Oceania included tours

[juhacorno410]

Hi,

 

We recently booked the Nov. 16, 2018 Spanish Serenade cruise on the Marina and selected the 3 tours per person as 1 of our perks.

 

I wanted to know if the included tours are worth taking or should we take the $600.00 obc instead?

 

Our ports are Valencia, Almeria, Malaga, and Seville, Spain, Madeira, and Lisbon in Portugal, and Canary Islands.

 

Second time on Oceania, but first time using their tours.

 

Thank you for any information.

 

Sue

[Noxequifans]

When we have taken O tours we were mostly satisfied. The question of $ vs. O tours really depends on individual preferences. You could select the $ and pursue other options .... join with others on your cruise for tours or select tours just for yourselves. I don't believe there is an answer that "fits all".

[RachelG]

They are the same tours as on regent, and we have mostly been satisfied with those. I try to avoid ones that are just bus tours and look for ones that involve more walking or other physical activities.

[Mura]

While we generally prefer DIY tours, we've been using the oLife benefits on our recent cruises -- usually a combination of DIY and what they offer.

 

We were in Almeria and Madeira in October on Sirena and enjoyed our "free" tours very much. Were they the best tour ever? Nope. But we were happy with them. And they weren't too crowded.

 

Mura

[skiladyldp]

We are considering booking this cruise. How is the weather in Spain and Portugal in November? Thank you, Virginia

[arima22]

It is way too early to tell if you will have an active roll call for your Nov. 2018 cruise. If you do, and a lot of your fellow Cruise Critic cruisers like to form private tours, that would be better than the Oceania excursions. Fewer people in the group- Oceania's are usually 40 passenger buses while you could use companies like "Spain Day Tours" for 6 to 12 passengers (They offer tours all over Spain and also Lisbon). As a small group, you may have the ability to tailor your tour to the group's wishes- no changes possible with the Oceania tours. Private tours are often able to go to places where large tours cannot go.

 

That said, our roll call for our last couple of cruises on Oceania was very "quiet" and there were very few people interested in private tours. So...we were happy to have the choice available to us of the included Oceania tours- some were good, others not so.

[Paulchili]

Duplicate

Edited January 8, 2017 by Paulchili

[Paulchili]

The "free" tours certainly offer value as most of them are over $100 (up to $199) - averaging $150/tour. Thus taking 6 tours gives you a value of $900 vs $600 OBC. You can maximize your value by choosing the more expensive ones that qualify as O Life as your included tours and pay for the less expensive ones.

That said, some people do not like big tours no matter the value and will only do private tours. We don't mind O tours and the majority of the ones we have taken were good. We usually do a combination of O Life tours and private tours.

[The bubble]

Thank you for all your answers. We usually only do private tours and the only ship tours we will take is if the area we want to see is far away.

 

We have done some research already, and will probably book the ships tour to Seville since it is far away from Cadiz.

 

Will have to decide which other more expensive tours we will book from the ship. Many of the tours in the Canary Islands are quite reasonable, so will so those on our own.

 

Sue

Edited January 8, 2017 by The bubble
wrong rollcall

[JimandStan]

Will have to decide which other more expensive tours we will book from the ship. Many of the tours in the Canary Islands are quite reasonable, so will so those on our own.

 

Not sure what your definition of expensive is, but if you're speaking about any of the O-Life Tours (which are the topic of this thread, btw), then they need to be booked in adance of the cruise.

Tours booked on the ship won't be free.

[juhacorno410]

Jim and Stan,

 

I was speaking about the O included tours. Can you book them more than 6 months out?

[Paulchili]

Not sure what your definition of expensive is, but if you're speaking about any of the O-Life Tours (which are the topic of this thread, btw), then they need to be booked in adance of the cruise.

Tours booked on the ship won't be free.

 

In addition to above, only tours that are not OE or OC can be booked as part of O Life tours.

[Paulchili]

Jim and Stan,

 

I was speaking about the O included tours. Can you book them more than 6 months out?

 

Not J&S but - yes, you can book them as soon as they show up on your cruise and have to be booked no later than 14 days prior to the cruise

[juhacorno410]

In addition to above, only tours that are not OE or OC can be booked as part of O Life tours.

 

Yes, I read that information, but thanks for confirming that for me.

[buggins0402]

We are considering booking this cruise. How is the weather in Spain and Portugal in November? Thank you, Virginia

 

We did an Andalusia trip in November a few years ago and weather was ideal. Perhaps a light sweater was needed in early morning and evening. I could probably count the clouds we saw during the entire trip on one hand. But, every year is different and there were major rains and flooding in other years, based on google searches and look ups of averages on Wunderground.com.

Edited January 8, 2017 by buggins0402

[skiladyldp]

buggins0402- thank you.