Does NCL add excursions after final payment?

[Kariz]

We booked a Panama Canal cruise for Dec 2024 and were told the Panama Canal excursions will be added at a later date. Final payment was made and still no excursions. Is this a thing? Do they add excursions after final payment? 

[DrUrsula]

Yes. 40 days out and excursions for one of our stops just posted yesterday. The other ports were posted months ago and new ones added every now and then.

Edited August 9 by DrUrsula

[shof515]

sometimes they do and i also noticed they sometimes add excursions on embarkation day so keep checking 

[julig22]

They add excursions anytime they get a contract signed. It can be years before or at the last minute.

Only consistent timing is that in their infinite wisdom they've decided to not post post-cruise port to airport excursions until day 50. For their convenience, to correspond with when they've theoretically made flight arrangements.

[BirdTravels]

3 hours ago, Kariz said:

We booked a Panama Canal cruise for Dec 2024 and were told the Panama Canal excursions will be added at a later date. Final payment was made and still no excursions. Is this a thing? Do they add excursions after final payment? 

NCL does not “run” any excursions. They are all subcontracted out to local tour providers. And it in NCL’s best interest to publish excursions as soon as contracts are signed to maximize the number of participants. 
 

That being said, there are some locations where getting reliable tour vendors to commit is harder. So posting of tours is delayed. 

Edited August 9 by BirdTravels

[Middleager]

We were on Getaway TA cruise at the end of 2021, when cruising just re-started after (and still during) Covid.

 

Also on the first Panama cruise of the Jewel in early/2022.  Excursions were being added as the sailing dates get closer.  For the Getaway TA cruise, passengers were not allowed onto 3rd party excursions, all had to be NCL contracted excursions, so it was even more important for NCL to secure excursions.  We had to pay a high price (close to US$300/p)for a NCL excursion to Pisa/Florence, while a 3rd party company would charge $99/p and we all waited till the last minute hoping the restriction would be lifted but it wasn't.

[zqvol]

Short answer they add excursions when they arrange them sometimes up to a few days before sailing. 

[PelicanBill]

There are a LOT of discussions going on about cruises through this year that did not have many excursions (or none!) well after final payment date.  NCL seems to be struggling to get them up on cruises as soon as September right now.

 

My own is November 17 and we have a port with 9 and another with 1 excursion. We are 3 weeks past final payment.

[BirdTravels]

We had a cruise to Bermuda last year. A port that has an NCL ship there 6 days a week. 
 

But, we were on a one-off cruise and there were no excursions listed until about a month before departure.