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On 7/10/2023 at 12:21 PM, Harters said:

I regularly play on the Tripadvisor Tenerife forum (which we visit annually) where these two companies are consistently recommended. Mentioned almost as often as the "one ot avoid" - Goldcar.

Yes, Cicar is good and have heard good things about AutoReisen. Tried to rent a car for this Christmas period from Santa Cruz Port and the only company I could find open over this period at the port was a company called Comauto. Well, their customer service is terrible and I'm still awaiting a reply to my queries over a month later! Tried to call them at every office in Tenerife in June and they had gone on holiday for a month, I found out later from their Facebook page. Unfortunately the Cicar office is closed at the port when we are there, so we have had to rent from them at the northern airport.

On 7/10/2023 at 12:03 AM, Hlitner said:

We have rented a car (several times) on Palma and always enjoyed our DIY freedom to go where we want, when we want. without being stuck with 60 or our "friends."   We generally rent from CICAR (you can walk to their downtown office from the port) although we suggest checking out the competition.  It took us 3 visits to have enough to explore most of the island.  Like most places, it is very helpful to have a working cell phone to use as a GPS.  Otherwise, you might want to rent a GPS system from the car dealer.

 

Hank

Yes, we too love our freedom and prefer to do our own thing on our trips. Really not a fan of coach trips and spending such limited time at each stop, then taking 2 hours for lunch (when we'd rather be exploring). We are just a bit wary of hiring a car on a cruise, as I'd be scared about getting back to the ship on time. We will do it on this trip in Tenerife as we do an overnight there, so can get back to the ship late evening. It's a shame some of the port car hire places are closed over the Christmas period too and you have to hire from the airports, which takes up valuable time getting to and from said airports to pick up/drop off the car. Thanks for your reply though Hank and will surely hire a car if we go back to La Palma.

On 7/7/2023 at 1:15 PM, tring said:

 

Our favourite has got to be La Palma, partly because of how well we know the island and the bus routes, so we can get around easily even on a port stop.  It is still a beautiful, unspoilt island though.  At the end of the time when we went regularly, they started to take bigger ships and construct a man made beach in Santa Cruz de La Palma.  A bigger ships were quite a shock, having been used to arriving with just our small, (700 pax max), ship.  On one visit the QM2 was there with us, so we looked at each other and said, "Los Cancajos" (the nearby small resort where we stayed on the land holiday).  So we hopped on a bus to there, took a stroll around including along the quiet scenic coastal path and had a small relaxing lunch in a local restaurant, before, walking back to Santa Cruz as we had done a number of times previously.  We then took in a bit more of Santa Cruz and went  into our favourite bar there in the evening before our late departure.   On a visit since the pandemic, we have sadly found that friendly, local bar has changed hands and become a very different type of place. 

 

We went to La Gomera regularly and El Hierro once on Fred's Braemar about 6-7 years ago when she was sailing out of Tenerife to Cape Verde, the Canaries and Madeira, each November/December before going over to the Caribbean.  We went for three years on a back to back basis, getting really good deals by using his "buy two get one free" deals at the time.  We really like the bigger Canary ports at that time as well, with the Christmas lights on - particularly Tenerife and Madeira and there was so much variety of what we could do in each port, at a pleasant but not popular and touristy time of year.  We only went to El Hierro once and it was not popular with most passengers as it was a cloudy, drizzly morning with the tours all returning about lunch time and the small local "town" was largely closed as it was a Sunday.  With the hire care we did have restricted views in the mountainous part of the island in the morning, but then went over to the far side of the island, near the coast, arriving at a visitor centre just before a tour group left.  The weather cleared whilst we were there and the views along the coast were brilliant.  We then went on to some very quiet, remote parts of the coast along some small roads, finding a local bar where we had some Tapas.  A really good day for us, though Fred has not been to El Hierro since then.  I presume because of the unpopularity with most passengers, though that is sad, since it is a very quiet, very unspoilt, but beautiful island.  Just not a lot there apart from the scenery.  Fred does call at some unusual ports, though sadly his three smallest ships are no longer sailing for him.

 

Barbara 

 

 

Thanks Barbara for all the info and good to know that La Palma is your fav! Yes, sadly mass tourism is invading every corner of the earth these days and making everywhere so crowded, which takes a little bit of the enjoyment away! Hope to visit all the canaries in time.  It's a shame Fred no longer sails to El Hierro, as I like quiet and unspoilt locations and a chance to get away from the crowds for a short time, as least.

On 7/3/2023 at 11:38 AM, tring said:

 

We have used cicar in La Gomera and El Heiro on cruise visits and having now driven in Lanzarote on a land holiday, would be happy to use one there as well, but on reflection, probably best to skip the idea on La Palma, unless you just wanted to pooter around the south of the Island. 

 

I did write a lot for my previous post, getting a bit carried away, reminiscing about our really good holiday in La Palma.

 

Which is your favourite Canary Island Tring? Which cruise did you do that included La Gomera and El Hierro for future reference please? Thanks

8 hours ago, 9265359 said:

 

Ah, well in that case then its Cicar and AutoReisen, but AutoReisen tend to only have offices at the airports, whereas Cicar has them at the airports, in the towns, and usually at the port terminals (they are the one with the logo designed by César Manrique, the artist, sculptor from Lanzarote).

 

When I hired from Cicar in February in Fuerteventura I booked the car, went to their office in town to collect it and they said "it's in that street up around there, it's half-full of fuel, bring it back the same, and here are the keys". A week later I go back to the office, hand over the keys and tell them it is parked in a street a few hundred yards away and they are "that's fine".

Thanks for the info! Did use Cicar/Cabrera Medina last year in Lanzarote and agree, they are very good and we liked that there were no extra fees.

On 6/30/2023 at 5:42 PM, tring said:

As Molecrochip suggests, if you are keen to have more info. you can email P&O who will send provisional times, we did this for a forthcoming cruise in September.  No point asking too early, but it took a couple of weeks for the reply, so do not leave it too late either.

 

Most of the time we are quite happy with the approximations on the cruise schedule, do only done that once.  Of course they can still change.

 

 

Yes, will drop them a line...tried to call them yesterday, but was hold for ages, so hung up.

3 hours ago, besberry said:

If you go to a shore excursion site such as https://www.shoreexcursionsgroup.com/ then you should be able to find all the times.  They've never been wrong for me yet!

Thanks...will check them out there.

Thanks so much Tring for your reply! I think we will probably take the ship excursion to the caldera national park, which is half a day and then look around the town for the other half. Would definitely have gotten a car if we had longer and we can always go back if we like it and spend more time there.

Thanks for the replies

Hi all - will be doing a Christmas cruise on Azura departing Tenerife on Dec 23. Arrives back in Tenerife on Dec 29 with an overnight in port, before we disembark for the flight home on the 30th. Thinking of hiring a car for the whole day on the 29th and would like to book it soon, but have no idea at what time (roughly) we will be able to get off the ship. Booking only says "early morning". Does anyone have a rough idea of a docking/disembarkation time? Checked Santa Cruz port schedule, but the Azura schedule is one of the few arrival/departure times that are blank.

Many thanks.

Hi all - will be taking a Christmas cruise on Azura this year and wondered whether anyone has rented a car on La Palma v's doing a ship excursion? Have done several cruises before with different companies, but have never hired our own car for the day. Any personal recommendations for the ship excursions?

Many thanks