cruise ship excursions

[che5904]

Does anyone know where, besides the NCL web site, that has reviews on the excursions offered by NCL.

 

I've tried the port boards, but they really center on self-booked excursions and have very little on ship ex. offered. People ask about specific ship excursions but very seldom get answered.

 

I've googled the actual tour name with little to no results and searched a very popular trip review site, again not much luck.

 

I can get reviews for example on the main destination of the tour such as "Gumbalimba Preservation Park" in Roatan but not the tour that gets you there and makes other stops or shows you other things.

[shelly11]

If you go to ncl.com and find your cruise you will see your excursions. Reviews are listed when you click on each excursion.

 

I've done NCL excursions and private ones, good experiences with both. The plus for NCL is that you are guaranteed not to get left behind if your excursion is late, with private no guarantee. The two private ones I chose I researched a lot so not to be nervous about making it back to the ship.

 

Hope that helps!

[che5904]

If you go to ncl.com and find your cruise you will see your excursions. Reviews are listed when you click on each excursion.

 

I've done NCL excursions and private ones, good experiences with both. The plus for NCL is that you are guaranteed not to get left behind if your excursion is late, with private no guarantee. The two private ones I chose I researched a lot so not to be nervous about making it back to the ship.

 

Hope that helps!

 

Thanks Shelly yes, I have been to the reviews on NCL site for the excursions. Some don't have any reviews there, or only a couple.

 

I will only take ship excursions unless I just plan to stay around the ship and explore or in the case of my last cruise where my ports were in my own country or the U.S. and I could just rent a car. I have a great fear of being left behind, so I don't have the courage to venture far.

[Ilovesailing]

You can use Tripadvisor and read reviews based on land experiences which I have used over the years successfully, for the most part the excursions will be the same.

Also sites like Viator offer customer reviews similar to NCL setup.

[Cretia]

**Note: I'm still looking for this information. If/when I find more reviews, I'll add it to this post.**

 

A quick search revealed a website called CruisePortInsider.

 

http://www.cruiseportinsider.com/roatanexcursions.html#.UrMCqFNW6E8

 

It seems to provide slightly more information about the shore excursion than the NCL description, but it's not necessarily what I would consider a review. I imagine the reason you are asking is because you are concerned that the official reviews are... let's call it...filtered, so I wanted to see if there was any review of CruisePortInsider as a reviewer. Turns out they publish e-books at Amazon.

 

http://www.amazon.com/CruisePortInsider-Guide-Roatan-2013-Bob-Haefliger-ebook/dp/B00AXBM8Y2/ref=pd_sim_kstore_1

 

The Roatan one does not appear to be highly recommended although some of the others seem to be.

 

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_pg_2?rh=n%3A133140011%2Cp_27%3ABob+Haefliger&page=2&sort=relevancerank&ie=UTF8&qid=1387464213

 

Now to see how much else I can find before being guilted back into doing real work this morning.

[Twelvevman]

Thanks Shelly yes, I have been to the reviews on NCL site for the excursions. Some don't have any reviews there, or only a couple.

 

I will only take ship excursions unless I just plan to stay around the ship and explore or in the case of my last cruise where my ports were in my own country or the U.S. and I could just rent a car. I have a great fear of being left behind, so I don't have the courage to venture far.

 

 

While I won't try to discount your fear about being left behind, just realize the private tour operators rely on positive reviews in order to stay in business. My last few cruises have involved nothing but private tour operators and I could not be happier. I got a better tour that was less crowded and cheaper. In some cases, I was able to do the tour as I wanted and go only to the place we wanted to see. Be dillagent about the operator, but know they will do everything to et you back on time because any missed passengers or even close calls can ruin their business.

[Artemis]

Here on Cruise Critic, in the reviews section, there are two places to look:

 

Shore Excursions Reviews

- grouped by port, then by name of excursion (generic, e.g., Beach Break, Snorkeling)--a little clunky to wade through the results looking for a match to your cruise line and then specific excursion in question

 

Cruise Port Reviews

- also grouped by port, but then there is a drop-down menu allowing you to filter by cruise line, and when you get those results, you can even sort by ship

 

Oddly, as similar as these two seem, they appear to draw from different databases, as using Roatan to test, Roatan isn't even listed under Shore Excursions, but throws off 1,632 reviews under Cruise Ports! When I filtered those reviews by cruise line = NCL, the results were 422 reviews, which could then be sorted by ship name, date or rating...but not by excursion name or even generic type.

[che5904]

Thanks everyone so far for the links.

[mikewrit]

Reviews of particular excursions -- whether arranged privately or through a cruise line -- may have small value in selection and planning. Most such reviews seem usually to be about subjective experiences including the mood of fellow travelers, the capability of the guides, the skill of the driver, the weather, the traffic, the reviewer's initial mood et cetera.

[che5904]

Reviews of particular excursions -- whether arranged privately or through a cruise line -- may have small value in selection and planning. Most such reviews seem usually to be about subjective experiences including the mood of fellow travelers, the capability of the guides, the skill of the driver, the weather, the traffic, the reviewer's initial mood et cetera.

 

Oh I absolutely agree which is why I'm looking for more than just what I have found on the NCL shore excursion site.

 

I have a tendency to pick apart every review I read good or bad. If someone just states love it or hate it, I go past those. I pay more attention to reviews that have what that person loved or hated, which may or may not be loves or issues I may have. I also don't base my entire decision on those reviews. But it does normally give me an idea on what I may want to do.

 

Is there a better method that you would suggest to choose an excursion?

 

I only see a couple of ways to choose an excursion. Since the description of the excursion is written for sales benefit only then I could choose it based on someone who has written this strictly to sell it, based on other peoples opinion and try and weed through them. Or close my eyes and point to the paper hoping whatever my finger lands on will be something we will enjoy :eek:. I'm thinking the latter isn't a very good option :D

[OCruisers]

Sometimes doing a google search of the exact name of the excursion will provide additional information.

 

LuLu

~~~~

[kindergarten16]

I inquired about booking directly with Pat & Diane for a snorkeling adventure and was told that I had to book through NCL. The price went up considerably, but doesn't seem to be an other option for that one.

 

Rita

NCL Sky 5/12/14

[che5904]

**Note: I'm still looking for this information. If/when I find more reviews, I'll add it to this post.**

 

A quick search revealed a website called CruisePortInsider.

 

http://www.cruiseportinsider.com/roatanexcursions.html#.UrMCqFNW6E8

 

It seems to provide slightly more information about the shore excursion than the NCL description, but it's not necessarily what I would consider a review. I imagine the reason you are asking is because you are concerned that the official reviews are... let's call it...filtered, so I wanted to see if there was any review of CruisePortInsider as a reviewer. Turns out they publish e-books at Amazon.

 

 

That one is great. I have used that site for information on the ports before but I guess I never went to the excursion tab :o. If you click on the name of the excursion, there are customer reviews there as well. There are also videos for some that show you at least a little of what you will be seeing. The videos I looked at were taken by customers, so they weren't just sales videos.

 

Thanks very much.