Asia Cruise Advice

[ano]

We are exploring a cruise to Asia and looking for any advise on a first trip. We've been on many cruises but never outside the US except Mexico and Canada, which are both pretty tame. Does anyone have any experience to share what's good to see between Hong Kong, Japan, Vietnam and other parts of China. Maybe approx. 15 days total. Were totally open on the time of year.

 

Keep in mind were not the high-adventure type, so we are hoping to stick more easy-to-naviagate places at least to start and end. I was thinking Tokyo might be best. Also what cruise line? I see Princess and Celebrity have the most, where hopefully they will be English speaking.

 

Much Appreciated.

[NantahalaCruiser]

We are exploring a cruise to Asia and looking for any advise on a first trip. We've been on many cruises but never outside the US except Mexico and Canada, which are both pretty tame. Does anyone have any experience to share what's good to see between Hong Kong, Japan, Vietnam and other parts of China. Maybe approx. 15 days total. Were totally open on the time of year.

 

Keep in mind were not the high-adventure type, so we are hoping to stick more easy-to-naviagate places at least to start and end. I was thinking Tokyo might be best. Also what cruise line? I see Princess and Celebrity have the most, where hopefully they will be English speaking.

 

Much Appreciated.

 

My wife and I took a back-to-back Asian cruise on the Celebrity Millennium last year from mid-Oct to mid-Nov; from Yokohama to Hong Kong and then Hong Kong to Singapore. We really enjoyed both legs - especially our time in Japan and Vietnam.

 

Highlights of Japan were a couple of extra nights in the Tokyo area (went to a Japanese cooking school) and a day and a half in Kyoto (took a train from Kobe port to Kyoto where we shared a private guided tour with another couple)

 

Highlights of Vietnam were an overnight trip on an upscale junk in Halong Bay with 7 other couples and a food tour in Saigon with two other couples.

 

Please be aware that cruises with Japanese ports often sell out early - especially during cherry blossom time - e.g. all balcony cabins are currently sold out on the Millennium April 15, 2018 departure!

 

Enjoy

 

Larry

[Floridiana]

We enjoyed our cruise along the Japanese coast. Japan is a great country, especially for new international travelers. It has beautiful landscape, cultural treasures, a good infrastructure, friendly, polite people and it is safe and clean. Safer and cleaner than Florida where I live.

 

China: the ports were not worthwhile except Hong Kong and Shanghai which deserve more time. Beijing is far from the coast and the actual port facility is in the middle of nowhere, quite far from Tianjin which serves as Beijing's port. For China I would look at a land tour with a short river cruise on the Yangtze. Almost all of China's treasures are inland.

 

We travelled to Bangkok, Singapore, Saigon, and Hanoi on our own and on land tours. Highlight was a 2 night tour of Halong Bay in northern Vietnam. We also enjoyed our Mekong river cruise in southern Vietnam and Cambodia.

 

This year, we will do an ocean cruise from Australia to Hong Kong through the islands.

[loeb]

in addition to comments by Floriniana, Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, Beijing & Shanghai are more developed. Where as the rest of China , Viet Nam, Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia and Indonesia are less developed except for the major cities. Said another way, the first group have better infastructure. The later group are still in the process of developing.

 

If you want to see China (PRC) then as Floriniana stated, it's better to take a land tour. This would also apply to any site far from the coast / ports like Angkor Wat in Cambodia or Chiang Mai in Thailand.

 

If you can take two trips, then I would suggest that you try Japan / Korea / Beijing & Shanghai first and then if you like it, try the other countries. I would recommend that you go in the spring / fall to Japan and the other places in the first group. The second group, other than the wet season, doesn't really matter, it's typically hot most of the time since they are close to the equator.

[DipBrat]

If you want hassle free and are unadventurous look at a Japan only cruise or maybe Japan and Korea. China has come a long way but it is still on the chaotic side.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

[SpokaneDan]

Singapore is the most Westerner friendly port in Asia IMO. It rivals Japan in its modernity, cleanliness and organization plus English is the official language. However, only 90 miles from the equator, it has only 2 seasons - hot and hotter. If you can stand the heat and humidity, it's a great start/end port.

[kjets]

I agree with Spokane Dan. Japan has a totally different language whereas Singapore's street signs, shops, train stations are all in English.

 

Singapore is a great place to start when never being overseas before. It is the first place I took my husband for an overseas cruise and he has never looked back. We are going from Japan to Sydney at the end of the year and he is really looking forward to it.

 

Three years ago I wouldn't have believed that we would still be seeing the world and all because he felt so comfortable in Singapore! Thank you, thank you Singapore!

[Ashland]

We've done China both by a land tour (Affordable Asia based in Monrovia Calif) visiting Bejing, Xian & Shanghai and an RCI (Mariner) cruise Singapore-Shanghai with ports in Hong Kong & Vietnam and enjoyed both but so glad we did the land trip the first time and the cruise the next year. Booking a land tour might be something you should consider...the company we used was amazing and included international flights, great guides, amazing hotels, some meals and inter-country flights...We were concerned at the low price we paid and thought how can this be true but it was absolutely the best !! Each time we ended our travel in Shanghai and added time post-tour & cruise...We just loved Shanghai as well as Singapore of course and can't wait to go back to both cities..

[4774Papa]

We have done a 21 day land tour of China that included a four day river cruise. It was wonderful. That would be tops on my list.

 

A close second would be a cruise including Japan. We did 8 days in Japan pre-cruise and then a 14 day Japan and China cruise on Celebrity Millennium ending in Hong Kong. Fantastic trip. We very much loved Japan and the people there.

 

We also did a Singapore to Dubai cruise that stopped four times in India then Oman ending in Dubai. Great trip as well, but no match for the first two.

 

 

Also, did a land trip in the 80s that included Bangkok, HK and Manila. Another good trip.

 

If you do the HK to Singapore cruise that stops in Vietnam and Thailand, just note that your ports are frequently far away from the cities you must see and the bus rides are through heavy traffic. Still, you might want to consider that choice.

 

Here are my reviews of those trips

China

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1718320

 

Japan and a little bit of China

http://www.cruisecritic.com/memberreviews/memberreview.cfm?EntryID=518503&et_cid=2531924&et_rid=17221689&et_referrer=Boards

 

*

Singapore to Dubai

*

http://www.cruisecritic.com/memberreviews/memberreview.cfm?EntryID=501167

[Hoyaheel]

If you do the HK to Singapore cruise that stops in Vietnam and Thailand, just note that your ports are frequently far away from the cities you must see and the bus rides are through heavy traffic. Still, you might want to consider that choice.

 

A solution to this problem is to choose a small ship that is able to sail up the rivers to dock in town in Bangkok and/or Ho Chi Minh city. We just did SIN-HKG on Azamara and had overnights docked in town in both cities and it was wonderful!!! Would definitely recommend that option

 

The first Asian city my husband visited was Shanghai - he accompanied me on a business trip (and we spent some "tourist" time together once my business was completed) He was worried about how well he'd handle it (we've traveled internationally quite a bit - me to more "out there" places than he) and he did great! Shanghai's subway system also has English signage and is so easy to use! Other things might be a little more complex so I wouldn't necessarily recommend it to someone who has never left North America, but it was "easy" enough that my husband doesn't have any qualms about traveling anywhere else. Actually - his biggest problem is that he doesn't want to fly coach and I refuse to pay for business class, so.... :p

 

[right now I personally don't have a strong desire to visit Japan - my next Asia wish list for vacation travel is a Mekong river cruise and a visit to the Angkor Wat complex in Cambodia....]

Edited January 5, 2017 by Hoyaheel

[cricketnut]

We did a 21 day back to back cruise of South East Asia on the Sapphire Princess last Feb and had a wonderful time. Cannot recommend highly enough this cruise and the places we went to with the cruise starting and ending in Singapore which is a great and very Westernised city to start at.

The cruise included Bali as our first port of call where we employed a local guide, Putu Supartana - putu.supartana@yahoo.com, Malaysia where Penang was our favourite stop and a place easily able to be walked around and close and handy to the port.

We then stopped off at Phuket which we enjoyed and had a great personal guide for the day Lek Landen leklanden@hotmail.com and he showed us around the place including having a lovely lunch up in the hills. His charge for our group of 4 was the equivalent of NZ$70 for the day so very cheap and he most importantly was a lot of fun and gave us a good insight into Phuket and Thailand in general.

We then returned to Singapore before heading on to Brunei - not a lot there to see, Vietnam, Cambodia two marvellous countries with very hospitable people and great food and culture before then stopping at Koh Samui - our favourite destination of the trip absolutely lovely place with beautiful beaches -our guide there again was good value at 4000 Thai Baht for the day -Michelle and Jack of Samui Explorer - samuiexplorer@hotmail.com. Went on an elephant trek here where the elephants were well treated as a highlight before having a Thai massage on a beautiful beach which I think was Crystal Bay Beach before having a lovely Thai lunch at The Jungle Club again up in the hills with beautiful views over the beaches.

In Cambodia we had a memorable day and again had a wonderful tour guide whom we booked costing approx US$50 each. The tour guide whom we strongly recommend as good value is Mr Sothy from Sihanouk Seaside Ville Seaside Tours http://www.sihanoukvilleseasidetours.com. The highlight was lunch at Don Bosco Hotel School which is run by orphans or under privileged children who are trained here over a 2 year period and serve up the most delicious and beautifully presented food you could wish for. We went to a local fishing village and saw several temples as well as a dtrive around the city and local beaches and it was a very relaxing day.

Our last stop was Bangkok where I had booked another private guide through Our Thai Tour Guide - chob@thaitourguide.com. The cost of this was THB20900 for 8 people where we had a very busy and memorable day. Because of the visit of the Thai princess which delayed people entering the Royal Palace we decided not to hang around and instead went to the fish and vegetable markets in Bangkok which turned out to be a very pleasant surprise as we had a very enjoyable hour wandering around before then taking a canal ride in a longtail boat all to ourselves which was great. Our guide then hired 4 tuk tuks and we had an exciting time racing each other through the streets of Bangkok racing in between buses and heavy traffic before being taken to a local Thai restaurant for the normal enjoyable and tasty meals that you seem to get in Thailand. We did not see any of the gold temples or the Palace because of the disruption caused by the Palace entry being shut down till the Princess had come through but these can be seen on our next visit. Thr problem with Bangkok and Ho Chi Chi Minh City is that on a cruise you are a long way out of the city approx and hour and a half so you have to make the best of the time available and having your own guide allows you to change your itinerary for the day as it suits.

From there we returned to Singapore.

This was a most enjoyable cruise, our first cruise in Asia and our first cruise on a Princess ship, and all we can say id the Sapphire Princess is a lovely ship and the staff on board are tremendous. So much so that we are looking at booking the same cruise in another 2 years time.

Prior to the cruise we actually did a 7 day tour in Japan using a Japan rail pass which was very easy to use and saved us a lot of money. In this time we went initially to Tokyo and then by train up to Kyoto, then to Hiroshima and on to Osaka and I must say that Japan was surprisingly enjoyable as our preference has always been to see places that are kind of third world and not as westernised and modern as Japan is. Kyoto was our favourite with lots of interesting temples and the most beautiful the Yellow Temple which is spectacular. We also enjoyed visiting the Hiroshima memorial and museum which was eye opening.

As a result of this experience in Japan and Asuia we have booked a land tour of China for April this year which we are looking forward to.

Hope some of this information is of assistance to you in your planning.

Regards,

Ian

[4774Papa]

A solution to this problem is to choose a small ship that is able to sail up the rivers to dock in town in Bangkok and/or Ho Chi Minh city. We just did SIN-HKG on Azamara and had overnights docked in town in both cities and it was wonderful!!! Would definitely recommend that option

 

The first Asian city my husband visited was Shanghai - he accompanied me on a business trip (and we spent some "tourist" time together once my business was completed) He was worried about how well he'd handle it (we've traveled internationally quite a bit - me to more "out there" places than he) and he did great! Shanghai's subway system also has English signage and is so easy to use! Other things might be a little more complex so I wouldn't necessarily recommend it to someone who has never left North America, but it was "easy" enough that my husband doesn't have any qualms about traveling anywhere else. Actually - his biggest problem is that he doesn't want to fly coach and I refuse to pay for business class, so.... :p

 

[right now I personally don't have a strong desire to visit Japan - my next Asia wish list for vacation travel is a Mekong river cruise and a visit to the Angkor Wat complex in Cambodia....]

 

Azmara may be one solution, however that is a relatively expensive cruise line.

 

There are many remarkable things about Japan that caused us to fall in love with that country.

1) The country is extremely clean, tidy, efficient and safe (little crime). Westerners have little problem moving around the country, despite the language.

 

2) Contrary to popular opinion, Japan is not expensive. Hotels, restaurants and tours are less than Northern European countries and close to the USA.

 

3) It is a very picturesque country as well as full of history and local culture. Kyoto is amazing. While is doesn't quite measure up to China's Great Wall and Terra Cotta Warriors, there is much to see there.

 

4) Contrary to China, while Japan has a large population for its territory, we never felt overrun with crowds like we did in China. The Japanese people are very polite and courteous, while in public, China can seem intimidating due to the crowded cities and highways.

 

5) We found the Japanese people to be extremely helpful. Several times, people would stop to assist us or go out of their way to help.

 

6) The food is excellent in Japan and far more diverse than sushi and the Japanese restaurants in the USA.

 

In summary, your visit to Japan will involve fewer hassles. Also, the infrastructure is top notch and very efficient. Other places in Asia just don't compare.

 

I have been to Thailand, Indonesia, Singapore and Malaysia and only Singapore compares well with Japan on many of those accounts.

[ano]

Thanks everyone for these great comments. This was exactly what I was looking for. Will probably use a travel agent on this one. We usually don't but this has many more moving pieces. These comments give us a great starting place.

Edited January 6, 2017 by ano

[Hoyaheel]

Azmara may be one solution, however that is a relatively expensive cruise line.

Price was never mentioned as a priority by the OP so I was simply responding to your comment about port locations. And we got a GREAT deal on our cruise:p Just throwing out my own opinions, since that's what OP asked for.....

[ano]

Price was never mentioned as a priority by the OP so I was simply responding to your comment about port locations. And we got a GREAT deal on our cruise:p Just throwing out my own opinions, since that's what OP asked for.....

This will be an expensive trip one way or another. Just the flight and a few days in Tokyo is easily over $10K if we go business class. The price differences of Azmara are pretty small in comparison. Having said that, Asia seems to be an area with lots of port days and few sea days, so I'm not sure its really worth it to me to pay extra for a luxury cruise for this itinerary but I'll check out the deals. I'm open if the itinerary is good. Were open on dates, so itinerary is what counts for us.

[Hoyaheel]

Our itinerary actually had more sea days and fewer port days than most Asia cruisers would prefer (considering what I've read online). It was a 10 day cruise with only 3 ports - Ko Samui, Bangkok, & Ho Chi Minh City (but overnights in Bangkok & HCMC). I like the HAL itinerary that does SIN-HKG or reverse in 16 days and hits more ports, but husband decided that was too much time away from home right now (we both still work).

 

We don't cruise a ton. We like cruises that give us an overview/introduction to a new area, and what we like we tend to go back and visit on a land trip. Since all the ports were new to us, we were very happy with the choice & the extra time pre & post-cruise.

 

I'm sure you'll have fun exploring wherever you end up!!!

[floinnc]

We have been to Japan several times and love the country. Our son, daughter-in-law and granddaughter live in Yokohama so we have good reasons to go. Just be aware that summer in Tokyo, Yokohama and south are extremely hot and humid in the summer. I recommend spring and fall for more comfortable tourism. There is a lot of walking if you like that kind of exploration and temperatures can be really unbearable in the summer.

We were on the Celebrity Millennium in Oct 2015 and have another one planned for April, 2018 (Yokohama to Vancouver). Hoping to catch cherry blossom time!

[ano]

Even being from Phoenix, I'm not sure if hot and humid weather would be comfortable.

 

Taking all this into account, I think we are looking at a 15-day Cruise on Princess, "Japan, Taiwan & Vietnam" leaving September 26, 2017. This seems to have several ports in Japan, but still Vietnam, China, and Taiwan also. This seems to be a good mix of emerging and developed. We wanted to see Singapore also, as we've heard much good about it, but it came down to a choice of either Japan or Singapore, as none really hit both. We are planning to go a few days early to tour Tokyo, then the cruise and then return.

[4774Papa]

Even being from Phoenix, I'm not sure if hot and humid weather would be comfortable.

 

Taking all this into account, I think we are looking at a 15-day Cruise on Princess, "Japan, Taiwan & Vietnam" leaving September 26, 2017. This seems to have several ports in Japan, but still Vietnam, China, and Taiwan also. This seems to be a good mix of emerging and developed. We wanted to see Singapore also, as we've heard much good about it, but it came down to a choice of either Japan or Singapore, as none really hit both. We are planning to go a few days early to tour Tokyo, then the cruise and then return.

 

 

Late September is a good time to visit Japan. You will find that by the time you reach Taiwan that temps go up and SE Asia will be hot and muggy.

[Hoyaheel]

Taking all this into account, I think we are looking at a 15-day Cruise on Princess, "Japan, Taiwan & Vietnam" leaving September 26, 2017. This seems to have several ports in Japan, but still Vietnam, China, and Taiwan also.

 

That sounds like a great mix of ports and a nice overview to a new area for you! I hope you have a great trip:D