Port Canaveral Port Excursions

[Queenie1001]

We are doing the NCL Pearl out of NY,  on of the ports if Port Canaveral. Only shore excursion they have is Cocoa Beach. Is there anything else besides the space stuff? Could we pull of a Universal Day and be back to the ship on time?

[hallux]

Looking at NCL's site you're only in port for 8 hours, from 1-9, unless I'm looking at the wrong one.  At least 2.5 hours of that is going to be getting a rental car, returning it and getting to and from the park (1 hour each way) plus you should try to be on board at least 30 minutes before sail-away.  It looks like the park is open until 10 so you're not restricted by that.

 

How much of the park will you really be able to do in 5 hours when you consider lines and grabbing a meal somewhere there as well (I assume)?

Edited February 17, 2020 by hallux

[BirdTravels]

9 hours ago, Queenie1001 said:

We are doing the NCL Pearl out of NY,  on of the ports if Port Canaveral. Only shore excursion they have is Cocoa Beach. Is there anything else besides the space stuff? Could we pull of a Universal Day and be back to the ship on time?

I don’t think it would be worth the effort. I would allow an hour to get to the park and 90 mins back. Add the park ticket to the Uber and it is an expensive shore ex for a few hours in the park. 

[dexddd]

Ever since they moved the arrival times to 1 pm PC basically worthless, for your convenience, of course.

[farkell]

We are going on the Bliss in April and agree that there isn't enough time to do anything well in Orlando.  There is nothing to do in the port either.  We are staying on the ship.

[softl]

Try the airboat ride for the adventure and a different view of Florida.

 

[hallux]

Did I read that PC is a provisioning stop for NCL on these trips?  Maybe it was Royal?

[shof515]

11 minutes ago, hallux said:

Did I read that PC is a provisioning stop for NCL on these trips?

yes that is correct. From what i remember in Q&A talks onboard the ship, this is because the provisioning is cheaper (less $$$) in PC compare to NYC.

[April42749]

We've done the Daytona Raceway trip, we've done the Best of Port Canaveral, we've done the Orlando Eye/Mme Toussand's  and the Disney Springs.  There was enough time for all of them and we enjoyed all of them.

Going to Kennedy or any other Disney attraction is not worth it.

This is one port where you can't just wander around the terminal (we did that once too....waste of time).

We did Cocoa Beach also....typical US East Coast Atlantic Ocean beach.  "Special" only if you usually don't go to East Coast Atlantic Ocean Beaches.

Edited February 17, 2020 by April42749

[NYcruzzer]

12 hours ago, Queenie1001 said:

We are doing the NCL Pearl out of NY,  on of the ports if Port Canaveral. Only shore excursion they have is Cocoa Beach. Is there anything else besides the space stuff? Could we pull of a Universal Day and be back to the ship on time?

 

Our last few stops to PC we opted for the Disney Springs Excursion. It's really reasonable. Like $35.00 P/P 

https://www.disneysprings.com/

 

Spent about 4 hours shopping and dining..Great way to get a little Disney fix without the madness of the parks.

Edited February 17, 2020 by NYcruzzer

[Mike_DeA]

13 hours ago, Queenie1001 said:

We are doing the NCL Pearl out of NY,  on of the ports if Port Canaveral. Only shore excursion they have is Cocoa Beach. Is there anything else besides the space stuff? Could we pull of a Universal Day and be back to the ship on time?

 

I did exactly this in Dec. 2018.  Rented a car and went to Universal, had about 4.5 hrs in the park.  Toward the end of the day I kept checking the traffic via an app to ensure there were no issues.  It's a solid hour drive with no traffic.  We were the road by about 7pm to return the rental car, and lucked out since an Uber driver was basically waiting in the rental car lot for cruisers (this is common apparently and some Uber drivers prepare), and got back to the ship at 8.15pm, 15 min. before all aboard. 

 

Would I do it again?  Probably not by renting a car since I was the driver and was stressed about leaving the park on time, but I would take the cruise lines's excursion bus since you're guaranteed that the ship will wait if there is a delay getting back.  I think it's $35 pp or so, but it wasn't available on my trip (not sure if it was sold out or hadn't started yet with the new pricing structure). as it was a last minute decision to go to Universal.  The rental car was about $60, but rates vary. 

Edited February 17, 2020 by Mike_DeA

[Cilosgirl]

We did the airboat ride and Alligator Jungle 2 years ago. The airboat ride was awesome but I wasn’t too impressed with Alligator Jungle, we spent too much time there. You can do an excursion that is just the airboat ride which I would recommend.
We are heading there again in March and we were debating on just staying on the ship but we have a shore excursion credit so we are going to use it to check out Cocoa Beach. 

[HowardK]

If you would be interested in Kennedy I would not discourage you from it- we had 5 hours there several years ago but then again the times could have slightly changed. From feedback from my cruise I would not go to Disney- it simply wasn't enough time there

[hallux]

A point of note on going to Kennedy - if there's a rocket launch planned for the day you're there, especially coming in to port as late as you are, you're not getting anywhere NEAR the facility.  I did an RCI excursion on a Space-X launch day during spring break week, it took 3 hours to get to the facility from the port and halfway there we were told we were lucky we had tickets as they weren't allowing any more walk-ups.  As we were on KSC-run buses they opened a shortcut that's not open to others so we could bypass the traffic on the main road.

[poohdreaming]

Disney Springs - the price is reasonable and lots of things to look at, shop, and eat if you want to. There's also a movie theater inside Disney Springs. If you do not want to spend anymore monies besides the bus transfer to Disney Springs, that's fine too.

[tokidoki]

We r going for $35 each, minus shore x credit and platinum discount to Disney Springs, then bus to Polynesian(transportation center), to ride monorail to Epcot, it goes right thru park, then to ride new sky ride.  Then back to Springs to walk around to see shops, etc and meet bus.  Probably get 4 hrs at most, but it’s a cheap and fun day

[hallux]

Disney Springs is neat to walk around and see some of the things they've done there.  I was there in January, stayed across the street for a work event and had dinner there every night.  I wouldn't dedicate an entire day to it but it definitely would be a good place to grab a meal.

 

A couple of the meals I had -

The Boathouse - Shrimp & Andouille Mac & Cheese.  EXCELLENT, might be spicy.

D-Luxe Burger - Barbecue Burger.  Good burger

Polite Pig - Smoked Turkey BLT

Edited February 18, 2020 by hallux

[smplybcause]

1 hour ago, tokidoki said:

We r going for $35 each, minus shore x credit and platinum discount to Disney Springs, then bus to Polynesian(transportation center), to ride monorail to Epcot, it goes right thru park, then to ride new sky ride.  Then back to Springs to walk around to see shops, etc and meet bus.  Probably get 4 hrs at most, but it’s a cheap and fun day

 

You do know the only way to get from where the monorail drops you off at Epcot to the gondolas is to walk through Epcot (which you need a ticket to be able to do), right? 

[BigPodge]

Is it worth doing the Kennedy Space Center tour with NCL or better to Uber there and go it alone?

[bbritton81]

16 minutes ago, BigPodge said:

Is it worth doing the Kennedy Space Center tour with NCL or better to Uber there and go it alone?

I checked that same thing last week.  It essentially costs the same and at least with NCL you're guaranteed to get back on time.

[hallux]

45 minutes ago, BigPodge said:

Is it worth doing the Kennedy Space Center tour with NCL or better to Uber there and go it alone?

See my post earlier in the thread.  Yes it was on Royal, but it would apply to any ship in port on those days.

[BigPodge]

39 minutes ago, bbritton81 said:

I checked that same thing last week.  It essentially costs the same and at least with NCL you're guaranteed to get back on time.

 

Why do you think it costs the same?

 

Sorry if I'm missing something but it looks like it's $57 for a general admission ticket so not sure if it's worth $70 per person just for the bus, do you get any extras with the tour that is not included in general admission?

[bbritton81]

5 minutes ago, BigPodge said:

 

Why do you think it costs the same?

 

Sorry if I'm missing something but it looks like it's $57 for a general admission ticket so not sure if it's worth $70 per person just for the bus, do you get any extras with the tour that is not included in general admission?

ok similar, I'd rather pay the extra and be sure I'm getting back on time.  The price for a lyft each way when I looked was around $32-38.  So for two adults using Uber/Lyft and purchasing tickets on their own it was approximately $200 total.  I paid $250 with NCL for piece of mind, and actually only $200 because I got $50 shore excursion credit.

[tokidoki]

21 hours ago, smplybcause said:

 

You do know the only way to get from where the monorail drops you off at Epcot to the gondolas is to walk through Epcot (which you need a ticket to be able to do), right? 

No😱. Will have to reroute😳thx

[smplybcause]

55 minutes ago, tokidoki said:

No😱. Will have to reroute😳thx

 

Yea they're at the back Epcot entrance that not everyone knows about which it's where yacht & beach club and boardwalk hotels are. I'm not sure if there are any buses that take you from the front of epcot to those hotels since you can walk to epcot from them.