First time on Celebrity - questions re Far East cruise

[The Odd Couple]

We have done several cruises in the past, but it will be our first time on Celebrity Constellation when we sail with her in January 2019 - a long way ahead, I know. We're doing a back-to-back starting off in Shanghai and ending in Abu Dhabi calling into Hong Kong, Thailand, Vietnam, Sri Lanka and India on the way. We note that another cruise line doing a similar itinerary is providing its passengers with a complimentary visa in Sri Lanka. Does Celebrity do this? (We know we will need visas for China and India at least). Any info on this cruise overall for newbies would be very welcome. Thanks for your advice.

[Chewbecca]

We did a similar cruise on Connie last Easter & did not require a visa for Sri Lanka. Best check off CC though.

[The Odd Couple]

Thanks for your help.

 

Can anyone give me any tips on cruising into India (not from a visa viewpoint but in general), please?

[suekay]

The best advice I can give is to join your roll call and either arrange or join private tours. So much more enjoyable in a minibus with a small number of people, and usually cheaper too. We aren't very sociable onboard ship, but did enjoy bumping into other participants and having a short conversation about how their later trips had gone. Go to the Cruisecritic ports of call board for lots of information. We used mumbaimagic.com in most of the India ports and can highly recommend them

 

Sent from my SM-T550 using Forums mobile app

[Miaminice]

Are there any other Chinese ports on the itinerary besides Shanghai?

 

If there are no other Chinese ports, if you are flying into Shanghai on a direct flight from the UK and if you are stying in Shanghai only (not touring outside of Shanghai) for less than 144 hours, you will not need a visa for China.

 

We just returned from Shanghai two weeks ago. We checked all the boxes of the 144 hour regulation and did not need a visa.

[Jim_Iain]

We sailed B2B Singapore to Rome and visa's were arranged by celebrity for all ports with the exception of India. Sri Lanka was taken care of by Celebrity.

 

India was wonderful and with the exception of the bureaucracy of the Indian Immigration it was wonderful. For India the immigration staff boarded in Sri Lanka and processed passengers on a mandatory face to face meeting on the sea day. The crew had a problem in Goa and immigration would not let any of the crew off the ship even Indian nationals. It was very disappointing for our Butler who was from Goa and his family had been invited on-board but the immigration folks would not let them into the port.

[The Odd Couple]

Are there any other Chinese ports on the itinerary besides Shanghai?

 

If there are no other Chinese ports, if you are flying into Shanghai on a direct flight from the UK and if you are stying in Shanghai only (not touring outside of Shanghai) for less than 144 hours, you will not need a visa for China.

 

We just returned from Shanghai two weeks ago. We checked all the boxes of the 144 hour regulation and did not need a visa.

 

Sorry for late response as have only just logged back into CC. We don't as yet know if our flight will be direct or indirect (as we have an add-on package) into Shanghai. Two nights in a hotel before joining the ship. Two days at sea then Hong Kong. I had read exactly what you describe re a Shanghai visa and assumed we didn't need one, but my T/A thinks we do. Will have to check in more detail. Thanks for your advice.

[Miaminice]

Sorry for late response as have only just logged back into CC. We don't as yet know if our flight will be direct or indirect (as we have an add-on package) into Shanghai. Two nights in a hotel before joining the ship. Two days at sea then Hong Kong. I had read exactly what you describe re a Shanghai visa and assumed we didn't need one, but my T/A thinks we do. Will have to check in more detail. Thanks for your advice.

 

The visa exemption can be applied if you leave Shanghai within 144 hours to a THIRD country. Any flight not connecting in China or Taiwan before Shanghai would work. Your first stop after Shanghai, is Hong Kong. So your TA might think HK is no third country. However, funny enough HK counts as a thrird county according to the rules.

 

But please don´t just take my word for it since I do not know all your itinerary. However, here are some good sites with information:

https://www.travelchinaguide.com/embassy/visa/free-transit-144hour.htm

https://www.shine.cn/archive/metro/Everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-144hour-visaexemption-transit-policy/shdaily.shtml

http://www.sh-immigration.gov.cn/listPageEn.aspx?lx=40&id=4414