Disappointed Sun not going to Santorini on June 8th.

[Globaler]

Going to Crete instead - said it was ship congestion. 🙁

[Lady Arwen]

Ship happens!  Itineraries are never written in stone and can change weeks, days, or even hours, before you receive notification.  All part of cruising, unfortunately.

Edited April 22 by Lady Arwen

[TRLD]

Personally having been to both several times, I would rather go to Crete on that size ship. 

 

But do feel sorry for those that have not ever been to Santorini.

 

These days too many ships and too many people in Santorini on any given day.

[shakuyi]

cruise ship congestion sounds like poor planning on the boats and port, sucks that consumers have to deal with those poor planners. Not like they dont plan these ports out years in advance.

[Esprit]

In that case our 13th August Sun visit to Santorini will be doubtful. I've checked what other ships are in that day and the passenger total would be almost 12,000!

We've been many times but always enjoy returning. For first timers I can imagine the disappointment.

Crete is a poor substitute IMHO

 

[azbirdmom]

Yes, it seems there's more news like that to come.  Saw this article last week https://greekreporter.com/2024/04/15/cruise-ship-cancels-santorini-visit-overcrowding/?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR3YHNRyUnT8tDUHJC5Krp-Sb_x2iZuRZdhWvKg3MchsDpdYZyo3_yjsS_g_aem_AWXbTjQvEJjBPrcrHo_zB6rcl1eI1IPIZRUXvjoZHq67GieTuhA6y5_TBmxrUmyxkqiaJfpmixXna4i3x7Kbay6I

[hpeabody]

5 hours ago, Esprit said:

In that case our 13th August Sun visit to Santorini will be doubtful. I've checked what other ships are in that day and the passenger total would be almost 12,000!

We've been many times but always enjoy returning. For first timers I can imagine the disappointment.

Crete is a poor substitute IMHO

 

I can not begin to imagine the wait for for the cable car to get down with 12,000 people.  You would likely have to spend half the time there waiting in the line. I see this kind of thing happening with more and more Mega Monstrosities being built.  Sad for those who prefer lovely ports over the ship.  I have no plan to ever board one of those Mega Monstrosities,  IMO / YMMV 

[Sox Fan Cruiser]

Yeah, it’s totally because of the cable cars. Things started getting dicey when we were there. The heat.  A lot of foot traffic congestion right at the entrance. And people waiting in line for a long time.  We could feel the negative energy in the air building and so we walked down. Only took 25 minutes. There were people waiting for over 90 minutes and we were the only ship in port. 
 

Not a cruise friendly port. 

Edited April 22 by Sox Fan Cruiser

[leck57]

49 minutes ago, hpeabody said:

I can not begin to imagine the wait for for the cable car to get down with 12,000 people.  You would likely have to spend half the time there waiting in the line. I see this kind of thing happening with more and more Mega Monstrosities being built.  Sad for those who prefer lovely ports over the ship.  I have no plan to ever board one of those Mega Monstrosities,  IMO / YMMV 

 

Arriving in Santorini on a smaller ship may not be any benefit if there are also a number of the Mega Monstrosities there the same day. The number of people there will still be high.

[cynbar]

I agree that things happen and ports are sometimes missed, but in the past it has generally been due to unforeseen events such as weather, port workers strikes, etc. The Sun this season has 2 ports switched last minute for reasons that should have been known in advance ---- Santorini on days with too many ships, Kotor (perhaps) because the Sun is too large for the narrow channel. We are still scheduled to call on Kotor on our June 15 Sun cruise, but I'm not too hopeful. These two ports just seem like poor planning on Princess' part. It's also unfair if they did know this in advance but still advertised the ports, only switching them at the very last minute. I won't be devastated if Kotor is changed to Bar, but I will be disappointed in Princess.

[JimmyVWine]

6 hours ago, Esprit said:

In that case our 13th August Sun visit to Santorini will be doubtful. I've checked what other ships are in that day and the passenger total would be almost 12,000!

We've been many times but always enjoy returning. For first timers I can imagine the disappointment.

Crete is a poor substitute IMHO

 

You might be OK.  The passenger load for the 8th would have been just under 16,000.  Apparently, cruise lines have been meeting with the island tourism board trying to get the island to cap out its cruise ship capacity at around 8,000-10,000 per day, but no deal was reached.  We'll never know which cruise lines reserved space in what order, so we can't know if it was Princess, Costa, Royal or MSC that was the straw that broke the camel's back.  But given that Princess is the cruise line that decided that its passengers would not benefit from a port stop with 16,000 people descending on the island, it seems unlikely that Princess was the last to secure its spot.  More likely, Princess slotted itself in when the total passenger load was around 12,000 and when one more ship joined the party to drive the number up to 16,000, Princess pulled the plug.  It is a shame that passengers have to bear the brunt of this, but it seems as if Princess, is intent on calling the island's bluff and perhaps drive them back to the bargaining table to get a workable passenger limit finally put into place.  All that said, circumstantial evidence suggests that Princess would have considered 12,000 people to be workable, but 16,000 was not.  So maybe you will be OK.

[JimmyVWine]

4 minutes ago, cynbar said:

These two ports just seem like poor planning on Princess' part.

See my post above.  It isn't necessarily poor planning by Princess.  It might be poor planning by some other cruise line, but Princess is the one willing to back out to give its passengers a better experience.  If Princess is the ship that caused the passenger load to go from 11,500 to 16,000, and then Princess decided that 16,000 was too many, then yeah, that would be poor planning. But it is unlikely that they could have missed that fact.  More likely, Princess was one of the first 11,500 to lock in, and some other line decided, (along with the island) that 16,000 would be just fine, and Princess said, "Nope" and pulled out.  Perhaps that happened in Kotor.  We'll see. 

[SCX22]

You won't be missing anything.  Santorini is more of pain than a pleasure as a cruise ship passenger because you get dropped off at the bottom of a cliff and you're at the mercy of a cable car with not enough capacity, donkeys, or a path full of donkey dung to get to town--all of which are terrible options.

[Sox Fan Cruiser]

46 minutes ago, SCX22 said:

You won't be missing anything.  Santorini is more of pain than a pleasure as a cruise ship passenger because you get dropped off at the bottom of a cliff and you're at the mercy of a cable car with not enough capacity, donkeys, or a path full of donkey dung to get to town--all of which are terrible options.

You are absolutely missing something. Santorini is one of my top 5 most beautiful places on Earth. But I agree, the cable car only access is horrible and not a good experience. I spent my honeymoon here (not on a cruise) and it’s absolutely stunning. But it’s not a good cruise port. And I think that’s what you were saying. 

[SCX22]

16 minutes ago, Sox Fan Cruiser said:

You are absolutely missing something. Santorini is one of my top 5 most beautiful places on Earth. But I agree, the cable car only access is horrible and not a good experience. I spent my honeymoon here (not on a cruise) and it’s absolutely stunning. But it’s not a good cruise port. And I think that’s what you were saying. 

 

Years ago, Santorini was amazing.  Now, it's bombarded with tourists.  No joy for me at all.  Even before the pandemic, Fira was an absolute zoo.  It's a shame if people didn't get to see it before all the overtourism. 

[TRLD]

3 hours ago, azbirdmom said:

Yes, it seems there's more news like that to come.  Saw this article last week https://greekreporter.com/2024/04/15/cruise-ship-cancels-santorini-visit-overcrowding/?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR3YHNRyUnT8tDUHJC5Krp-Sb_x2iZuRZdhWvKg3MchsDpdYZyo3_yjsS_g_aem_AWXbTjQvEJjBPrcrHo_zB6rcl1eI1IPIZRUXvjoZHq67GieTuhA6y5_TBmxrUmyxkqiaJfpmixXna4i3x7Kbay6I

Good article.

 

Unfortunately almost all excursions end in Fira resulting in massive crowds, and long lines to get down to the old port.

 

Kind of surprised that a ship doesn't do both drop off and tender pick in the new port and run a shuttle bus. That means way their passengers could visit Santorini, do excursions, visit Fira, but not have to deal with the team crowds to/from the old port.

[TRLD]

1 hour ago, JimmyVWine said:

See my post above.  It isn't necessarily poor planning by Princess.  It might be poor planning by some other cruise line, but Princess is the one willing to back out to give its passengers a better experience.  If Princess is the ship that caused the passenger load to go from 11,500 to 16,000, and then Princess decided that 16,000 was too many, then yeah, that would be poor planning. But it is unlikely that they could have missed that fact.  More likely, Princess was one of the first 11,500 to lock in, and some other line decided, (along with the island) that 16,000 would be just fine, and Princess said, "Nope" and pulled out.  Perhaps that happened in Kotor.  We'll see. 

Or it may be that even though the destination was locked in that the anchor position and tender timing assigned by the port authority may not have acceptable.

 

Santorini has some of the tightest controls for cruise ship passengers going to and getting picked up by tender. Not surprising considering  the passenger loads on the tram.

 

Was there last October on a 50 passenger ship. Even that ship had to use one of their tenders to get to/from shore. We had a window of 15 minutes for the tender to get to shore. And a set time for then tender back. No other option. We arrived as the large ships were leaving for an evening visit, and absolutely Noone around when it was time to leave.

 

 

[Tranquility Base]

2 hours ago, Sox Fan Cruiser said:

Yeah, it’s totally because of the cable cars.

 

2 hours ago, Sox Fan Cruiser said:

 

Not a cruise friendly port. 

Why isn't the ferry port used for some of the tender returns to the ship as well as the existing options from Fira?

 

 

 

Edited April 23 by Tranquility Base

[Senga]

We knew Santorini was a MUST for us when we were planning a vacation and read that often cruise ships can't make it in to port.  For this reason we did a Greece land vacation and it was fantastic.  Pays to do research and know what's important to you.

Edited April 23 by Senga

[Esprit]

11 hours ago, SCX22 said:

You won't be missing anything.  Santorini is more of pain than a pleasure as a cruise ship passenger because you get dropped off at the bottom of a cliff and you're at the mercy of a cable car with not enough capacity, donkeys, or a path full of donkey dung to get to town--all of which are terrible options.

Where's your spirit of adventure!

We've gone up all 588 steps and down a couple of times. It's fun dodging the donkeys when you see a train of them coming towards you. We also wear older shoes so we aren't bothered by what we might tread in!

A refreshing beer at the end is so much more rewarding too. 

[capriccio]

13 hours ago, SCX22 said:

You won't be missing anything.  Santorini is more of pain than a pleasure as a cruise ship passenger because you get dropped off at the bottom of a cliff and you're at the mercy of a cable car with not enough capacity, donkeys, or a path full of donkey dung to get to town--all of which are terrible options.

Santorini is beautiful but even on our first visit (vacation for 5 days in 1998) it was obvious to me that the port would reach its breaking point sooner or later.  Actually I'm amazed that it was 25 years later.

[JimmyVWine]

12 hours ago, TRLD said:

Or it may be that even though the destination was locked in that the anchor position and tender timing assigned by the port authority may not have acceptable.

Another real world possibility.  I think that the only fair conclusion is that Princess cancelled the port because it concluded that the passenger experience would be suboptimal and not because some Goofus working in Santa Clarita made some colossal mistake.  All I know for certain are the following facts:

• Princess was among the cruise lines lobbying the island to limit the passenger load to around 10,000.
• That effort has so far failed.
• The passenger load on the day in question was expected to be around 16,000.
• Princess pulled out.   

[JimmyVWine]

12 hours ago, Tranquility Base said:

 

Why isn't the ferry port used for some of the tender returns to the ship as well as the existing options from Fira?

 

 

 

That wouldn't be much better.  Even if you are dropped off at the ferry port (Thira), you still have to make your way up the winding switchback road by vehicle. 4,000 people at 40 people per bus would mean 100 busloads of people going up that road at 5 mph with buses passing one another in opposite directions.  There just aren't enough buses or taxis on the island to transport that many people. My daughter walked it with her friends when they arrived on an intra-island ferry but she admitted that that was a serious overestimation of how fun and how difficult it would be.  It took over an hour, and they were walking to an Air BnB.  Once you get up the road, you really aren't anywhere where a tourist from a cruise ship wants to be.  So motorized transport is really the only option.

 

The ferry port can barely handle the load of people with ship-booked excursions.  Putting all the people into that port would overwhelm it especially with regularly scheduled ferry traffic being added to the mix.  Quite simply, no matter where one arrives, the trek up to the places that the tourists want to go to is arduous and logistically taxing.  Honestly, the cable car is the "perfect" solution provided that the number of people needing to use it on any given day is held in check.  The only "negative" to the cable car is the ridiculous line that forms to get back to the ships in the afternoon.  Cut that number of people in half and it's perfectly workable.  As the ships get larger and larger, Santorini is becoming more and more like Venice where the major cruise lines are risking having to take it off the board.

[JordanF]

Sorry you are missing this island.  We did a cruise day there a few years ago and it was delightful.  However, it was pretty full back then (about 10 years ago), and I do think that adding thousands more would have detracted from our visit.  

[deadzone1003]

If the Sun Princess had gone, you would have a not very positive experience.  We were there in 2010 and there were about 3 panamax ships, around 6,000 passengers, and it was crowded then.  We were there last September for 4 nights - one of those days there were cruise ships with a passenger count exceeding 10,000, it was like Venice.  On days like that, you can only hope to get a taste of Santorini because you will be waiting in line to get up and down the cable car.  Though early June doesn't have the summer heat yet, there is really no shade in Santorini so it is effectively hotter than the listed temperature.  Crete is no substitute for Santorini, but Santorini should be done at a leisurely pace so coming to Santorini by a cruise ship is perhaps your worst option (unless you can find a cruise ship that comes for an overnight, unfortunately, I haven't found one yet).