How crowded are the shore excursions?

[cindivan]

I apologize if this has been asked/answered multiple times.  I did spend some time searching previous posts on this forum but couldn't find specific answers/opinions.

 

We are doing French Polynesia in Feb 2024 and have been waffling between Oceania and RSSC. It's the exact same itinerary, and about 5K more for RSSC, but a bigger room with a better location.  (We are frequent cruisers, but only recently empty-nesters so our time/appetite for more exotic cruises beyond our normal RC cruises is finally being explored).

 

One of my main concerns with RSSC is that my partner and I like booking our own excursions because we get so frustrated with big tour groups, waiting for everyone to get there, use the bathroom, get lost, etc.  Years ago we had a day long tour to Doubtful Sound that involved big tour bus rides with lots of people and we swore off big group tours and haven't done it since.  I know we could still plan our own excursions, but since many are included with the price, it doesn't seem to make sense to go in with that attitude.

 

I know a lot of the answer is going to be "it depends."    But hoping to get some perspective on what to expect, particularly in FP if possible.

 

Thanks!

[ChucktownSteve]

2 hours ago, cindivan said:

I apologize if this has been asked/answered multiple times.  I did spend some time searching previous posts on this forum but couldn't find specific answers/opinions.

 

We are doing French Polynesia in Feb 2024 and have been waffling between Oceania and RSSC. It's the exact same itinerary, and about 5K more for RSSC, but a bigger room with a better location.  (We are frequent cruisers, but only recently empty-nesters so our time/appetite for more exotic cruises beyond our normal RC cruises is finally being explored).

 

One of my main concerns with RSSC is that my partner and I like booking our own excursions because we get so frustrated with big tour groups, waiting for everyone to get there, use the bathroom, get lost, etc.  Years ago we had a day long tour to Doubtful Sound that involved big tour bus rides with lots of people and we swore off big group tours and haven't done it since.  I know we could still plan our own excursions, but since many are included with the price, it doesn't seem to make sense to go in with that attitude.

 

I know a lot of the answer is going to be "it depends."    But hoping to get some perspective on what to expect, particularly in FP if possible.

 

Thanks!

 

We did a Miami to Montreal cruise in May 2022 with 21 tours between the two of us. We never felt the excursions were crowded. But our ship was the Navigator with about 60% occupancy.  So hard to tell what you'll experience.

[cwn]

We have been to FP 3 times  once on HAL, once on Queen Elizabeth and once with Regent. 
First two times we rented cars for bigger islands or arranged our own tours on the smaller islands. 
FP is different than than a lot of places there are no big  bus tours. The nature of most tours involve water and boats and are smaller groups. They are the same tours you can get privately in a group or though Oceania but you will pay for them. On Regent many are already included in the price or for a s all up charge. We have found most of the tours included are worth the extra cost for the Regent cruise.

[cindivan]

Thanks so much for your replies.  I was kind of thinking/hoping by it's small nature FP wouldn't be able to have very big groups, and I appreciate cwn's statement of that.  

 

Looking forward to learning more about RSSC before our cruise!

 

Thanks for the time and knowledge.

[RetiredandTravel]

In our Tokyo > Tokyo Regent cruise, which was 100% capacity, almost every cruise bus was 90-100% full.  I would say the buses held 50 people or so.  All of the tours guides were exceptional but some areas like Kyoto were very crowded.

 

 

[Go9ersjrh]

Cindivan - We are taking our first RSSC cruise next week.  I too have always planned independent shore excursions and share your same concern. We booked this trip in May and were considering 3 different cruise lines - RSSC, Azamara and Oceania.  In the end, the RSSC was the best value and we have friends that are loyal RSSC cruisers that have been trying to get us on Regent for years.

The quality of the shore excursions will have an impact on how we evaluate taking another Regent cruise.  We have cruised on Oceania before and really enjoyed it.

I'll let you know what I think when we return home in September.  To be honest, I have missed researching independent shore excursions that do exactly what we want to do in small groups of 6 - 12 people.

[Jlhalldc]

We have been on three Regent cruises totaling 80 nights and most of the busses on our excursions ranged from 50-70% full. The crew a the destinations desk told me they try to keep at least 30 percent of each bus empty to allow for more comfort and spreading out. I can't think of a time we've been on a full bus, but that may have happened...but very rarely. 

[cwn]

The op is asking about.tours in FP.  
The tours offered there except for maybe a circle the island overview are rarely on a bus, usually in a van or a group of self driver or driven ATVs.. They are ATV tours into the interior, diving, snorkeling, boat ride to a sand island for a picnic, sailing around the island etc. Last time we were there the buses the companies were using were not the most modern. Much better to do something involving the water.

FYI we had an unfortunate issue with one of the small group private island picnics arranged by one for the cruise critic RR members (HAL). It was nothing like advertised.at least the ones though Regent had ship personal suppervising the loading process and there was no bait and stitch going on.

[Gpilon]

We have found that the “Small Excursions” were worth the price and so much more personal. 

[Tsunami74]

And Cindivan, the $5000  difference between Oceania and Regent is more than made up by flying business vs. coach.

Certainly how you would want to do that from NC!

[cindivan]

2 hours ago, Tsunami74 said:

And Cindivan, the $5000  difference between Oceania and Regent is more than made up by flying business vs. coach.

Certainly how you would want to do that from NC!

 

Our TA told us on RSSC we are only guaranteed first/business for the non-domestic flights.  Is that not correct? 

 

Based on that, we will do book w/o included airfare.  It's $7500 pp for air on RSSC which seems steep especially when the NC to west coast is not guaranteed to be first/business, and that's at least 5-6 hours.   I looked at Feb 2023 and while I know prices can certainly change, we can do first/business for about $4500 per person.  

[cindivan]

On 8/16/2022 at 1:55 PM, Gpilon said:

We have found that the “Small Excursions” were worth the price and so much more personal. 

Are you referring to the additional $$ on RSSC, or ones you book yourself?    I totally agree smaller excursions are generally so much better.  

[wcsdkqh]

Generally speaking, if you book both the domestic and international segments on the same ticket with the same airline, the domestic part will be first class. At least this has been our experience for multiple cruises over the past 8 years or so, including one coming up in November. Having said that, your TA is correct, it is not guaranteed.

[Gpilon]

13 hours ago, cindivan said:

Are you referring to the additional $$ on RSSC, or ones you book yourself?    I totally agree smaller excursions are generally so much better.  

I am referring to those offered by RSSC with an additional cost. We think they are very good. 

[UUNetBill]

16 hours ago, wcsdkqh said:

Generally speaking, if you book both the domestic and international segments on the same ticket with the same airline, the domestic part will be first class. At least this has been our experience for multiple cruises over the past 8 years or so, including one coming up in November. Having said that, your TA is correct, it is not guaranteed.

II was going to say the same thing - I'm pretty sure every domestic leg we've taken on the same airline and same ticket has been First Class when connecting to International Business Class.  Not guaranteed, of course, but highly probable.  Of course, we choose our own flights to send to the air desk, and when you select them it shows you what class you'll be in.