Converting Currency

[ackieboy]

I am sailing on the Infinity on Sept 18 on the Immersive Wine Cruise. I am booking a private excursion in Bilbao, Spain. Can I convert U.S. Dollars to Euros onboard? Thanks for the information.

 

Regards,

 

Dean

[Baseball fan]

Yes you can. However you will get a bad exchange rate. I use bank ATMs in land. You can generally find one in the airport after clearing customs.

 

 

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[Lsimon]

You should either buy your Euros at the bank where you bank in the USA (major banks have no fee and change an exchange rate around 5% premium from the spot rate) or get your Euros from an ATM machine in Europe. The exchange rate premium is most favorable at ATM machines (usually under 1%) but your ATM card issuer might have fees of 3% to 5% plus a set fee for such transactions.

 

Personally, we buy our Euros at home for convenience as we like to have them when we land for taxis and incidental expenses. We also don't want to have to worry about whether our card will work in a European ATM or about daily limits. But many here on Cruise Critic prefer the ATM route.

[Northern Aurora]

 

Personally, we buy our Euros at home for convenience as we like to have them when we land for taxis and incidental expenses. We also don't want to have to worry about whether our card will work in a European ATM or about daily limits. But many here on Cruise Critic prefer the ATM route.

 

Just as we notify the issuers of our credit cards that we will be using the cards overseas, we also call the banks which issued our ATM cards. We have the daily limits increased for a specific time period.

[varoo]

I am sailing on the Infinity on Sept 18 on the Immersive Wine Cruise. I am booking a private excursion in Bilbao, Spain. Can I convert U.S. Dollars to Euros onboard? Thanks for the information.

If your private excursion operator accepts credit cards, which many do, we find that to be the easiest way to pay for excursions.

 

By using a credit card that does not charge a fee for currency conversion, you avoid the hassles and fees of exchanging money and needing to carry around foreign currency.

 

For those that do not accept credit cards, we also find it easy to get foreign currency from ATMs, which are widely available at cruise ports and airports as well as in cities in Europe.

Often excursion operators will begin the tour with a stop at an ATM, or will point them out along the way if anyone asks.