Holy Land Aug Shore Excursions ?

[acadian_dad]

Considering booking the Aug 7 Holy Land cruise (Venice to Athens) for our family of 4 but last time we did a Princess cruise in Europe, the shore excursions sold out VERY early ...

 

If there is anyone boomed on that cruise, how is the shore excursion availability looking right now ? Is everything booked up ?

 

Thanks in advance for any info !

[Pam in CA]

If you book, I'd recommend taking two full-day tours rather than the overnight. Granted this was years ago but the hotel where we stayed overnight on the Princess tour was filthy dirty (I still have photos of the mold in the shower dripping down the sides) and they tried to rip us off. A bottle of wine at dinner was included in the printed tour details but the hotel forced many to pay for it. That stopped when our tour guide finally showed up but they already had money from a lot of people. Thirty-six hours later, we all came down with Noro. :(

 

Distances in Israel are surprisingly short so you probably won't miss out on a thing (other than possibly getting sick) by booking the days separately. Some day, I'll tell you what I really think of the hotel. :)

[Tiffany's mom]

Considering booking the Aug 7 Holy Land cruise (Venice to Athens) for our family of 4 but last time we did a Princess cruise in Europe, the shore excursions sold out VERY early ...

 

If there is anyone boomed on that cruise, how is the shore excursion availability looking right now ? Is everything booked up ?

 

Thanks in advance for any info !

 

 

We have cruised to the Holy Lands and Egypt the last two years on the Pacific Princess. We used private tours in all the ports. For a family of 4 this maybe the best answer. We really joined all of our tours. One was just the two of us. The others we were with a group of four to 6. For the four of you the prices might be the same and you will enjoy the tour a lot more.

 

Go to the port guides and ask about guides in the port you are interested touring. We have used different guides in the Holy Lands. Egypt I can recommend a great guide "Hany". He owns Alex City Travel. You can check on his web site. We did a overnight in Cairo with him and used the same beautiful clean hotel as the princess tour. Last year we skipped Cairo but had a all day tour of Alexandria.

 

Other ports you may want to look into the "hip-on-Hop off" buses. They are in most ports and are a less inexpensive way of seeing the important sites.

 

Pamela also from Ca.

[acadian_dad]

Thanks for the info, Pam's !

 

Previously, we exclusively used cruise ship excursions due to the usual set of "what if" nagging concerns in our minds (in one case, it proved to be helpful as our tender just got to the boat as the anchor was being pulled up in Grand Cayman - there were a couple of passengers on their own left behind as I recall).

 

On our British Isles cruise, we used a mix (because we had to due to many of the ship's excursions being booked) and they all worked out fine. On our upcoming Caribbean cruise we only have one ship's excursion booked and mostly private plans. But these are all mostly english soeaking, westernized areas that we are reasonable comfortable and familiar with.

 

My wife speaks a little Italian, so not too concerned about the Italian ports on the Holy Land cruise. We were a little more concerned about Israel, Egypt and Greece as we have no local language skills and don't know the area at all - and frankly things are a little unsettled in the area. I suppose with the high risk of last minute port changes, the ship's excursions might be better from a refund perspective ?

 

Anyway, would still like to know if anyone on the cruise has any info re. the shore excursions - I'll try checking the roll-call but not having already booked the cruise, would feel like a bit of a lurker ...

[caribill]

We were a little more concerned about Israel, Egypt and Greece as we have no local language skills and don't know the area at all - and frankly things are a little unsettled in the area.

 

In Egypt, reputable tour vendors such as Ramses provide English speaking tour guides and do not ask for any advance deposit.

[zahav1]

I only have knowledge about Israel, basically they all speak English, even the young kids. This country is ultra modern. The problem with going back and forth to the ship is the traffic, you may kill too much time sitting in traffic. Make sure to check out the hotel Princess will use, in Egypt as well.