Avalon passenger boarding time

[marie&rick]

We are doing the “cruise only” portion of a land + cruise Avalon Danube river cruise in June. What time will we be able to board the ship on the first day?

 

Edited March 24, 2019 by marie&rick

[acwmom]

It may depend on where you are embarking. When we did a cruise only with Avalon, we dropped our bags at the hotel in the morning, then had to meet back at the hotel late afternoon, at which time we were bussed to the ship, as a group. This is different from our Uniworld experiences, where we could arrive as early as we wanted.

 

IIRC, others have had different experiences on Avalon.

 

Robin

[mhb1757]

1 hour ago, acwmom said:

It may depend on where you are embarking. When we did a cruise only with Avalon, we dropped our bags at the hotel in the morning, then had to meet back at the hotel late afternoon, at which time we were bussed to the ship, as a group. This is different from our Uniworld experiences, where we could arrive as early as we wanted.

 

IIRC, others have had different experiences on Avalon.

 

Robin

That was our experience as well with Avalon on the Danube. One couple on our trip stated they had arrived at the ship at noon and were not permitted to board. The buses arrived around 4:30 or 5pm as I recall. 

We are doing an Avalon cruise in Holland in May and Avalon is taking us straight to the ship from the airport for early boarding. However there is not a precruise land portion offered on this particular itinerary so I’m not sure if Avalon has changed their boarding policy or if the early boarding is just on this cruise. 

You can check with Avalon directly and they will tell you for sure. 

[marie&rick]

Thank you, I will contact Avalon.

[Hoyaheel]

We boarded Avalon in Nuremberg - we were to go to the ship on our own. I think the paperwork said 4-5 but we showed up at 3 and it was no problem to board (4 of us took a taxi from our hotel - we had spent a couple of nights on our own in Nuremberg). The passengers who had already been on board returned later in the afternoon from their excursion, as did the passengers who did an Avalon pre-cruise trip to Prague (including my in-laws 😉 Your final paperwork will have the information (and if they want you to get yourself to the ship, they should have a phone number you can call to confirm where it is docked as that can change at the last minute...)

[marie&rick]

Thank you for the helpful information!

[foodpolice]

On 3/24/2019 at 5:09 AM, marie&rick said:

We are doing the “cruise only” portion of a land + cruise Avalon Danube river cruise in June. What time will we be able to board the ship on the first day?

 

We did a Paris to Normandy cruise with Avalon in 2016 & were dropped off at a meeting place hotel, prior to embarkation. 

We just returned from an Amsterdam cruise & were taken directly to the ship upon arrival at around 9 AM.  We were able to get into our rooms, but bear in mind, this was Avalons 1st cruise of the season.  When we disembarked yesterday around 9 AM, new passengers were checking in, although their rooms were not available.

Enjoy.

[oneadam12]

From the Avalon  'Know before you go-Europe' site (paraphrased)

 

You can board at any time on embarkation day but your rooms may not be ready until 4PM.  You are free to leave you luggage and tour on your own.