Grand Bahama and Freeport Resorts: Lucaya Hotels, Celebration Key and Where to Stay

Early in the evening, music starts to drift across Count Basie Square in Port Lucaya, and the boats in the Bell Channel marina swing gently at their moorings while diners settle on the terraces. Grand Bahama has long been a resort island, with a stretch of hotels along its southern shore and a quieter, more rustic side at each end. For a traveler choosing where to sleep, the island offers a clear set of options, from Lucaya’s beachfront properties to a yacht harbor in the far west.

What resorts are there in Grand Bahama?

The island’s resort scene centers on Lucaya, where the Our Lucaya resort holds both The Radisson and Reef Village properties, and extends west to Old Bahama Bay Resort & Yacht Harbour at West End. A newer name, Celebration Key, sits on the south side of the island, but it is a day destination for Carnival guests and not a place to book a room.

Tourism is Lucaya’s primary industry, and it shows in the way the district is laid out: hotels, a marina, restaurants and shops all within one compact seaside suburb of Freeport. Tourism around Freeport draws more than a million visitors a year, and the island has been a vacation destination for decades. Hurricanes have taken their toll on that traffic since 2004, which is part of the story of the island today.

Our Lucaya: The Radisson and Reef Village

Our Lucaya is the name to know in Lucaya. The resort groups two properties under one banner, The Radisson and Reef Village, so the choice is really between two moods of stay under the same roof of ownership. Having two properties in one resort means you can look at what each offers in terms of setting and activities rather than treating them as a single block.

Lucaya is where most of the island’s hotels stand, along the southern shore facing the Northwest Providence Channel. That puts you close to the beaches the district is known for and within reach of Port Lucaya, where an evening out is a matter of wandering over to the square. It suits travelers who want a hotel base with restaurants, music and the water all close at hand.

Old Bahama Bay at West End

At the western tip of the island, the resort at West End was reopened in 2001 as Old Bahama Bay Resort & Yacht Harbour. The name tells you what kind of stay to expect: a harbor setting for those who arrive by boat, and a place far from the main hotel strip.

West End is also where Leo and Carol Moxie run shark fishing adventures, and they can be chartered for other fishing or snorkeling as well. They are described as great with kids, which makes the western end a reasonable base for families who want time on the water rather than a lively resort scene.

Celebration Key: a cruise day, not a hotel

Celebration Key is a Carnival destination on the south side of the island, and the only way to visit is on a Carnival cruise. It has a mile-long white sand beach and more than 30 dining and bar locations, including authentic local Bahamian flavors. If you are choosing a resort for an overnight stay, this is not it, but it explains some of the activity along the south coast.

Inside, the layout is divided by mood. Starfish Lagoon is made for families, while Calypso Lagoon is designed for adults, and Pearl Cove Beach Club is adults only. Lokono Cove shows Bahamian art, music, history and culture, with goods from local artisans.

Where are they?

Most Grand Bahama hotels are in Lucaya, the seaside suburb of Freeport on the island’s southern shore, with Old Bahama Bay out at West End and Celebration Key on the south side. Grand Bahama lies about 56 nautical miles east of Palm Beach, Florida, at its western end, and Freeport sits 67 miles off the same coast.

Freeport is the island’s main city and holds the commercial ship harbour and the main airport. It was established as a free trade zone on August 4, 1955, and covers a wide area, so the island feels spread out rather than packed into one town. Lucaya is a suburb of Freeport, and the surrounding area shapes how you move between your hotel, the airport and the marketplace.

Lucaya and Port Lucaya

Lucaya is the heart of the resort district, with beaches and hotels along the southern shore. Port Lucaya, within it, is the social center. Count Basie Square hosts live music most evenings, and the area is known as a spring break destination, so the mood there can be livelier at that time of year.

Port Lucaya Marketplace offers duty-free shopping in over 80 stores in 12 buildings overlooking the Bell Channel Bay marina. UNEXSO, also in Lucaya, is a dive charter operation that was the first destination dive charter business in the world. It has a dolphinarium and a variety of SCUBA diving charters, including shark feeding dives.

West End and the eastern settlements

West End is the westernmost town on the island, and Old Bahama Bay is its resort. At the opposite end, McLean’s Town is the easternmost settlement, within a 30-minute ferry ride of the neighboring island of Abaco. These two ends frame an island where the hotel concentration lies in the middle of the south coast.

Between the extremes, the evening scene has other corners. Bikini Bottom Bar in Williamstown has live music on Thursdays and Saturdays, and Tony Macaroni’s Conch Experience on Taino Beach has it on Wednesdays and alternate Sundays. A stay in Lucaya puts these within the same stretch of coast.

Getting to the island

Grand Bahama International Airport, code FPO, serves Freeport and receives domestic flights from various islands of the Bahamas and international flights from the United States and Canada. The island is in the Eastern Time Zone.

By sea, Freeport has an international ferry connection to Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale, operated by Baleària using the high-speed passenger catamaran HSC Jaume II. Lucaya itself lies roughly 105 miles east-northeast of Fort Lauderdale.

What is included?

What a Grand Bahama resort includes depends on the property, and the Bahamas Ministry of Tourism hotel search lets you filter by the amenities that matter: a casino, children’s activities, a golf course or a spa. It also offers a filter for Clean & Pristine Certified hotels and for a nightly rate range, so you can narrow the list to your own priorities.

Beyond the room, the real inclusions on Grand Bahama are what sits at your doorstep. In Lucaya that means beaches, a marina, duty-free shopping and evening music, all in one district. Many days will start at the resort and finish in Port Lucaya.

Around the resort in Lucaya

A Lucaya stay puts Port Lucaya Marketplace within easy reach, with its duty-free shopping in over 80 stores overlooking the marina. In the evening, Count Basie Square is the place for live music, and the waterfront restaurants fill with diners.

For active days, UNEXSO offers SCUBA diving charters and a dolphinarium, which makes it a draw for families and divers alike. The shark feeding dives are one of its signature offerings.

What Celebration Key includes

For Carnival guests, the day at Celebration Key starts at Paradise Plaza, the first portal, with guest information, live music and photo ops. From there the choices split by mood. Starfish Lagoon has the Flash Flamingo and Mach III Marlin waterslides, the Guppy Grotto splash pad, and sports courts for basketball, beach volleyball and pickleball.

Calypso Lagoon is for adults, with lagoon-side swim-up and swings bars and a DJ island. Pearl Cove Beach Club, for adults only, adds an infinity pool, a swim-up bar, elevated dining and attentive service poolside or beachside. Lokono Cove is where the local artisans and Bahamian culture come forward.

Nature beyond the resort

Lucayan National Park is the only place in the Bahamas where you can see all six of the island’s ecosystems. Access to its caves is seasonal because the caves are also used for bat conservation. Visitors are advised never to leave belongings unattended there, as thefts have been known to occur.

Peterson Cay National Park is accessible only by boat, and visitors are instructed to anchor in specific areas away from the coral reefs. Fishing, shelling, and damage to or removal of any coral is strictly prohibited, and so are garbage disposal and leaving ash coals or embers.

Good to know before you go

The U.S. State Department rates the Bahamas Level 2, “Exercise increased caution”, and says most crime occurs in Nassau on New Providence and in Freeport on Grand Bahama.

Grand Bahama has a hot, rainy season from May through October and a warm, dry season from November through April. Freeport’s summer highs average in the high 80s and winter highs in the low 80s. The hurricane season on the island runs from June through November, with the highest risk in August, September and October.

Roads are driven on the left and locals drive aggressively, so caution is advised for car, motorcycle and buggy rentals. Hurricane Dorian struck the island in early September 2019 as a Category 5 hurricane, and its effects are part of the island’s recent story.

Sources

Bahamas Ministry of Tourism, Hotels (https://www.bahamas.com/hotels), checked October 10, 2026
Wikipedia, Grand Bahama (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Bahama), checked October 10, 2026
Wikipedia, Freeport, Bahamas (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freeport,_Bahamas), checked October 10, 2026
Wikipedia, Lucaya (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucaya,_Bahamas), checked October 10, 2026
Wikivoyage, Grand Bahama travel guide (https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Grand_Bahama), checked October 10, 2026
Carnival Cruise Line, Celebration Key (https://www.carnival.com/celebration-key), checked October 10, 2026
U.S. Department of State, The Bahamas Travel Advisory, Level 2 (https://travel.state.gov/), checked October 10, 2026
NOAA National Hurricane Center, Climatology (https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/climo/), checked October 10, 2026