verga

10 minutes ago, Mike_DeA said:

Does the shareholder OBC always get split between the passengers in the cabin? 

 

Mine is showing half to me and half to my cabin mate on the amenity confirmation.

Mine shows the same - 50% to me and 50% to my cabin mate.

On 4/3/2023 at 1:00 PM, skiierdi said:

Has anyone from port Alexandria on a 2 full days in port, booked a tour to Cairo then flown to Luxor for an overnight flight to see Luxor and then fly back to Cairo for a 3 hour ride back to port ?  I found a tour that does it and looks doable but tight.

 

I am interested in doing this too but the cost is quite high due to the RT airfare Cairo to Luxor. I was quoted USD$630 pp with an overnight stay in Luxor. 

Our group of 10 seniors recently did a 6 days private land tour of Jordan in Nov 2022 and our tour guide, Ismail Nas (WhatsApp +962 7 98324 2219), was just amazing. It is no wonder that he is the #1 TripAdvisor tour guide in Petra. He took us through the back entrance of Petra where we visited the Monastery first (a lot less of walking uphill) and then to the Treasury and the Siq.
Ismail can pick up a group of passengers from the Aqaba cruise port.  Please check him out in TripAdvisor.

For our Oct-Nov 2022 Azamara Pursuit cruise, our group of 8 seniors used Spiros Taxi Service / Elite Tours for Airport-Hotel and Hotel-Piraeus transfers, as well as a one day tour of Sparta and Mystras. Price is reasonable and his team's service is excellent. I even recommended Spiros' team to other cruisers on our ship who was also happy with Spiros' service. He responds very quickly. WhatsApp +30 694 428 5686

Spiros has a recent model 14 pax Mercedez Sprinter that can accommodate your group of 13 pax. He assigned us this vehicle for our full day tour of Sparta/Mystras on Oct 26, 2022.

For our Oct-Nov 2022 Azamara Pursuit cruise, our group of 8 seniors used Spiros Taxi Service / Elite Tours for Airport-Hotel and Hotel-Piraeus transfers, as well as a one day tour of Sparta and Mistras. Price is reasonable and service is excellent. I even recommended Spiros to other cruisers on our ship who was happy with Spiros' service too. He responds very quickly. WhatsApp +30 694 428 5686

Our family group of 6 pax booked a one-day Koper tour, that included Vintgar Gorge, Lake Bled, Ljubljana and a quick city tour of Koper. Our Oceania Riviera cruise was in Koper from 9 am to 9 pm thus allowing us to add the Koper city tour at the end and Vintgar Gorge at the beginning. The Vintgar Gorge walk was awesome after several rainy days before the tour. We met Adrijana at the cruise terminal, who is very knowledgeable and accommodating. From initial contact to the day before the tour, our email inquires were responded to promptly by Barbara, specially about Vintgar George which is usually closed during the time of our visit. Lucky for us, it was open the day we visited. The price for our private minivan tour is 350 Euro (6 to 8 pax) plus admission fees and tips. Overall, it was an excellent tour and we highly recommend Roundabout to anyone.

Can anyone please recommend a private tour guide in Zadar we did not want to do it on our own.

Thank you

Wendy

Our family group of 8 pax used Romeo and Juliet Travel Agency. We selected the Plitvice Lakes National Park tour at 75 Euro pp, which included a boat tour and a packed lunch. Ivan was our tour guide and he is excellent. At the end of our Plitvice Lakes tour, Ivan added a quick city tour of the Zadar walled city as well as a visit to the Greeting to the Sun and the Sea Organ. We had an enjoyable time with Ivan. From initial contact to finalizing our tour, our email inquires were responded to promptly by Terezija. We would definitely recommend Romeo and Juliet Travel Agency for your Zadar day tour. http://www.romeoandjuliet.hr/

We were in Vietnam in late September and we used Bestprice Travel (http://www.bestpricevn.com) to book our private tours in Hanoi and Halong Bay. Bestprice Travel, which is highly rated in tripadvisor, provides excellent service and at reasonably priced tours including domestic airfares. I would definitely book with them again on future visits to Vietnam.

If you are staying overnight in Lisbon and can form a group of 6 to 8 pax pre or post-cruise, we suggest using a private tour guide. We were in Lisbon recently and we used Daniel Travel for a private tour for 8 pax. We visited Evora and Sintra in one day. Daniel is very knowledgeable, professional, accommodating and an excellent guide. He has a 1-year new & spacious Mercedez Benz van that seats 8 pax comfortably with free wifi (an awesome bonus) and a large luggage space at the back of his van. He uses a mike when he makes commentary. We stayed at Hotel Expo Astoria in Lisbon which is a reasonably priced and well located hotel near Pombal Square. http://www.danieltravel.pt/

Thank you for your response, Nitemare and 125Cruise. We are now looking at Southern Caribbean leaving on May 15th (after the grad ceremony)!

Our family is planning to take the May 7, 2016 Canada/New England cruise with HAL Veendam if the logistics work out for us on May 14, 2016 Boston disembarkation.

Our family of 4 (including our daughter who is graduating) is hoping to catch the 9:00 am flight out to Philadelphia (arriving at 10:34 am) as we will be attending the graduation ceremony at 3 PM in Wharton U. The next direct flight out is at 11:00 am (arriving at 12:34 PM). It takes about 30 to 40 minutes by cab from PHL to Wharton. We plan to bring carry-ons only so no luggage to check-in

For those who have disembarked at Boston pier before, we would appreciate your feedback on how fast was your Boston's disembarkation?

Is the 9:00 am flight from BOS to PHL feasible with a 7 am scheduled disembarkation in Boston?

Thanks in advance for your assistance!

Same charges as the Canadians. My sister and brother-in-law who came with us on this Cruise are US citizens.

Our family group of 8 seniors and 2 adults just completed the 10 nights' RCCL Legend of the Seas cruise. In Laem Chabang, we pre booked a 2 day tour with Tourwithtong. We opted for an overnight stay at the Navalai River Resort. Perhaps you can organize a group of 8 in your roll call because Tong owns a few 9 seater VIP vans. Tong had to hire a 12 seater van for us and the seats are okay only for petite size Asians (which we are). We were so lucky to get Lily as our tour guide. She spoke excellent English and is very animated and knowledgeable.

Day 1- Ayutthaya with a visit at Bang Pa In summer palace and 3 temples. We also visited the public market and munched on snacks and fruit juice for lunch and left Ayutthaya at 3 pm for BKK to catch the Chao Phrya River cruise. We got to BKK at 4:50 pm and we were lucky that the canal gate was still open for us otherwise the long tail boat will cruise along the big canals instead of the smaller canals where you get a close up look of the communities. By the time we were returning back, the gate to enter/exit the smaller canals were closed and we waited 15 minutes before it reopened to let other long tail boats in /out of the small canals. We had a night view of the temples and the Grand Palace on our way to Navalai which has a private dock. Wonderful Lily also took the time to take us to a laundromat, and also walked us to Koh San Road for best eateries and massage.

Day 2 - Floating Market and Grand palace. We left at 630 am and we were one of the first group of tourists. We ate coconut pancakes, mango sticky rice and other munchies for breakfast, shopped for souvenirs and left at about 10 am for the Grand Palace tour. We were going to check out Chinatown but traffic was bad so we left BKK at 130 pm, stopped at a 7-11 store for a Thai burger and fruit drinks. 30 minutes away from the dock, we stopped at a goldsmith to buy gold jewelry (cash only, no credit card).

The price for our group of 10 was approx. 33,500 THB for the 2 day tour. This is a quick paced tour and may not suit everyone who would prefer a slower paced tour. 6000 THB net non-refundable deposit was required which we paid by PayPal.

We just completed RCCL's Legend of the Seas, 10 nights cruise, which included Sihanoukville, Cambodia, Nha Trang and Ho Chi Minh. We were charged $35 per person for Cambodia and $6 per person for Vietnam (single entry for 2 ports). RCCL used our Seapass photo for the Visa. We are Canadians.

Hello Verga,

Thank you for your detail post. If I remember correctly, we saved $15/person to meet him outside the port. It was totally worth the 5 min walk...

 

In Nha Trang, I organized another awesome tour. Could you share with us who Zoom suggested you use?

 

Thanks again for your post.

The Canadians!:D

Yes, we saved the $15 permit fee per person charged by the port. Definitely worth the 10 mins walk to the gate.

In Nha Trang, Zoom suggested his partner Thao. Unfortunately, I didn't take his email info as everything was done through Zoom. Zoom only provided me with Thao's cell # and Vehicle license plate #. We also met Thao outside the gate and saved $10 or $15 permit fee per person. The walk to the gate is very short.

How did he ask for the deposit is it through PayPal?

We were given two options for payment: direct transfer to Zoom's bank account or by PayPal. We opted to pay by PayPal.

We cruised Asia in Jan-Feb 2015 for 28 days. I did extensive research and booked the following:

 

HO Chi Minh City: I was lucky enough to book ZOOM one year in advance. He toured Chelsey Clinton years ago when her parents were in HCMC. Zoom (be careful as other people try to use his name) was maybe in his 50s with a passion for his country. He was extremely interesting. "My" group was tHe first one to leave the port and we were the last one (I asked the crew how maybe people were still out and he said 5 after scanning my card and 5 people in my group were behind me!) to board the ship at 8pm. Saigon is INCREDIBLE... It took about 1 hour and 20 min to get to Saigon from the port. The highway was very smooth and new... Tell him that The Canadians! are sending you. One of the best guide we have encounter in all our travelling. I believe he used to be a teacher...

My group was 17, we boarded "outside" the port and we paid an EXTREMELY good price compared to bigger companies... We paid him 50% of the cost of the tour through PayPal (8 months in advance but I really wanted to secure him) and everything went very smoothly.

 

Everyone spends a lot of money and energy planning for their special Asian cruise, I just Hope people are as fortunate as we were...

 

The Canadians!:D

Our family group of 10 also used Zoom yesterday for our Ho Chi Minh tour and it was a fantastic tour at a cost much lower than the price quoted by the other other tour companies. We also met him outside the gate, which is a 10 minutes walk from the ship. Two members of our family group were disembarking on this port and Zoom rearranged our itinerary so that we can drop them off at the airport at the end of our tour. Zoom's tour includes a Vietnamese noodle lunch at Pho 2000 where Bill Clinton also had lunch when he visited HCM. We visited all the highlights of HCM including a 40 minutes stop at the central market where we bought souvenirs and clothing at super cheap prices. it was raining hard on our way to the port. Zoom was very thoughtful and bought each of us a rain poncho at one of the stalls on the highway.

Our ship, Legend of the Seas, also stopped at Nha Trang. Zoom recommended his partner to us at a price which is also below the cost quoted by other tour companies and it included a Cai river cruise. We also met the Nha Trang tour guide outside the gate, which was a 5 minutes walk from the ship. It was a fantastic tour well worth the money we paid.

Zoom worked as a tour guide for over 10 years with the tour company used by RCCL. You can't go wrong using Zoom as your tour guide. He is very prompt in replying to your email enquiries. A deposit is required to secure your tour with him, and he will confirm receipt as soon as you send the deposit.

We will also be in Catania the beginning of November. What was the weather like? Last year our friends also on the Silhouette had a day of torrential rain in Catania and had to cancel their tour.

We were lucky - on Nov 11, 2013, it was drizzling on our way and then the rain stopped at 9:00 am as we reached Siracusa and for the remainder of the day, it was cloudy with some sun.

We just got back from our Silhouette cruise which visited Catania on Nov 11. From Catania, we took a wonderful private tour with Christian Guardione (Info@newtravelservices.net) to visit Siracusa (archeological site) and Ortigia with a licensed tour guide (Valeria) for 4 hours before we returned back to Catania to spend 2 hours on our own. We found having a licensed tour guide to visit the archeological site and Ortigia very useful. The history of the Cathedral in Ortigia is very interesting as is the city itself. There is an audioguide in the Cathedral so I think you can easily do both Siracusa and Ortigia on your own.

On your port day in Catania, you may wish to consider taking a private tour to visit Taormina, Savoca (Godfather) and Castelmola and at the end of the tour, spend a couple of hours in Catania before you return to your ship. We visited Taormina, Savoca and Castelmola in May 2013 and had an awesome day.

To keep your cost down, maybe you can organize a group of 6 to 8 people from your roll call? Our group of 6 paid 290 Euro for the minivan with an English speaking driver (Christian) who gave an excellent running commentary and 110 Euro for the licensed guide to visit Siracusa (archeological site) and Ortigia.

In general, if you want to tour a port in Europe, you'll need to make arrangements with a guide in advance of your arrival.

 

In general, if a place is a national site like Diocletian's Palace in Split or the city walls in Dubrovnik, you're going to need to use the currency of the country. Most places allow credit cards.

I agree with Pet Nit Noy's comments. Our group of 6 had booked our private tour in advance and used the ATM to get approx. 2600 Kuna to pay for our tour and admission fees plus tips.

Our licensed tour guide was Helena Super (helena.super@gmail.com). Helena is only available during off season (pre-mid-May and post mid-Oct) because she is one of the tour directors of large coach buses traveling in Slovenia, Croatia. Montenegro, Bosnia, etc. Her English is quite good.

Our tour was approx. 8 hours and covered Trogir, the Salona ruins and Spit. For our group of 6, the tour fee was 1800 Kuna + admission fees + tips. Helen walked with us throughout the day pointing areas of interest. SPLIT is one of our favourite ports.

We just got back from the Silhouette and visited Valetta on Nov 10 (Sunday). Our group of 6 also opted for a private tour with Joan Sheridan - joan@maltatourguide.com. Joan is the wife of the owner of Malta Travel.

Joan is so knowledgeable about the history of Malta. For details, here is her website.

http://www.maltatourguide.com/malta_private_tours

Our 7/8 hours tour covered walking tours of the following attractions:

- Valetta

- Grandmaster's Palace (replacing St John's Co-cathedral)

- Hagar Qim

- Marsaxlokk fishing village

- Mdina

Unfortunately our tour was on a Sunday so St John's Co-cathedral was not opened for public tours but Joan timed our tour so that we were able to get in during Church service to view the inside of the church which was awesome. We covered quite a cross section of Malta's culture and history (approx. 7000 years of history) in one day. There was a bit of walking to do but no climbing or uphill walking.

The cost of the tour for our group of 6 was 295 E (350 E for 8 people) plus approx. 12 E pp for admission fees. Tips are additional/optional. She was so good, we gave her and the driver handsome tips.

Since we would usually have big breakfast at the ship, we opted for a short lunch break at Marsaxlokk and added the Blue Grotto boat tour (8 E pp) in our itinerary.

We had set-up private tours at each of the ports visited during our 13 nights Adriatic cruise. We had great tour guides at Koper, Ravenna, Split, Valetta and Naples.

Biara,

I am so happy to hear that you and your family are safe. My thoughts and prayers are with you and everyone in Madeira. I hope and pray that everything would return to normal soon.

Veronica

I understand that most hotel rooms in NY are very small and cannot even accommodate a rollaway bed. I called Crowne Plaza if we can get King size beds and non-smoking rooms and the reservation staff said that she will put a note in our reservation files but cannot guarantee our request. I will call the hotel again in early Oct.

I was reading the postings in www.betterbidding.com regarding your same question and the moderators would recommend that you book your room with Hotwire because you can request a room with 2 beds.

www.betterbidding.com helped me with my bidding strategy.

I recently won my bid for 3 rooms, 2 nights (Oct 11 - Oct 13) for a 4* hotel (Crowne Plaza Times Square) at $135/night + taxes (about $162/night all in).

I was only bidding for 3.5* but my offer was accepted at $135/night and upgraded to a 4* hotel.

I didn't realize it was discussed 6 weeks ago. Sorry - I have no first hand experience of using the card itself. It was referred to me by a friend as my sister and I are planning to visit Victoria in early June and I am checking the Victoria attractions which aren't a lot to make the smartcard worthwhile.