Salerno now and not Naples

[tassietravellers]

I have just noticed on the HAL website that we now stop in Salerno and not Naples..I haven't had any notification yet from my TA, is this normal for ports to be changed this far out , still 4 months away.

 

Hopefully Kusadasi stays on the itinerary, if it was changed I could understand that with all that's happening in Turkey..but I'm unsure why Naples would be changed.

 

Deb

[kazu]

I have just noticed on the HAL website that we now stop in Salerno and not Naples..I haven't had any notification yet from my TA, is this normal for ports to be changed this far out , still 4 months away.

 

Hopefully Kusadasi stays on the itinerary, if it was changed I could understand that with all that's happening in Turkey..but I'm unsure why Naples would be changed.

 

Deb

 

I believe I saw a post yesterday where the reported Hal said it was for operational reasons. Better to have the change earlier IMO - outside of fina payment date and allow for planning ;)

[Krazy Kruizers]

Yes -- it is normal. At least you have been given time to adjust your plans if you need to.

One time we got on the ship and there was a letter on the desk indicating that we had a port change.

And HAL does use those words "For Operational Reasons" when they make changes.

[cruisemom42]

With all the cruise ships in the Med now, the port of Naples has become very crowded. Salerno is nearby -- a bit further south.

 

It is not as convenient for those wanting to go to Capri on their own (the Capri ferry was right next to the Naples port) or for those wanting to get to Pompeii or Herculaneum via train.

 

It is, however, a shorter drive to reach the Amalfi Coast and also gives the possibility of a visit to Paestum.

[OlsSalt]

Naples is one of our favorite cities and Rick Steve's Mediterranean Cruise ports book offered an excellent walking tour of its highlights from the convenient downtown Naples port. Additionally, it was only an hour ferry ride to the delightful small island of Procida, the Lemon Isle and home to Limoncello.

 

Naples itself has a wonderful historic neighborhoods, pedestrian only streets and the glorious glass domed Galleria, old world crafts, elegant fashion shopping, enticing vistas, art-filled metro stations, world class museums, one of the best royal palaces with stunning tapestries, magnificent churches on almost every block, delicious street food and famed restaurants are all part of Naples, a city far too often overlooked and admittedly overwhelmed by too much grit and graffiti if you stray from its central historic core.

 

Losing Naples will be a loss to those who like to explore on their own and are now forced into the far more heavily tourist impacted Amalfi Drive cities or just a pass through the rough industrial districts of Naples to Pompeii.

[sail7seas]

I really like Naples but would be okay with a change to Salerno. :)

[Hlitner]

Keep in mind that Salerno is well located for those that choose to visit the ruins at Paestum. As to Turkey, we are on the next HAL (or any Western ship) scheduled to dock at Kusadasi (and also Istanbul) in early April. As of today, HAL has not made any change to the itinerary. And a change from Istanbul would be complicated since that is where one of the segments (it is a long cruise) begins and ends.

 

Hank

Edited February 25, 2016 by Hlitner

[Keith1010]

I am sure your TA has the information and will send to you shortly.

 

Keith

[tassietravellers]

I am sure your TA has the information and will send to you shortly.

 

Keith

 

I sent our TA an email last night and it seems that she's away from her office until the end of next week, so all good, no doubt we will hear from her then.

 

Its not a bother that we arent going to Naples, even though we were looking forward to exploring it on our own, we had only spent a short time there in transit a few years ago. Salerno we havent been to, so now to work out what there is to see there :-)

[CruisingKT]

We had a private tour booked from Naples. Sent an email to them and that has been sorted very quickly😄

 

The port change does not worry us as we would not have seen much of Naples anyway as our tour is all day.

 

Our TA did send us an email, but I found out here on cc first!

 

As for Turky, I really want to go there and hope we do. It is a little concerning though. Our Australian government keep putting out travel warnings about traveling there.

 

Karen

[baggal]

Naples is one of our favorite cities and Rick Steve's Mediterranean Cruise ports book offered an excellent walking tour of its highlights from the convenient downtown Naples port. Additionally, it was only an hour ferry ride to the delightful small island of Procida, the Lemon Isle and home to Limoncello.

 

Naples itself has a wonderful historic neighborhoods, pedestrian only streets and the glorious glass domed Galleria, old world crafts, elegant fashion shopping, enticing vistas, art-filled metro stations, world class museums, one of the best royal palaces with stunning tapestries, magnificent churches on almost every block, delicious street food and famed restaurants are all part of Naples, a city far too often overlooked and admittedly overwhelmed by too much grit and graffiti if you stray from its central historic core.

 

Losing Naples will be a loss to those who like to explore on their own and are now forced into the far more heavily tourist impacted Amalfi Drive cities or just a pass through the rough industrial districts of Naples to Pompeii.

 

Salerno has none of the above. It is a large industrial port and city that in recent years spent some money and made it more "cruise ship friendly." I wouldn't be surprised if there was a financial incentive for cruises to port there instead of Naples. On the cruise we were on a few years ago, the CD referred to Salerno as a "gateway" port. I believe there is a ferry that goes to Capri but with limited service. You can still go to most of the destinations that you would if you stopped in Naples, but you would be coming from a different direction.

[SilvertoGold]

Pompeii is seriously a great place to see! Easy train ride right to the entrance to the site from Salerno.

 

Alternately Herculaneum is quite different, smaller.

 

Never been a fan of Naples, although the "cruise terminal" is spectacular!

 

Have a great cruise!

Edited February 25, 2016 by SilvertoGold

[Stakeout]

are you sure it said Salerno and NOT Sorrento which is just across the Bay of Naples-- Sorrento is a tender port where Naples is a regular dock port.. they usually switch between Naples and Sorrento or at least they had in the 5x we took cruises there.. never heard HAL mention Salerno though instead of Naples.. Naples is PIZZA it doesn't get any better :) :)

Edited February 26, 2016 by Stakeout

[Mary Ellen]

are you sure it said Salerno and NOT Sorrento which is just across the Bay of Naples-- Sorrento is a tender port where Naples is a regular dock port.. they usually switch between Naples and Sorrento or at least they had in the 5x we took cruises there.. never heard HAL mention Salerno though instead of Naples.. Naples is PIZZA it doesn't get any better :) :)

 

I'm sure they meant Salerno, as they posted. There is currently another thread also about the substitution of Salerno for Naples. We took 4 Med cruises last fall. On the original itineraries we were to go to Naples twice. Months before departure we were notified that Salerno would be our port for one cruise instead of Naples, for operational reasons. Just because you haven't heard of this switch occurring, doesn't meant it doesn't happen. ;)

[cruisemom42]

are you sure it said Salerno and NOT Sorrento which is just across the Bay of Naples-- Sorrento is a tender port where Naples is a regular dock port.. they usually switch between Naples and Sorrento or at least they had in the 5x we took cruises there.. never heard HAL mention Salerno though instead of Naples.. Naples is PIZZA it doesn't get any better :) :)

 

See my post #4 above. The substitution of Salerno for Naples has been happening on other lines for a couple of years now. It's been mentioned on the Italy boards many times.

[sail7seas]

Pompeii is seriously a great place to see! Easy train ride right to the entrance to the site from Salerno.

 

Alternately Herculaneum is quite different, smaller.

 

Never been a fan of Naples, although the "cruise terminal" is spectacular!

 

Have a great cruise!

 

Thanks for the reminder about the cruise terminal in Naples. I can still picture it (where I bought a beautiful pair of cameo earrings :) and also remember the game of 'dodgems') trying to cross that busy street with speeding traffic. :D I think there were bonus points for hitting a cruise pax. :eek:

 

We were three couples on one of our cruises that stopped in Naples. One of the ladies still swoons at the memory of a 4 cheese pizza she ate for lunch. :)

 

 

 

Edited February 26, 2016 by sail7seas

[SilvertoGold]

Sail

 

We have yet to try real Napolian pizza because we always take the train to either Pompeii or Heculaneum and stay the whole day. One day perhaps we will stay and explore Naples!

 

I was enchanted with the cruise terminal! All that marble! If all terminals were like that.....!

You are right: the traffic was wild. Not as bad as some cities in China, though, but scary enough!

[sail7seas]

DH and I had spent a number of days in Sorrento on a previous land vacation in Italy. We spent lots of time in Pompeii and I loved it there. Had we not seen so much of Pompeii just a few years prior we surely would have visited there again. Our friends had never been to the area and they really enjoyed a long, full day in Naples.

 

Edited February 26, 2016 by sail7seas

[OlsSalt]

Just guessing here but they were slowly working on underground metro links in this area and I wonder if that whole area around the Naples terminal is now torn up to make a metro connection - wouldn't that be nice. And maybe that is why ships are no longer docking there for "operational" reasons.

 

Considering how long it has taken this metro project to move even a few miles, it might be a long time before it will ever get done. It will be wonderful and they have refurbished a lot of their stations now with color and art.

 

Anyway, an off the wall thought. I hope ships come back to Naples and more tourists attempt to see the inner core of this city itself. Layers and layers of art, architecture and history. Great book about history Naples: From Salt Water Holy Water. It was the leading port city for centuries in the Mediterranean, first university starting in 1100's, rich in diversity and commerce.

 

And then the trains came in and things almost overnight faded as it lost the exclusivity of its sea port commerce connections. But it left this stupendous monumental city behind to languish in neglect until it is now a backwater of a far more sordid nature.

 

But the ghosts of its grand and elegant past are there among the cobwebs with a little snooping and adventuresome walking.

 

Update; cancel that speculation - cruise time tables show plenty of other ships still docking at Naples. Did the Camorra decide it only wanted Costa Lines to dock there in the CCL family. More speculation. http://ports.cruisett.com/schedule/Italy/454-Naples/October_2016/

Edited February 26, 2016 by OlsSalt

[cruisemom42]

Yes, there are plenty of ships still arriving at Naples port. My own speculation would be that either:

 

1) Salerno is trying to lure cruise traffic from Naples and is charging less to dock there.

 

or

 

2) Some cruise lines have realized it is more difficult to "DIY" from Salerno than from Naples (for almost all of the area attractions except the Amalfi Coast) and so they end up selling more of their own excursions. :rolleyes:

 

 

In reality I expect it is just that Naples port sometimes is overbooked.

 

By the way, the metro stop close to the port was actually finished and opened last year. Makes it easier to get to the museum or to the Central train station (but not to the Circumvesuviana line that takes one to Pompeii and Herculaneum).

[dakrewser]

Where would Cruise Critic be without conspiracy theories (cf "Guilt trip by HAL to promote ships tours?")

[tedcruise]

I received an email from HAL on 2/24 informing me of the change of ports and stated that any excursions booked would be refunded and that new excursions could now be booked. It looks to me that most of the offerings are to same, though some have changed.

I know the one into Naples to watch pizza being made is gone. :rolleyes:

 

 

My wife wants to see Pompeii so it really doesn't effect us, but yes it's nice that there's plenty of notice given and it not really a major change.

[OlsSalt]

Thanks for the update on the Naples metro, even more of a reason now to go to this port stop. Hope we learn more about why it has been eliminated in future HAL cruises. In Naples nothing is totally above board. There might be a lot more to this story than the superficial gloss of "operational reasons".

[sail7seas]

Whenever a cruise lines makes a change such as this I always think $$ first.

I am only speculating (like others here) but I would not be surprised if there is money to be saved by having the ship go to Salerno.

 

[SonnekeH]

Naples is one of our favorite cities and Rick Steve's Mediterranean Cruise ports book offered an excellent walking tour of its highlights from the convenient downtown Naples port. Additionally, it was only an hour ferry ride to the delightful small island of Procida, the Lemon Isle and home to Limoncello.

 

Naples itself has a wonderful historic neighborhoods, pedestrian only streets and the glorious glass domed Galleria, old world crafts, elegant fashion shopping, enticing vistas, art-filled metro stations, world class museums, one of the best royal palaces with stunning tapestries, magnificent churches on almost every block, delicious street food and famed restaurants are all part of Naples, a city far too often overlooked and admittedly overwhelmed by too much grit and graffiti if you stray from its central historic core.

 

Losing Naples will be a loss to those who like to explore on their own and are now forced into the far more heavily tourist impacted Amalfi Drive cities or just a pass through the rough industrial districts of Naples to Pompeii.

 

There is NOTHING to beat the Amalfi Coast Drive and Pompei. But only in a small group, in a van. With an experienced guide.

Edited February 26, 2016 by SonnekeH
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