Do excursions sell out quickly?

[FSU Girl]

I’ve been reading conflicting information about when excursions become available on a cruise. There are a few that I would like to book and was wondering if I’ll have any difficultly booking the excursions? Do they open to everyone on the cruise the same day? It’ll be our first time sailing on Norwegian

[BirdTravels]

Totally dependent upon the shore excursion providers. NCL does not run the shore ex. They are all contracted out. Some companies have the capacity to add additional buses to a tour,,, some don't. Some tours are capacity limited.

 

For example, a tour to Atlantis in Nassau, they will continue to add buses for anyone and everyone. On a New England cruise, 3 of our 4 first choice tours were sold out 6 weeks prior to departure (forcing us to go to "Plan B").

[casofilia]

Book now and cancel later!!!

[zqvol]

A few, especially in AK, sell out early. Most of them have availability after you board.

[brookie848]

Escape to Jost Van Dyke out of Tortola and cabanas on GSC can also sell out quickly.

[FSU Girl]

I haven’t booked the cruise yet, we’re still on the fence of doing Alaska or Mediterranean. The cruises are next May, will the excursions already be available for those cruises?

[OCruisers]

So depends on the excurson ... some sell out quicker than others. ;)

[newmexicoNita]

A few very popular ones do sell out quickly but we have always had good luck just booking when we get on the cruise.

[yankees111]

Book now and pay onboard

 

 

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[rtkenmore]

Our experience has been that the more popular ones may sell out online but can sometimes still be booked once you get on the ship in very limited quantities. It's as if they hold a certain percentage out for booking on board (same with dining reservations often).

 

If you see something you want, you're best to go ahead and book it ASAP to guarantee you get it. You can always cancel before your cruise and I think you can cancel onboard as long as it's 24 hours or more in advance.

[casofilia]

24 hours or more in advance.

NCL 48 Hours before port arrival.

[CruisingNole]

Don't take an excursion from the ship. Overpriced, overcrowded and mediocre compared to a private trip from a trusted third party.

[newmexicoNita]

OP, booking through the cruise line isn't the cheapest way to see an island, but when you are new to cruising, have mobility problems or other concerns like timing it can be worth it. We booked via the ship the first couple cruises we took and now split it up. We do some private and some through the ship.

[4774Papa]

I haven’t booked the cruise yet, we’re still on the fence of doing Alaska or Mediterranean. The cruises are next May, will the excursions already be available for those cruises?

You might consider doing some research on private tours. You can save lots of money going private.

 

For Alaska, we couldn't find a private tour in Skagway that did the railroad, so we did the ship's excursion.

 

We found an excellent whale watching/glacier tour in Juneau on Viator. For Ketchikan we used Ketchikan Taxi which was cheap and very good.

For the Med, check for private tours RomeinLimo offers some good ones, but you have to recruit others on the roll call.

[billslowsky]

You might consider doing some research on private tours. You can save lots of money going private.

 

For Alaska, we couldn't find a private tour in Skagway that did the railroad, so we did the ship's excursion.

 

We found an excellent whale watching/glacier tour in Juneau on Viator. For Ketchikan we used Ketchikan Taxi which was cheap and very good.

For the Med, check for private tours RomeinLimo offers some good ones, but you have to recruit others on the roll call.

 

I think you can walk up to the train station in Skagway and buy tickets.

 

We went through the alaska-shoreexcursions site for Juneau and Skagway and were very happy. We did a bus tour up to the Yukon Suspension Bridge which was much cheaper than the train (and didn't have to worry about the "better" side for viewing on the train). Booked a fishing morning online from Ketchikan. Whale watching through a company called Alaska Tales was great.

 

Online booking sites also have reviews posted on trip...sor. Ones booked through the cruise have a lot fewer reviews in general.

[rtkenmore]

OP, booking through the cruise line isn't the cheapest way to see an island, but when you are new to cruising, have mobility problems or other concerns like timing it can be worth it. We booked via the ship the first couple cruises we took and now split it up. We do some private and some through the ship.

 

We do the same thing essentially. If it's somewhere we've been before and know an idea of what we want to do, we get off the ship and get a taxi or book on shore. If it's a new port, we'd rather play it safer and use the ships excursions to be sure where we're going and that we're back on time, etc.

 

There are definitely some ports now that we would not dare book through the ship because we've been so many times (Cozumel, Costa Maya, Nassau)...