Princess Cruises 2021

[traveller_man]

We are booked on a Princess Cruises trip from Southampton that is scheduled to stop at Cadiz and Seville and Princess are not allowing guests to disembark on their own, you have to book a Princess Tour. Both these stops offer tours “on your own” meaning you are free to walk around once you have been given a expensive bus ride to your destination. Seems crazy and with no explanation given is this just a ploy to increase tour revenue by the Cruise Lines. Anyone know the true factual reasoning behind the decision. 

[CruiserBruce]

First, check out the Princess board, here:

 

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/forum/119-princess-cruises/

 

Second, the shore excursion situation is fluid and based on Covid issues and requirements of the ports involved. By the time you get on the ship, the situation may change. No one is forcing you to take a Princess excursion.  The cruise lines know some people don't all want to go on ship's shore excursions.

[Host Kat]

10 hours ago, traveller_man said:

We are booked on a Princess Cruises trip from Southampton that is scheduled to stop at Cadiz and Seville and Princess are not allowing guests to disembark on their own, you have to book a Princess Tour. Both these stops offer tours “on your own” meaning you are free to walk around once you have been given a expensive bus ride to your destination. Seems crazy and with no explanation given is this just a ploy to increase tour revenue by the Cruise Lines. Anyone know the true factual reasoning behind the decision. 

 

Howdy @traveller_man  

 

Welcome back to the Cruise Critic message boards!   I see it has been a while since you have posted.

 

Thank you for your new thread titled Princess Cruises 2021 on the Ask a Cruise Question forum. 👍  However, it is the forum for general questions regarding cruising. Your thread was off-topic there since your post concerns a specific cruise line's business practice during the COVID-19 pandemic.

 

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Host Kat  

[wowzz]

11 hours ago, CruiserBruce said:

First, check out the Princess board, here:

 

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/forum/119-princess-cruises/

 

Second, the shore excursion situation is fluid and based on Covid issues and requirements of the ports involved. By the time you get on the ship, the situation may change. No one is forcing you to take a Princess excursion.  The cruise lines know some people don't all want to go on ship's shore excursions.

The official answer from Princess UK, as reported by a member of our roll call for our October 21 cruise, is that, at present,  you will only be allowed onshore if going on an official Princess excursion.  Otherwise you will not be allowed off the ship. Also, excursions such as "Cadiz on your Own" will not yake place, as they are obviously not covid  secure.

But, things are in such a state of flux at present,  that the excursion situation may have changed totally by the time the cruise takes place.

 

[traveller_man]

Thank you. What a dilemma as having sixty cruises under our belt we have always chosen to tour independently when visiting ports, with the exception of Russia. I consider the tours to be very expensive and those that we have done I get fed up of being directed to chosen tourist shops. Being on a full bus with all be it Covid safe guests does not seem like fun and it may be we will have to cancel the cruise. We have recently cancelled a Celebrity cruise as Scotland was removed from the itinerary and replaced with Liverpool. We have a Cunard cruise booked this year and expected to have a little more freedom having been strictly complying with government guidelines for months and months. Our daughter has also just cancelled a Celebrity cruise that was due to visit Spain and Portugal as during that week UK ports websites show Silhouette in Scotland and Liverpool. I think more transparency from the cruise companies would be helpful. 

[wowzz]

1 hour ago, traveller_man said:

Thank you. What a dilemma as having sixty cruises under our belt we have always chosen to tour independently when visiting ports, with the exception of Russia. I consider the tours to be very expensive and those that we have done I get fed up of being directed to chosen tourist shops. Being on a full bus with all be it Covid safe guests does not seem like fun and it may be we will have to cancel the cruise. We have recently cancelled a Celebrity cruise as Scotland was removed from the itinerary and replaced with Liverpool. We have a Cunard cruise booked this year and expected to have a little more freedom having been strictly complying with government guidelines for months and months. Our daughter has also just cancelled a Celebrity cruise that was due to visit Spain and Portugal as during that week UK ports websites show Silhouette in Scotland and Liverpool. I think more transparency from the cruise companies would be helpful. 

We are just treating our October 21 cruise as a floating hotel holiday, with hopefully a bit of autumn Mediterranean sun thrown in!. If we can get off, it will be a bonus.

We booked as soon as it went on sale in January, so got a great deal, with Princess Plus thrown in,  so the holiday will cost us considerably less than staying in a decent hotel in the UK.