If you've always dreamed of a Caribbean vacation, it's time to stop snoozing and pick up the phone.

Some island resorts are cutting rates as much as 35 percent for the peak winter season, December through April. Seven-night cruises have been advertised as low as $399. Next month, giant Pleasant Holidays, best known for its budget package tours to Hawaii, will storm the beaches of the Caribbean for the first time, armed with six-day air-hotel combos from about $700 per person.

"It's a buyer's market," says Peter C. Yesawich, president of Yesawich, Pepperdine, Brown & Russell, a marketing firm based in Orlando, Fla.

Caribbean resorts still aren't going for a song, especially during the heavily booked holidays. One East Coast hotel executive told me he began trying in August to trade a ski week in Park City, Utah, for a Christmas-season timeshare in the Caribbean. He recently threw in the towel. "It was locked up," he reports.

Holidays aside, Caribbean hotels are discounting for the first time in peak season, says Richard Kahn, spokesman for the Barbados-based Caribbean Tourism Organization. In the past, he says, "you just didn't find discounts after mid-December." The rate-cutting stems from a decline in visitors. Kahn expects the region to finish the year with 6 percent to 9 percent fewer tourists than in 2001.

Chalk that decline up to money woes and fears about foreign lands. The shaky U.S. economy is discouraging big-ticket trips. Worried about security, Americans are still reluctant to stray far from home. (The decrease in American visitors to the U.S. Virgin Islands has been less than to the Cayman Islands, Jamaica and several other foreign territories in the region.) Crime and security are issues on some islands, concerns that two cruise lines cited when they stopped docking at St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

The Caribbean, with its sybaritic beach resorts, crystal-clear diving venues and exotic cultures, remains popular none-theless. It ranks third, behind Europe and Australia, as the international destination that Americans would most like to visit, according to surveys by Yesawich's company and Yan-kelovich Partners.

Here are some tips for seeing the region this winter without plundering your bank account:

* Timing is everything: If you want bargains, don't travel during Christmas season, Presi-dents Day weekend, spring break and other holidays.

Typically, the cheapest winter deals in the Caribbean are for departures in the first half of January, after New Year's Day. Act quickly on these deals; the booking deadline for some has already passed. (In fall, when hurricanes are common, rates are usually even cheaper.)

Try to schedule trip departures for a Tuesday or Wednesday to get the lowest prices, advises Alice Harmon, an agent with Travel Travel in Irvine, Calif.

* Get on board: Caribbean cruises are discounted even more deeply than resorts.

The main reason for the low fares, Yesawich says, is "an unprecedented oversupply of cruise cabins," which grew in numbers by 40 percent from 1999 to 2001 as companies rushed ships off the assembly line. The glut is especially large in the Caribbean, where many cruise lines station ships in winter, as opposed to Los Angeles-to-Mexico routes, where a few lines dominate.

Recent offerings include a three-night Bahamas cruise on Norwegian Cruise Line, departing Feb. 7 from Miami and starting at $279 per person (from the Carlson Wagonlit travel agency), and a seven-night western Caribbean cruise from several U.S. ports on Royal Caribbean starting at $499. Air is extra. (These deals may no longer be available.)

* Book air-and-hotel packages: Airfares to the Caribbean have tended to be high. A way around this problem is to go on a package that combines air and hotel. Many such packages are available.

Pleasant Holidays, which is reserving now for trips starting Jan. 1 and later, recently advertised six-day Jamaica packages starting at $709 per person for air and hotel. Its Caribbean packages with all-inclusive chain resorts such as Sandals and SuperClubs start at about $1,000. Funjet Vacations and Apple Vacations are among other discounters with good deals.

* Shop around: "Don't accept the first thing you see," Yesawich advises, because prices are volatile. Consider using a travel agent. Although the Internet can be useful, it's helpful to have a human handle packages.

Jane Engle is a reporter for the Los Angeles Times, a Tribune Publishing newspaper.