How to get from Livorno port to station?

[MaryPoppinz]

Good question. I wonder if that private shuttle bus is always there when cruise ships are in port.

 

14 euro per person is a bit steep though. Taxis are 5 euro per person so would be much cheaper if you can get them to take you.

 

It's 14E for roundtrip, but I will gladly pay the extra 4 E pp to not have to grovel for a taxi, especially since it means that we wouldn't have to deal with waiting on the port shuttle to start service and then deal with a local bus to the train station. :) If that option is out there, I would love to have more info about this!!

[graceinmelbourne]

It's 14E for roundtrip, but I will gladly pay the extra 4 E pp to not have to grovel for a taxi, especially since it means that we wouldn't have to deal with waiting on the port shuttle to start service and then deal with a local bus to the train station. :) If that option is out there, I would love to have more info about this!!

 

 

Sorry, I thought it was 14 euro EACH WAY not round trip. Okay, that sounds a lot better. I would be good to know that this bus is available as it seems the other shuttles just take you to the centre of town which is not near the station. They should have a shuttle which goes to the train station first then to centre of town as the majority of people will be wanting to go the station.

[KirkNC]

Sorry, I thought it was 14 euro EACH WAY not round trip. Okay, that sounds a lot better. I would be good to know that this bus is available as it seems the other shuttles just take you to the centre of town which is not near the station. They should have a shuttle which goes to the train station first then to centre of town as the majority of people will be wanting to go the station.

 

I am not sure they want to make it too easy, that might encourge people to go on their own and not with the cruise line :confused:.

 

I may try and see if they know on the ship if there will be a shuttle. My primary plan is still to hit the taxis with a 20 euro bill in my hand. We will be at the front of the line getting off so hopefully they will take us as they can ge back and get a second fare. This is one of those stops where saving money is secondary to me :eek:. If I can make the 7:33 train I pickup 30 minutes in Florence which is priceless.

 

Kirk

[Bobal]

I am not sure they want to make it too easy, that might encourge people to go on their own and not with the cruise line :confused:.

 

 

I think you've made a very relevant point there. Livorno itself is not a place where people want to visit so virtually everyone catching the shuttle wants to get to the station. The only reason they don't run coaches to the station is because it hits their revenue from excursions. :mad:

 

We've given up on visiting Florence this time. I really don't want to have to get off the ship at 7 and beg a taxi driver to take me to the station, the hassle with getting the ship's shuttle and then bus to the station means it will cut too much time into our day and I refuse to buy the ship's coach to Florence since they (RCL) can't guarantee that we'll actually dock there - the port has been so overcrowded recently that they've docked in La Spezia on occasion and can't guarantee it won't happen again. I'm not prepared to spend another hour on a coach getting to Florence from La Spezia.

 

A coach to the station would make much more sense but I doubt we'll be seeing it from any of the cruise operators.

[MaryPoppinz]

Are we sure this shuttle was arranged by Princess? It may be that an enterprising tour driver has discovered that he can take a load of passengers to the train station *before* he picks up his tour group for the day. If so...I hope it catches on.

[graceinmelbourne]

I think you've made a very relevant point there. Livorno itself is not a place where people want to visit so virtually everyone catching the shuttle wants to get to the station. The only reason they don't run coaches to the station is because it hits their revenue from excursions. :mad:

 

We've given up on visiting Florence this time. I really don't want to have to get off the ship at 7 and beg a taxi driver to take me to the station, the hassle with getting the ship's shuttle and then bus to the station means it will cut too much time into our day and I refuse to buy the ship's coach to Florence since they (RCL) can't guarantee that we'll actually dock there - the port has been so overcrowded recently that they've docked in La Spezia on occasion and can't guarantee it won't happen again. I'm not prepared to spend another hour on a coach getting to Florence from La Spezia.

 

A coach to the station would make much more sense but I doubt we'll be seeing it from any of the cruise operators.

 

 

So RCL won't guarantee that they will dock in Livorno? Is that mainly in the peak summer months? Will they know before the cruise if they need to go to La Spezia? We have already been told that the ship will not dock in Naples but in Salerno. I think if the ship did dock in La Spezia we would skip Florence and go to Portofino or Cinque Terre.

 

What are you going to do rather than Florence? Have you been to Florence previously? We are still going to try for a taxi as our first option.

[Bobal]

So RCL won't guarantee that they will dock in Livorno? Is that mainly in the peak summer months?

 

What are you going to do rather than Florence? Have you been to Florence previously? We are still going to try for a taxi as our first option.

 

I read on these boards that early in June the ship had docked in La Spezia due to volume of traffic in port, I'm not sure if it's the time of year but I imagine that is the reason and there is a limit to how many large cruise ships they can take. We've docked at Livorno before and know that sometimes it can be difficult to get a taxi and the shuttle can take an age to fill up so we'd decided to take the ship's 'Florence on your own' bus. When I read about the change of dock I emailed RCL to ask whether, if we docked in La Spezia, we would be able to get a refund as the extra time on the coach would just be too much and to ask how likely this is to happen again. The response I got was:

 

"You would obviously be able to

cancel the shore excursion onboard up until normally noon the day prior

with a refund of the cost if you were unhappy at taking the tour from La

Spezia. this istuation could possibly happen again given the busy dock

situation at Livorno."

 

I emailed again to ask whether they would know by noon the previous day where they would be docking but have had no response back, 2 weeks later :rolleyes:

 

We've decided to have a plan A & B. If we dock in La Spezia we will visit Cinque Terre and if we dock in Livorno we will go via the ship's shuttle and the train to Pisa. We did the same thing when we were on Voyager before but it was pouring with rain and we had 2 moaning teens with us, so we cut our visit short. This time we plan to see Pisa in more depth and in a different light ;) We had planned to book tickets to the Uffizi in Florence but are not prepared to do that in case we didn't get to Livorno so we've decided we'll do Florence for a few days at some time in the future, as we're lucky enough to get reasonably cheap flights from the UK and can choose to go at a less busy time of year.

[canadian cruise queen]

I just got back from my cruise on the NCL Jade. We docked in Livorno and they had a shuttle for 5 euros each return to the center of town and back to ship. From there we got the number R1 bus to the train station. When we returned we found out the last shuttle left the town at 6pm, so we missed it as we arrived at 6:05 thinking they would have last shuttle at 6:15 since we didn't sail until 7pm. They did not inform us of the last shuttle time We then had to take a taxi from town to the ship at a cost of 17 euros (for 2 of us). It was alot of hassle. Make sure to get back with plenty of time to avoid such things :)

[kannna]

La Spezia is a tender port. Just so you are prepared if you do stop there.