Booking Avalon Excursions

[RTLS]

Our first ever river cruise is coming up late September. The Legendary Danube- Prague to Budapest. Today I began looking at the excursions available to pre-book and see that, as well as the optional excursions, in some instances but not all, booking is available for the included choices as well at the optional ones. Does this mean that we have to pre-book our choice of included tours.

 

I'm pretty sure that I read somewhere here, that many people wait until on board to book even for the optional ones. That's what we would prefer to do but is that not the way to do things?

 

I'd really love some clarification.

Thanks

 

[Daisi]

Hi.  Sometimes there are more than one included tour per day (eg - the day you are in Roth, there are 2 tours to Nuremberg, one of the town, the other to the Rally Grounds), so I would assume that they are just trying to provide the option to choose ahead.  We did the same on our Rhine tour last year,  there were more than one included tour on the day so we chose which one we were interested in.  You can wait to book on board, but you will be paying in Euro's, so we chose to pre-pay in CDN $$...it was much easier to know what it cost then.  

 

I am not sure if it is the same, but I have heard that on Avalon, if someone has booked for a tour, it goes, even if there are not many people on it.  

[BarkLessWagMore]

We did the Danube Dreams trip this past May (our first river cruise also) and we pre-booked our paid and included excursions mostly because that is our nature. I did not sense that the excursions on a day-to-day basis were full so I don't think you will miss out if you wait but pre-booking will ensure that you don't. I do think Avalon hopes you pre-book so that they know in advance if they need an extra guide for an active or a "gentle walker" group, for instance. I will say that one of our paid excursions to Schonbrunn Palace was overbooked but that was not the fault of Avalon. 5 passengers boarded the bus without having registered or paid. That was unfortunate because the group being too big did detract from the tour as we all did not fit in the room being described by the guide so we were always a room behind. Small problem though. The trip was fabulous and Avalon is an excellent company. We are planning our Rhine trip for next year now.

 

I predict you will have a great time.

[RTLS]

Thank you both for your insights and yes I m sure we will have a great time.

[FuelScience]

If there's a "must do" optional excursion, you should book through Avalon before travelling. On our Rhone cruise a couple of years ago, some tours didn't take place because not enough people signed up. The exception was for cruises where people had pre-booked. These excursions took place even if there were only a few people who had booked. It may have changed since, but Avalon's policy was that any tour booked before the cruise would take place regardless. If no one had booked before the cruise, then the excursion was conditional on some minimum number of participants. 

[mhb1757]

We always precook the included excursions that are on the website just so they have some idea of who is going on which excursion. Sometimes we will prebook optional excursions and sometimes we wait until on board. The advantage to waiting usually is weather. If we wait until a day or 2 ahead you can have a more reliable prediction. On some excursions it doesn’t really matter but some of the active ones (hikes, bike trips, kayaking, etc) I hate to pay for in advance and then be obliged to go if it’s 106 or 25 and sleeting.  

BTW on our Holland trip this spring there were only 3 of us that signed up for the optional bike excursion and they canceled it. On a Danube cruise with Avalon in 2018 my daughter signed up for an optional excursion (I forget which one) and since there were only 4 people they canceled that too. So they will cancel if not enough people sign up. The cruise director will usually announce the night before that they need x more people to sign up or they will have to cancel so it’s not a surprise and you can make other plans. 

[Daisi]

mhb, were those tours that were cancelled pre-booked or signed up once on board.  I know we took some that had very few people on them, - one I think had about 6 -  last May.  Just curious if maybe it's the cruise director that also has some decisions involved.

[mhb1757]

On 8/2/2019 at 4:45 PM, Daisi said:

mhb, were those tours that were cancelled pre-booked or signed up once on board.  I know we took some that had very few people on them, - one I think had about 6 -  last May.  Just curious if maybe it's the cruise director that also has some decisions involved.

We had precooked for the tour on the Danube and signed up on board for the one in May in Amsterdam. On the canceled Danube excursion my daughter didn’t find out it had been canceled until she showed up at the time for the trip, so that was kind of a bummer. On the bike excursion in Amsterdam in May that was canceled we signed up the first day on board (the bike excursion was on day 7) and the cruise director told everyone the evening before that they needed x more people to sign up or it would be canceled. Then after dinner they told us it would be canceled so we had some advanced warning. 

I suspect they have a set minimum number required for each optional excursion and the number may vary depending on the location and the excursion. 

[RTLS]

Reading through the  thread, I get the impression that many wait until on board to book and if we do wait, which I prefer to do, we won't be the only ones.

 

I am pre -booking for the optional Prague evening event because, of course,  that happens on the first night in Prague when most will arrive although we will be there a day earlier.

 

Thanks you all very much for the responses.