HAL future shorex 7:30am departure times -- placeholders?

[Turtles06]

We'll be on the Rotterdam for 21 days this summer cruising the Norwegian fjords and also up to the North Cape, and are really looking forward to it.  Lots of ports, and we've planned a mix of DIY days, private tours, and some HAL shorex (given the HIA promotion and the fact that in some of the small towns, HAL is the best option).

 

Over the past few months, as we've been setting up tours, I noticed that many of the HAL shorex, in port after port, showed departure times of 7:30am (after a 7am arrival in port), including for excursions for which that time made little sense.   We nonetheless booked a couple of those shorex since we wanted to do them, but it struck me that the departure times might be placeholders.  Interestingly, in the past few days, we've received emails from HAL moving those shorex departure times to 9am and 10:30am, "due to operational reasons."   We're totally happy with the new times, but I have never encountered a situation with ship-sponsored tours available for booking that showed such early departure times.  

 

This will only be our second HAL cruise, and I was just curious as to whether this might be a "placeholder" thing that HAL does while it works out the specific timing arrangements with the actual tour operator.  

 

 

[Banditswife]

I think so, we had a cruise in Nov/Dec 2022 that I thought departure times for tours were odd.  As it turned out, some times changed when on board & others ended up being a "meet up time." 

[Dutchman48]

On 1/13/2023 at 8:20 AM, Turtles06 said:

We'll be on the Rotterdam for 21 days this summer cruising the Norwegian fjords and also up to the North Cape, and are really looking forward to it.  Lots of ports, and we've planned a mix of DIY days, private tours, and some HAL shorex (given the HIA promotion and the fact that in some of the small towns, HAL is the best option).

 

Over the past few months, as we've been setting up tours, I noticed that many of the HAL shorex, in port after port, showed departure times of 7:30am (after a 7am arrival in port), including for excursions for which that time made little sense.   We nonetheless booked a couple of those shorex since we wanted to do them, but it struck me that the departure times might be placeholders.  Interestingly, in the past few days, we've received emails from HAL moving those shorex departure times to 9am and 10:30am, "due to operational reasons."   We're totally happy with the new times, but I have never encountered a situation with ship-sponsored tours available for booking that showed such early departure times.  

 

This will only be our second HAL cruise, and I was just curious as to whether this might be a "placeholder" thing that HAL does while it works out the specific timing arrangements with the actual tour operator.  

 

 

The shorex times are like you said a place holder for the first few excursions.  I have however found that stated times come pretty close, it just depends on how long it takes them to clear port after arrival.

The same seems to go for independent tours I have booked, tour operators keep a close eye on arrival and departure times and adjust accordingly.

[Arizona Wildcat]

You also are dealing with lots of new tour operators.  Times can and will change.  It really never mattered to me of a tour began at 8am or 8:30.

What was important is it did not start before we were able to disembark and got us back before sailaway.