Celebrity “Easy Tours” experience anyone ?

[oldfella73]

booked on the Celebrity Eclipse 15th September 2012. Ports of call are Malaga - Villefranche - Civitavecchia - Livorno - Genoa - Gibraltar - & Lisbon.

 

Wheelchair accessible transport for tours essential.

 

General experience of Celebrity “Easy Tours” appreciated but more detailed on Ports of call a bonus

 

Peter

[kitty9]

Are you able to board a regular tour bus with the high steps? If so, some buses are able to put your wheelchair in the luggage hold, under the bus. If you cannot do steps, then unfortunately, you're out of luck and may have to book private tours on your own.

 

Now, I must caution you on RCI tours. When they have someone labeling the tours for difficulty, it's an able bodied person who has no idea what it's like to be physically challenged. What's easy to them is not necessarily easy for us. I found that out the hard way on a number of RCI tours in the Med.

 

Could you please do me a favor? Could you be more specific on what tours you're interested in doing? I've done a number of their tours in the Med and can give you a few pointers on specific tours.

[vickila]

Lisbon -- pedrobrandao@accessibleportugal.com Or look under accessibleportugal.com -- short trips - Lisbon.

 

We had a wonderful tour with them a few years ago -- combination of scooter around city and w/c accessible van -- remember lunch with guide -- they came out with what we here in NY would be free "pre order goodies" -- bread, chick peas, coleslaw -- in Lisbon - you pay per piece lol!!! .

 

You will find pricing in Euro to be fairly regulated -- be prepared for private tours to be expensive. Experience with cruiseline "easy" tours -- just panoramic. Vicki:)

[oldfella73]

Hi Darcie (is that right}, thanks for your post, its the steps that are the real problem.

 

Interests, sightseeing of course but with time to see things independently - terrain permitting of course. photography for me and my wife absolutely loves visiting gardens which gives me plenty of photo opportunities. Not too bothered about leather factories, wineries etc. and the like, scenery and architecture yes.

 

I think I have Gibraltar worked out and may well consider a couple of private hires but will not be able to consider these for all ports of call. So info on the ports with attractions locally which could be visited with a modest taxi fare would be helpful.

 

However any hints or tips based on your experiences would be useful, for example do ships call a taxi firm on the clients behalf.

 

Best Wishes

Peter

[kitty9]

Peter, Celebrity will not call for taxis for individual guests, so you'll have to make certain things are set up before you depart.

 

One thing you might try is speaking with the shore excursion manager to see if they can be of any assistance. But in my experience, they are not very helpful. When you travel on a large ship, making individual appointments is very, very rare. I've been lucky that I can travel on Crystal, a cruise line that excels in making tours happen for those who are physically challenged. But the large, mass market lines just don't have the ability to make individual arrangements.

[Going Coastal]

I have taken several of Celebrity's easy tours in this itinerary on Equinox. These differ from the panorama tours on Royal, which I just wrote about on another thread, in that they usually provide easily accessible transport on 'easy' tours.

In Lisbon this covered all the major sites of the old center city and outlying areas. Because these fill fast it is sometimes helpful to book online and then change or cancel if you find it is not workable after speaking to the onboard shore excursion folks. But for a refund you will need to cancel a certain period of time before, usually 24 hours.

Villafranche is very difficult for wheelchairs because of the steep and narrow sidewalks and poor surfaces. Even on the easy tour there, you must tender to the shore and make your way through the small terminal(which does have ramps) to the bus. The area is beautiful though and well worth the effort.

Civitavecchia is easier for the wheelchair and the easy tour to Rome also covered a lot of very interesting ground. It makes for a long day but very worthwhile.

I hope all this helps and that you have a wonderful trip. If you can, please let us know how it goes.

GC

[judyfssw]

When it's offered, we always take the "easy" tours. They provide an accessible bus for a wheelchair or scooter and we're able to see things.