Post-cruise excursions with airport transfer not available until day 50

[julig22]

If anyone is wondering why there aren't any airport transfer excursions, NCL, in their infinite wisdom (NOT!) has decided to wait until day 50 to release post-cruise excursions. Makes planning just that more difficult IMHO. But, true to their word, they did magically appear at day 50 for my upcoming cruise.

[Karaboudjan]

4 hours ago, julig22 said:

If anyone is wondering why there aren't any airport transfer excursions, NCL, in their infinite wisdom (NOT!) has decided to wait until day 50 to release post-cruise excursions. Makes planning just that more difficult IMHO. But, true to their word, they did magically appear at day 50 for my upcoming cruise.

 

Maybe this has something to do with air promotion ticketing being done around that timeframe?

[julig22]

5 hours ago, Karaboudjan said:

 

Maybe this has something to do with air promotion ticketing being done around that timeframe?

Sort of. Too many people booking, then cancelling once they got their flights if it didn't work out.  I've had my flights for weeks but still nothing until day 50. In the past I'd been told to book it ahead of time and the folks doing the flights would look to see if they could book a later flight.

And if I'm booking my own flights/hotels, I'm probably going to book them more than 50 days out.

Maybe they could list what they plan to offer and require your flight info before you are allowed to book? The lady I spoke to when I called was kinda rude about it - she thought it was a great idea, saved them a lot of time and effort. Oh well, more business for the local tour guides...

[schmoopie17]

This must be new. We scheduled the NCL Miami tour, followed by airport drop-off a few weeks ago,

[julig22]

13 minutes ago, schmoopie17 said:

This must be new. We scheduled the NCL Miami tour, followed by airport drop-off a few weeks ago,

Yea, it's new, probably affecting anything going forward. Guessing they won't pull any that have already been offered.

[Anoynmous Phoenix]

@julig22

 

Guessing they won't pull any that have already been offered.

 

I have had at least one pulled while on the ship; too few takers.

[kjquilts]

For the Spirit April 22, 2024 cruise they are showing two airport transfer excursions ....

 

[julig22]

1 hour ago, Anoynmous Phoenix said:

@julig22

 

Guessing they won't pull any that have already been offered.

 

I have had at least one pulled while on the ship; too few takers.

Had that happen once also. And they also cancelled the regular shuttle - that didn't go over well with me!  But they reversed that decision, fortunately.

By already been offered, I meant on the website.

[ontheweb]

On our cruise this summer on the Prima, DW said we are not spending hours and hours at the airport, therefore I am booking an excursion to the airport. There were supposed to be two available, but one disappeared. And that one was her first choice of course. But it really did work out as that one was a hike and it poured all day. And the one that we did take, the Perclan Musuem, a museum about the geology of Iceland turned out to be fascinating. 😊

 

But unfortunately, we did spend a lot of time at the airport as our plane was delayed. 😢

 

BTW, this was in Reykjavik.

Edited October 31, 2023 by ontheweb
added last paragraph

[julig22]

57 minutes ago, ontheweb said:

On our cruise this summer on the Prima, DW said we are not spending hours and hours at the airport, therefore I am booking an excursion to the airport. There were supposed to be two available, but one disappeared. And that one was her first choice of course. But it really did work out as that one was a hike and it poured all day. And the one that we did take, the Perclan Musuem, a museum about the geology of Iceland turned out to be fascinating. 😊

 

But unfortunately, we did spend a lot of time at the airport as our plane was delayed. 😢

 

BTW, this was in Reykjavik.

I've taken them several times. In fact, I just booked a cruise ending in Reykjavik in June - and it would be nice to see what's offered.  In most cases, it is what it is, more or less but in April, my cruise ends in Seward, too early for train service and some bus routes. And I'll be doing my own airfare, so it would be nice to know if they'll offer the trip that goes to the wildlife center for example.

My flight on my upcoming cruise doesn't leave until almost midnight so anything helps!

[Anoynmous Phoenix]

Another annoyance, along the same lines, is that there are no ship to ship tours for those on B2B cruises.

 

What would also be nice would be to offer tours that go ship-airport-ship that would cover both sets of travellers and would, more than likely, get enough custom to have them run.

[ontheweb]

13 hours ago, julig22 said:

I've taken them several times. In fact, I just booked a cruise ending in Reykjavik in June - and it would be nice to see what's offered.  In most cases, it is what it is, more or less but in April, my cruise ends in Seward, too early for train service and some bus routes. And I'll be doing my own airfare, so it would be nice to know if they'll offer the trip that goes to the wildlife center for example.

My flight on my upcoming cruise doesn't leave until almost midnight so anything helps!

Good luck finding something to occupy your time before such a late flight.

 

Our best to the airport excursion was on Princess from Dover to Heathrow. It included a walking tour of Dover and a visit to Canterbury. We also knew a few people on the tour, and it made it feel like we were still on our vacation, not just leaving the cruise for the airport.

 

We also once had a to the airport excursion booked from Southampton to Heathrow with a visit to Stonehenge. Unfortunately, that was in the summer of 2020, and never happened because of Covid. That was also through Princess, and they do not wait for 50 days to make them available. We had booked that tour with Stonehenge well before final payment was due. (We actually with a refundable deposit canceled before final payment as we saw the cruise would never sail. Princess waited until after final payment was due to cancel the cruise.)

[julig22]

4 hours ago, ontheweb said:

Good luck finding something to occupy your time before such a late flight.

 

Our best to the airport excursion was on Princess from Dover to Heathrow. It included a walking tour of Dover and a visit to Canterbury. We also knew a few people on the tour, and it made it feel like we were still on our vacation, not just leaving the cruise for the airport.

 

We also once had a to the airport excursion booked from Southampton to Heathrow with a visit to Stonehenge. Unfortunately, that was in the summer of 2020, and never happened because of Covid. That was also through Princess, and they do not wait for 50 days to make them available. We had booked that tour with Stonehenge well before final payment was due. (We actually with a refundable deposit canceled before final payment as we saw the cruise would never sail. Princess waited until after final payment was due to cancel the cruise.)

I was able to book an excursion when they finally posted them. It's listed as 6 hours, so still have a long time at the airport.

I also had the Stonehenge tour booked in 2020, that didn't happen.

The 50 days is new unfortunately.

[rnfulk]

I hope this is also why I can’t book a regular post cruise airport transfer for my January 2024 cruise. I don’t want to deal with taxis or Ubers or whatnot so fingers crossed it will change at day 50.  

[Karaboudjan]

13 minutes ago, rnfulk said:

I hope this is also why I can’t book a regular post cruise airport transfer for my January 2024 cruise. I don’t want to deal with taxis or Ubers or whatnot so fingers crossed it will change at day 50.  

 

I appear to be able to book a regular airport transfer for my cruise in February 2024 under Summary/Transfers on the desktop web site...

[julig22]

44 minutes ago, Karaboudjan said:

 

I appear to be able to book a regular airport transfer for my cruise in February 2024 under Summary/Transfers on the desktop web site...

Regular airport transfer, yes. It's the post-cruise excursions ending at the airport that they aren't posting until day 50.

Edited November 1, 2023 by julig22

[ontheweb]

1 hour ago, julig22 said:

I was able to book an excursion when they finally posted them. It's listed as 6 hours, so still have a long time at the airport.

I also had the Stonehenge tour booked in 2020, that didn't happen.

The 50 days is new unfortunately.

My DW was actually looking forward more to the excursion including Stonehenge then to the actual cruise to the Norwegian fjords. We did get to see some fjord ports such as Geiranger on our cruise this past summer.

[ontheweb]

44 minutes ago, Karaboudjan said:

 

I appear to be able to book a regular airport transfer for my cruise in February 2024 under Summary/Transfers on the desktop web site...

A regular airport transfer is not the same as an excursion transfer that takes you some other place before the airport.

[rnfulk]

58 minutes ago, Karaboudjan said:

 

I appear to be able to book a regular airport transfer for my cruise in February 2024 under Summary/Transfers on the desktop web site...

Thank you for letting me know. I’ve only tried to book on the app. It will find my flight information, but tell me its not available to book. I’ll try the desktop website to see if I have better luck. 

[rnfulk]

17 minutes ago, ontheweb said:

A regular airport transfer is not the same as an excursion transfer that takes you some other place before the airport.

They were quoting my post regarding my difficulty booking a regular airport transfer. I think everyone understands the difference. I just thought my issue could be related to timing discussed in this post. Karaboudjan confirmed that wasn’t the case.