Avalon - Booking excursions from the UK

We are having real problems booking optional excursions on our upcoming Avalon cruise. This appears to only be affecting UK passengers, our friends in Australia have been able to book their trips.

We’ve spoken to our TA and Avalon direct but they all seem unable to resolve the problem on their website.

Must say it is starting to sour my view of Avalon, shame after such a great cruise two years ago.

Have any UK passengers been able to book excursions via the Avalon website?

Have you tried going to the Avalon US or Aus websites? [it may not be possible, but I have read reports where people where able to override the internet-steering mechanism by entering .com or .au]

I'm sure that I had to go to the US AMA site to book excursions for my Mekong trip; nothing worked from the Canadian site. From the Avalon Canada site (avalonwaterways.ca) there is a Canadian flag in the top right corner and next to it a drop down box to change countries, so it should be possible to view the US site and see whether that works for you.

Thanks for the replies, yes we’ve tried other sites but no joy. It is very frustrating, Avalon say all their UK passengers have the same problem. It’s not a great impression.

No, I can believe that.

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I’ve taken 7 river cruises, mostly with Uniworld but also a couple with Viking and there was never a need to book excursions in advance. I don’t even think that there was an option to do so. However I’m taking one on the Douro with Emerald next month and some weeks ago had to choose whether or not to take two added cost excursions and book them before the cruise.

I’m wondering if my experience with Uniworld and Viking was the exception and that there is a need to book excursions in advance with other cruise lines such as AMA and Avalon as discussed above.

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I’ve taken 7 river cruises, mostly with Uniworld but also a couple with Viking and there was never a need to book excursions in advance. I don’t even think that there was an option to do so. However I’m taking one on the Douro with Emerald next month and some weeks ago had to choose whether or not to take two added cost excursions and book them before the cruise.

 

I’m wondering if my experience with Uniworld and Viking was the exception and that there is a need to book excursions in advance with other cruise lines such as AMA and Avalon as discussed above.

My guess is that pre-registration requirements are based on excursion limitations and/or vendor requirements. On our AMA cruises in Europe we only had to pre-register for the few 'limited edition' excursions, which are restricted to a small number of guests based on the size of the venue [e.g. making baguettes at a real boulangerie] – and for the pre- or -post cruise extensions which require arranging hotel reservations and transfers. For our AMA Discover Africa trip we were required to pre-register for our choice of excursions in Cape Town; one choice goes to Robben Island, the other to wineries – and I suspect they need to tell one or the other vendor how many places to reserve. In all other cases we have been able to choose the evening before, after the Cruise Director's presentation.