No shore excursions?

[Buckeye94]

Is it unusual for a cruise line to not have shore excursions posted for two ports even though we're after final payment? I'm sailing on the Celebrity Solstice May 11, and they haven't posted any shore excursion options for Naples or Florence.

 

I tried calling Celebrity, and they said "soon," "early this week," so I'll keep checking their site. Just wanted to know if this was odd based on more experienced cruiser experience.

 

Thanks!

[Sloop-JohnB]

Is it unusual for a cruise line to not have shore excursions posted for two ports even though we're after final payment? I'm sailing on the Celebrity Solstice May 11, and they haven't posted any shore excursion options for Naples or Florence.

 

I tried calling Celebrity, and they said "soon," "early this week," so I'll keep checking their site. Just wanted to know if this was odd based on more experienced cruiser experience.

 

Thanks!

 

Hi Buckeye94,

 

Hard to say... WHY they aren't available on-line... other than Celebrity's Website ALWAYS leaves a lot to be desired !!

 

BUT then again, it might be the sign of something else going on...

 

I was on the Solstice in January, and just before they changed the Itinerary for our cruising (they switched two ports around) they also did something similar with the website (prior to that one could make Shore Excursion Bookings)... and like you the "party line" was "Sorry for the inconvenience... it'll be fixed soon"

 

Suggest you keep a close eye on things to see what pops up... also be sure and touch base with the folks on your Roll Call... some people there heard sooner than others about the change in our Itinerary... Celebrity was very "willy nilly" about who they told, and who they didn't.

 

Hope this is (somewhat) helpful,

 

Cheers!

[Lsimon]

It does seem odd to me.

 

The excursion booklet for our Sept Solstice cruise has Naples excursions listed so I don't understand why the May cruises don't. We don't go to Florence. Something is wrong with the system and I'd email, or call, the excursion desk.

 

I have an email for them from a recent confirm, Shorex@celebrity.com. But I'd also try calling and see if you can get through to their department or find someone in Customer service who can help you. Sounds like a system glitch.

[pete_coach]

For Naples, it may be a matter of the port itself. On our cruise they had to change port to Salerno because of construction going on in Naples. The excursions had to be changed.

The situation could be the same for the "Florence" port visit. The actual port is Livorno, about 1 1/2 hours from Florence so perhaps they are changing ports there too?

[Orlandocruiser]

Our May 4 Norway cruise has been the same with shore excursions - they have been dribbling onto the website one port at a time over the past two weeks and still none up for Oslo (you would think that port since it is "big" city would have those earlier!) The people who have called about this from our roll call have gotten the same non-answer from Celebrity as you have.

[TMLAalum]

ALL shorexes for our upcoming June were unavailable when I checked over the weekend. What is bizarre is that they were showing for all ports-of-call when I last took a peek several weeks earlier.I'm a little worried that the unrest in Greece may result in some drastic itinerary deviations and that pending changes might have caused the shorex disappearance...

[TLCOhio]

Is it unusual for a cruise line to not have shore excursions posted for two ports even though we're after final payment? I'm sailing on the Celebrity Solstice May 11, and they haven't posted any shore excursion options for Naples or Florence. I tried calling Celebrity, and they said "soon," "early this week," so I'll keep checking their site. Just wanted to know if this was odd based on more experienced cruiser experience. Thanks!

 

For our Ohio "neighbor", it does seem strange on why those are not up and showing. The good news is that you have many, many great options for BOTH of these ports and many people don't bother with cruise ship excursions, especially here.

 

I would go to your roll call for this cruise and maybe tie-in with a private, custom tour that others are organizing. We used RomeInLimo in both of these ports and things worked super well for us and our group of eight. We weren't worried or wasting time as 30-45 people slowly got off of the large bus and then got back on at each of the various stops.

 

You'll love the Solstice. See more details on this ship and some of these Italy options, see my live/blog below. Here are a few of my visual samples for what we did via private tours in these two ports. What are your specific interest for what you seek and want to do here? Have visited both areas in early land tours.

 

THANKS! Enjoy! Terry in Ohio

 

Did a June 7-19, 2011, Solstice cruise from Barcelona that had stops in Villefranche, ports near Pisa and Rome, Naples, Kotor, Venice and Dubrovnik. Enjoyed great weather and a wonderful trip. Dozens of wonderful visuals with key highlights, tips, comments, etc., on these postings. We are now at 65,579 views for this live/blog re-cap on our first sailing with Celebrity and much on wonderful Barcelona. Check these postings and added info at:

http://www.boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1426474

 

 

It was a big “WOW” for our first visit to Pisa. This tower is much taller than I expected. They just completed a major cleaning of it in the past few weeks, making things perfect, except for that little foundation problem with one tower. Also impressive here are the Pisa Baptistry and Duomo (main) church. Pisa has a couple of major universities here. There is another church here that also has a leaning (and shorter) tower. We drove by that site, also. Two leaning towers in Pisa! How many knew that?:

 

 

 

We had visited San Gimignano in 1999 with our son, but it is a town that is always impressive in history and architectural styles. We had lunch here. Below is a long-shot of the hill town with its tower from the wonderful countryside below and nearby.

 

 

 

For Ravello overlooking the Gulf of Solerno, this is the view from their main square to its neighboring, hillside village.:

 

 

 

Ravello has many nice ceramics shops with locally-made pieces of many sizes. Here is the owner making a welcoming toast to come in and shop.:

 

 

 

Overlooking Positano along the Amalfi Coast, this is the view as we dined, family-style for lunch, at La Tagliata. The views here were super and the sun came out in strong force as we enjoyed our three-course lunch with local wine and drinks. Their website is http://www.latagliata.com.:

 

 

 

As the Solstice sailed from Naples, we passed scenic Capri island, former summer home for Roman Emperors. This is the sunset view of this island from the ship.:

 

[Mulege]

Naples: we used Aldo's limos and were highly satisfied with his Amalfi Coast tour. He will stop for lunch at La Tagliata too. Save money and only have max of 8 on your tour.

[moviegal]

Hi Buckeye, I'm on that Solstice cruise too and I have also noticed that no excursions are listed for the Italian ports. I don't usually book excursions through the cruise lines but I DO use their excursion guide to get ideas of things to do and then book my own tours.

 

It sounds like switching ports is common on the Solstice? Anybody know when a "final" schedule will be decided by Celebrity? I'm just wondering because I already have booked a few things to do on certain days in port and I'm counting on us docking on the days / dates and places specified.

[Sabbycat]

We are sailing on the May 5th, 2012 X cruise. Excursions for all ports of call but Sicily have been available for months. On Tuesday or Wednesday (just after final payment date - unsure if this is related), they finally included Sicily.

Perhaps yours will be up in a few weeks once final payment date passes too.

PS: This past weekend X's Web site apparently had issues and no excursions, speciality dining etc. could be booked. (I posted the question as I was unable to book and someone responded to my query indicating the site was down for those types of bookings.)

[DivasDare]

Overlooking Positano along the Amalfi Coast, this is the view as we dined, family-style for lunch, at La Tagliata. The views here were super and the sun came out in strong force as we enjoyed our three-course lunch with local wine and drinks. Their website is www.latagliata.com.:

 

Second this suggestion. The food was excellent and the owners were great!