First time Azamara Cruiser

[centrum]

Just booked the b2b cruise on Quest departing 10/8/11 and 10/15/11 for 18 nights. I am hoping this is a prelude of great things to come because there is a fabulous itinerary in 2012 to India and Asia that I would love to take. Anyway,I digress. The purpose of this post is to all the knowledgeable Azamara cruisers out there if you have any information regarding the turn around day in Athens on 10/15. The web site states that transfers into the port are provided at some ports of call. I have searched the web site and cannot tell if this would include a transfer from Piraeus to Athens. I appreciate your responses.

[maryann ns]

No there is no shuttle into Athens: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1435314

 

However it is possible to walk or take a bus to the subway station and get to Athens that way.

[Bill Leiber]

Just booked the b2b cruise on Quest departing 10/8/11 and 10/15/11 for 18 nights. I am hoping this is a prelude of great things to come because there is a fabulous itinerary in 2012 to India and Asia that I would love to take. Anyway,I digress. The purpose of this post is to all the knowledgeable Azamara cruisers out there if you have any information regarding the turn around day in Athens on 10/15. The web site states that transfers into the port are provided at some ports of call. I have searched the web site and cannot tell if this would include a transfer from Piraeus to Athens. I appreciate your responses.

Hello Centrum –

 

Based on the information that I have received from our shore excursion manager, we will be offering some type of excursion depending on the number of guests booked back to back and this offering is usually done onboard the ship closer to the turn-around date.

 

Probably there will be only one tour offered. As was explained to me in a hypothetical, if there were 30 guests on the back-to-back, we could only offer one tour because offering more would make the tours far too expensive since guests would be split over more than one tour and thus the lot cost for bus and guide would be shared by fewer people which will increase the per person cost.

 

We do not offer shuttle bus service in Piraeus to Athens on turn around days or if Piraeus/Athens were to be a port of call in order to comply with port directives to support the taxis. The drive is about 25-30 minutes and there are many taxis to make the trip. Should there be a taxi strike, then the shore excursion team will evaluate the situation and look at alternate options and share them with you while onboard.

 

I hope this information is helpful.

 

Happy sailing on your first Azamara Club Cruises vacation and we look forward to welcoming you onboard again and again.

 

Regards,

 

Bill Leiber

________________________

Chief Blogging Officer*

Azamara Club Cruises

(*CBO is an authorized and compensated representative of ACC)

[Lottie A]

It's so easy to do a independent trip to Athens from Piraeus by train. You can either walk from the ship's berth to the train station in about 20 mins or take a taxi from the rank on the street outside the port terminal - costs about 5 euro's or so. The taxi drivers at the port terminal won't take you to the station though - they only want to do private hire trips to Athens so you have to go to the street taxi rank in Piraeus outside the port gate. It's only a 3 min walk.

 

The train costs about 4 euro return and is clean, quick and safe - but likely to be packed with workers going into Athens. Please remember to validate your train tickets at the machines in the station. There are heavy penalties if you don't and they don't take the fact that you are a tourist into account. There are notices all over the stations.

 

You will need the Acropoli stop for The Acropolis and Monostiraki stop for Plaka (the old town) which is very picturesque. There is also a little tourist train that will chug around Plaka.

 

Have a great time - and I just may be joining you for the October 8th week myself!