MAVIP

Last time we were in Valencia, Holland America (or was it the port?) had a shuttle bus availabla to the entrance of the inner city. A taxi to the Plaza de la Reine takes about 15 minutes.

It is a bit complicated, but you remembered the reasons correctly. The changing of the Amsterdam Tourist tax did not concern the ships embarking and disembarking passengers in Amsterdam. Only the ships just calling Amsterdam.

https://sea.cruiseportamsterdam.com/adjusted-passage-regime-at-ijmuiden-sea-lock-affects-calls-at-cruise-port-amsterdam/ See here the message of July 26th 2022 about the adjustments.

Hallasm is right, Roterdam is a different forum location. But anyway: right accross the street of the cruise terminal is a nice hotel: Hotel New York, in the former head office of Holland Amerika Lijn. Nice location and close to the center and 5/7 minutes walk to Metro. And, with a shuttle to cruise terminal for cruisepassengers: ss Rotterdam (Rotterdam V) now a hotel in the port of Rotterdam, not far from the terminal. Enjoy your stay and the cruise!

And be in time for the bus, because they do not run every x-minutes! We missed it a few years ago and had to go by taxi we met during our walk back to the terminal (perfect by the way, he was back in Taormina for our returntrip at the time of our appointment and we paid after he brought the four of us back as close to the ship as possible. Not all Sicilian taxi drivers are - you name it. )

Our 4th visit and 3rd time from the cruiseterminal to Sagrada Familia this spring and we will,. like before, take the shuttle from terminal to "Columbus"; cross the street/place to Metro station Drassane and travel by Metro. Simple, fast and cheap. Enjoy your visit!

Can you imagine: discussion in a minute from NZ to NL and back 😉

Please see #2 where you will find it too https://sea.cruiseportamsterdam.com/cruise-calendar/

Interesting, especially for Cellar 2 and 3 bottles 🤣

You will see from the calendar that it will be Cruise Port Amsterdam. Close (walkable distance) to the center of Amsterdam, Centraal Station, and other public transport. I suggest you visit the website once in a while, so you will notice any change in the coming months. Enjoy your cruise and your stay in Holland!

The date of departure or arrival? https://sea.cruiseportamsterdam.com/cruise-calendar/

I think you will start from the Moyenne Corniche (middle road from Nice to Monaco etc)? It will take you maybe 10 minutes to the entrance. Anyway there is a tourist office close to where you start. I just found this page and it might help you to plan your visit to this very very nice village https://wanderingcarol.com/village-of-eze-france/

No warnings at this very moment, so no warning for high levels or low levels. Quite a few pages with all waterlevels, but the pages with warning signs: all signs green at this very moment. I hope I read them in the correct way.

Pre pandemic we paid f.e. the € 136 you mention (Service changed in the meantime from 15 to 18%). In you example we paid € 118 on the Rotterdam last year (one of three cruises we did not buy HIA).

Colin, I had a discussion with the HD about this, because I thought it was a mistake that we got 50% reduction on the price of the 8 bottle package INCLUDING the 18%. The answer was that they got too many complaints and decided to skip the method you mention. IMO the work for personnel is the same.....

Pity, those crutches of my husband just enabled us to disembark and mount/decend the steps of the cave. But if my memory is not failing me, the cruise itself was absolutely longer than 30 minutes. If I fiond time I could check the photo's....

Good morning John, In 2017 It was a Holland America Shore Excursion of 3 1/2 hours . "Halong Bay Cruise and Thien Cung Cave". The cruise and boat were OK, with of course just HAL passengers. The guided tour of Thien Cung Cave was OK too, but what a pity that tourists from a nearby country did not accept to stay behind the tour and guide and.... see above.

Beacause we already would have HAL issued multi entry visa (stop in Hong Kong and back to Vietnam) we did not need to go to the vietnamese embassy for our overnight stay. In 2019.....

Yes, we felt very safe. We stayed at the Hanoi Pearl Hotel, small and very pleasant. By the way I found the touroperators name www.smiletoursvietnam.com; www.specialtoursvietnam.com An american (Cruise critic) couple reserved 2 tours to Hanoi (and Hue) with them and we joined. In 2019 $ 140 per person for Hanoi (hotel not included), for car, driver, guide and the whole programm. 1st night, after a riksja tour we had dinner at Duong's restaurant in the neighbourhood and walked back feeling safe to our hotel. I can send you the programm, but maybe visiting their website is better to see what they offer now. (By the way we visited Halong Bay etc on an earlier cruise, beautufull, absolutely, but indeed crowded and some people do not hesitate to "crawl through you legs" to be in front of you... I in my turn wish you a good weekend from Holland, and of course a perfect cruise. Lenny

Try to find a 2-day tour from Halong Bay to Hanoi. Absolutely worthwhile if your ship has an overnight stop in Halong Bay.

It was in 2015, but we booked for € 50 a taxi for the 4 of us with CAN TAXI https://www.kusadasitaxiport.com/ in Kusadasi for a half day trip to the Ephesus site. From the ship to the taxi was a 5 minutes walk. Our advise: go as early as your can, so before the tourist busses arrive.... CAN Taxi waited for our return at the exit of the site in Ephesus and drove us to other sites we wished to visit that morning. So NO CARPETS. We bought the entrance tickets plus extra tickets for "the villas" (worthwhile!) ourselves. (We paid cash in Euro.) I see they offer Ephesus and House of Virgin Mary now for € 75. The brother of Yucel Bor drove us and we still remember the box of sweets he gave us on the way back. Enjoy your visit!

Thanks and I agree fully with the contents! Just my apologies for the yellow mark: without any doubt you meant so say: Rotterdam VI.

Cannot be used for World Cruises or Grand Voyages

No picture in Navigator, but we have pictures in Verifly and HAL still took pictures at embarkations.

We preferred to go to Rostock. Bij train (short walk to the railway station in Warnemünde) or by riverboat (next to cruise terminal). Rostock is worthwhile.