (this they call a visitors visa in Barbados (Bim as its sometimes known as)..my advice would be to have a ticket that is no longer than 3 months as otherwise this will raise a lot of questions..if you got to extend then you can always change your flights accordingly (keep it in mind to buy a ticket that has minimum change fees if you decide to do this)