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Cruise activities

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  • Nov 22nd, 2014 2:49 pm
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mcewen wrote: I believe that if you book an excursion with a private company they will refund your money if the port is cancelled by the ship.

Don't believe the cruiselines when they tell you that "if you book private you will be on your own if something happens and you don't get back to the ship on time." That is just fear mongering, trying to make sure you book through them and overpay. These tour companies make their living providing tours to cruisers. A few bad reviews on Cruise Critic and they are toast. So getting back to the ship late... that just doesn't happen.
Yes, but the refund may take a while and require some effort. Also inclement weather they may still choose to proceed, you can cancel without penalty on cruiseline excursions or if simply didn't enjoy it.

I"m not saying the cruiselines are better necessarily or the private ones are substandard, just pointing out the differences.

As for getting back to the ship ontime, it is entirely true if you do a private excursion and do not make it back on time, the ship will leave. That is entirely true and should be believed. The supplemental information is that private excursions will try their best to get you back on time since their reputation is dependent on it..but that does not negate the first point..if they fail to do that..you are on your own.

I had such an experience in Belize... went with local to the mayan ruins, but the fuel pump gave out in the middle of nowhere going there, no cell coverage. the driver tried to bang fuel pump to fix it to no avail... eventually he managed to flag down a passing car (another private operator doing same excursion) and got us into that car instead..this was over 1.5hrs... now it turned out ok for us..but if it had happened on the way back or didn't find a passing car willing to stop... very well could've missed the boat
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mcewen wrote: Don't believe the cruiselines when they tell you that "if you book private you will be on your own if something happens and you don't get back to the ship on time." That is just fear mongering, trying to make sure you book through them and overpay. These tour companies make their living providing tours to cruisers. A few bad reviews on Cruise Critic and they are toast. So getting back to the ship late... that just doesn't happen.
mozerfd wrote: +1 for that

CruiseCritic seems to have a lot of pull, some ships even have a special meet & greet with the Captain of the ship and CC members. A lot of people go on there to discuss good/bad about the ships and excursions and activities.

Look up your ship's roll call -- a thread dedicated to that ship and itinerary, and you can find other people who are in the same boat (literally!) as you. A lot of people will arrange excursions and they might be looking for another X number of people to join them to get the best deal. You can opt to be the organizer for a group or join another group.
+1 to both of these.

My wife and I have just returned from a Mediterranean cruise, have done a lot of cruises, and rarely do we book the ship's excursions. In Europe almost all of our tours were arranged as private tours through the cruise critic roll calls. Tour companies were chosen based on reviews there and on TripAdvisor. As mcewen said, the cruise line will try to scare you out of booking privately but the reputations of these companies are such that they're not going to risk their livelihoods by missing the boat. It would be business suicide to screw up to that extent.

The private tours we did were six to eight people in air-conditioned Mercedes vans with competent English-speaking guides and were all WAY better than being herded on and off buses with forty to fifty other people all over the place. An extra bonus was being able to go places in a van that buses couldn't get to and having the flexibility to alter the itinerary based on a majority vote of a handful of people. THAT isn't happening on a ship excursion. Add to all of this that the premium you pay for ship excursions for the "security" of knowing you'll get back to the ship before it sails away is saved for better things while on tour.
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mcewen wrote: CC has a lot of censorship going on. Tonnes of stuff you can't talk about. Can't discuss travel deals.... certain topics are off limits - one guy was asking a question once about "lifestyle cruises" and the thread got deleted. It was actually an entertaining thread that was full of information and the topic was discussed without immaturity or flaming. I made a comment about the censorship and how someone should start their own Cruise Website where people can talk about whatever they wanted.... ended up getting banned.. then commuted to a suspension.

Ultimately though... the website is great for some information... but there is a lot of stuff you can't talk about. You aren't even permitted to exchange contact information with other uses so you can communicate off board using FB or email.... A while ago I made a thread on rfd so people looking for deals and info can communicate with each other without the censorship hammer ... official-cruise-critic-contact-info-exc ... d-1420321/
There is not a lot of censorship going. It's similar to most forums. If you are a tour op, you cannot go and advertise yourself. Just like RFD, they don't like people advertising of the competitor (of RFD, or CC respectively). They don't have PM, so if you want to exchange email or info with someone, you'd have to do that in public, so that's a drawback. But if you act respectably, you'll be fine. It's actually a lot worse in RFD where there are a lot of rudeness, put downs, near swearing going on. I'm on CC as I love cruising and join in a lot of cruise discussions.

As for people worrying about missing port and may lose money, most of the tour ops would not charge you if you miss port. Most of them collect from you when you are in port, so that's ok. If they want a deposit first, I always ask, and if a tour op would charge, I don't book with them. It's that simple.

We were going to Costa Maya. The ship excursion would charge twice what I'd get from private op, for scuba diving. It's a no brainer to book privately there. We went to Belize, and booked the private tour for zipline and cave-tubing, for $60/p including lunch. The ship would charge that, no lunch, and no zipline. Reading the reviews there were a lot more complaints about the ship's excursion, while the reviews for the private tour op we went on were almost all excellent. Examples like this just go on and on. We've been on many cruise and went on many private excursions, and have not "missed the boat".
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Arrgh wrote: There is not a lot of censorship going. It's similar to most forums. If you are a tour op, you cannot go and advertise yourself. Just like RFD, they don't like people advertising of the competitor (of RFD, or CC respectively). They don't have PM, so if you want to exchange email or info with someone, you'd have to do that in public, so that's a drawback. But if you act respectably, you'll be fine. It's actually a lot worse in RFD where there are a lot of rudeness, put downs, near swearing going on. I'm on CC as I love cruising and join in a lot of cruise discussions.

As for people worrying about missing port and may lose money, most of the tour ops would not charge you if you miss port. Most of them collect from you when you are in port, so that's ok. If they want a deposit first, I always ask, and if a tour op would charge, I don't book with them. It's that simple.

We were going to Costa Maya. The ship excursion would charge twice what I'd get from private op, for scuba diving. It's a no brainer to book privately there. We went to Belize, and booked the private tour for zipline and cave-tubing, for $60/p including lunch. The ship would charge that, no lunch, and no zipline. Reading the reviews there were a lot more complaints about the ship's excursion, while the reviews for the private tour op we went on were almost all excellent. Examples like this just go on and on. We've been on many cruise and went on many private excursions, and have not "missed the boat".
I don't know what forum you're in on CC... there's a lot of bickering going on and name calling etc....but maybe only in certain forums/threads ... it's much more segregated over there with occasional crossover since most people stick to their own kind by being in the forum of their cruiseline

but the entertaining threads are when you have the fans of one particular cruiseline go onto another cruiseline's forum and ask the difference lol. They do censor a lot...as in can't mention certain companies, people, sites and etc.. not just advertisers and they outright delete posts..not just modify.

for information on certain ships and excursions CC is a good resource..but the demographics is much older than here and people there seem to just be a lot less traveled beyond the few ports the ship goes to.

again...private companies are fine for excursions..just be mindful of ones that are long and far away.... there's very little room for anything to go on and as I mentioned. I mean for a zipline.. it's over so quick ..lots of time to spare.
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LandKing wrote: I don't know what forum you're in on CC... there's a lot of bickering going on and name calling etc....but maybe only in certain forums/threads ... it's much more segregated over there with occasional crossover since most people stick to their own kind by being in the forum of their cruiseline

but the entertaining threads are when you have the fans of one particular cruiseline go onto another cruiseline's forum and ask the difference lol. They do censor a lot...as in can't mention certain companies, people, sites and etc.. not just advertisers and they outright delete posts..not just modify.

for information on certain ships and excursions CC is a good resource..but the demographics is much older than here and people there seem to just be a lot less traveled beyond the few ports the ship goes to.

again...private companies are fine for excursions..just be mindful of ones that are long and far away.... there's very little room for anything to go on and as I mentioned. I mean for a zipline.. it's over so quick ..lots of time to spare.
I'm in lots of CC forums. I read (and write) a lot there. As I said I love cruising, and had been on many cruises on various cruiselines, many different ships, many different ports. There are a lot more rude behaviour that people get away with in RFD compared to other forums not just CC.

Most people in CC are older and a lot more travelled than here in RFD. After all, the CC forum has people travelling and sharing. You also get views from all over the world. That's why when it comes to cruise activities, many people say go to CC for good info there.
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Apr 11, 2006
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Conquistador wrote: +1 to both of these.

My wife and I have just returned from a Mediterranean cruise, have done a lot of cruises, and rarely do we book the ship's excursions. In Europe almost all of our tours were arranged as private tours through the cruise critic roll calls. Tour companies were chosen based on reviews there and on TripAdvisor. As mcewen said, the cruise line will try to scare you out of booking privately but the reputations of these companies are such that they're not going to risk their livelihoods by missing the boat. It would be business suicide to screw up to that extent.

The private tours we did were six to eight people in air-conditioned Mercedes vans with competent English-speaking guides and were all WAY better than being herded on and off buses with forty to fifty other people all over the place. An extra bonus was being able to go places in a van that buses couldn't get to and having the flexibility to alter the itinerary based on a majority vote of a handful of people. THAT isn't happening on a ship excursion. Add to all of this that the premium you pay for ship excursions for the "security" of knowing you'll get back to the ship before it sails away is saved for better things while on tour.
I'd love to know the guides you used in the various cities you visited as I am in the midst of researching this exact point on CC for a cruise next year. I'll PM you
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Arrgh wrote: I'm in lots of CC forums. I read (and write) a lot there. As I said I love cruising, and had been on many cruises on various cruiselines, many different ships, many different ports. There are a lot more rude behaviour that people get away with in RFD compared to other forums not just CC.

Most people in CC are older and a lot more travelled than here in RFD. After all, the CC forum has people travelling and sharing. You also get views from all over the world. That's why when it comes to cruise activities, many people say go to CC for good info there.
I don't know about more travelled than people on there....cruising <> travelling. ... I can't believe how many people don't even has passports or have the passport questions come up on there.

I enjoy cruising too and have been on 20+ cruises and probably well in excess of 200+ days at sea now on multiple lines but cruising and actually travelling to a destination is very different I find. I find CC good for cruising related questions as in ports/ships/excursions but not really good for asking questions about destinations. Expat forums are better or even flyertalk or subreddits of places.

as for people from all over the world..I find CC to be mostly americans and have less varied background than even people from here in terms of where they are from and offering local information from someone who's lived in an area for a long period of time.

Though I'm more into river cruises now since I'm done the superficial touring on the bigger lines and will need to go on cc to do more research on those lol But I go on cruises when I'm too lazy to properly plan a trip which is too often..which explains why I've done so many cruises
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I booked three excursions through Carnival for my upcoming trip:

Cozumel - Waverunner, Snorkel, Beach - $90 USD
Belize - Cave Tubing + Zipline - $80 USD
Mahogany Bay - Dolphin Encounter - $110 USD

Please rate.
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iEyeCaptain wrote: I booked three excursions through Carnival for my upcoming trip:

Cozumel - Waverunner, Snorkel, Beach - $90 USD
Belize - Cave Tubing + Zipline - $80 USD
Mahogany Bay - Dolphin Encounter - $110 USD

Please rate.
I think for cozumel you can do better just by doing it locally when you get into port, those are just activity near the beach and you can get better rate locally.

Belize is fine since the private companies I found to have same rates as ship for the cavetubing.
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iEyeCaptain wrote: I booked three excursions through Carnival for my upcoming trip:

Cozumel - Waverunner, Snorkel, Beach - $90 USD
Belize - Cave Tubing + Zipline - $80 USD
Mahogany Bay - Dolphin Encounter - $110 USD

Please rate.
If you go to CC, there're lots of info.

For Coz, there are several AI beaches (e.g. mrsanchos.com, or cozumelnachicocom.com that limits to 100 people) that includes use of all facility (other than motorized sports), drinks and food. There are also pay as you go, like Paradise Beach. Those seem popular. We go to diving/snorkeling, as Coz is one of the best scuba diving destinations in the world.

Belize, we used cavetubing.bz, for $60/p. They own the zipline op, that everyone else go to (including the cruiseline) They use smaller van-bus, rather than the big buses the cruiselines use to heard 40+ people. They include lunch. When we finished the zipline, we saw the big buses pulling in, with lots of other cruise passengers. The cruiseline's op got some bad reviews. The cruiseline's op uses the tubes that you need to hook your foot to under the should of the person before you. The cruiseline's op make you carry the tubes, while on our excursion they carry the tubes for you. (Well, I helped out carrying because they were not heavy.) One more thing, the tubes we used, had a bottom. You do still get wet, from a lot of water that can still be splashing around, but it is a lot more comfortable when you can sit on something, rather than you butt directly in the water. A lot more people go with the cruiseline's op, because it's more "convenient" and they don't risk missing the boat.

For Mahogany Bay, the Dolphin Encounter is at Anthony Key Resort. This is one of the few places where they keep the dolphins at the sea, rather than inside their blocked of pool or aquarium. So it's a good tour -- if you like dolphin encounter. Note that with the ship excursion, as soon as you're finished, they bus you back to port, so you cannot stay at the resort to use their facilities. But there are other places you can do swim with dolphins at cheaper (I think it was Costa Maya that a family of 4 went for $160) At Roatan there are also zipline, and AI resorts, but it's more expensive in Roatan. We went to diving/snorkeling at Maya Palms, with Maya Divers. It was quite good there, nice resort, and nice dive shop where you can shower afterwards and hang your stuff to dry while you enjoy the beach, and they take you back at the end of the day.
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Oct 24, 2013
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ALWAYS cheaper to go with the locals.... however, NOT if its like ATV's and all that... there equipment tends to be dated. Honestly tho, I have NEVER used the cruise line for my excursions. Price check... if it's a few dollars more (most are a lot more than a few dollars) go with the cruise line... if not book with the locals or one of the online companies or just want till you get off the boat and deal with the companies...

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