First day in Israel, Ashdod or Haifa, expect delays!

[marylizcat]

I wanted to post on here just to warn others of what to expect on first arriving in Israel. I was unaware of the problems and would have planned differently if I had known. We were on Odyssey of the Seas, a very large ship. Quite possibly on a smaller ship, these problems would have been much less. 
 

After the ship was cleared, RCI excursions were the first allowed to disembark. Everybody else, on independent excursions had to leave in ‘group’ order.  This number was determined by your ticket, similar to a tender ticket, which was distributed on an earlier sea day. This meant that in a group minibus, it was necessary to wait for everybody to slowly arrive before the tour could depart. It took until 10.30 am for this, after disembarkation started at 8. This meant that the tour returned very late to the ship. Fortunately we were in port overnight. If it had been a one day call, the tour would have had to be abbreviated.

 

On subsequent days, there was not the same problem. Everybody was allowed off at the same time.

 

If I had my time again, I would either do a totally private excursion or a ship’s excursion on the first day.

 

(This all rather reminded me of visits to St Petersburg in the old days!)

[marylizcat]

I should have said that the reason given for this slow disembarkation was Israeli immigration procedures. You had to pass passport control on the first day. Actually a very fast process, just like at any European airport.

[Crazy planning mom]

We visited these ports recently on the Norwegian Jade.  We experienced some delays due to the immigration experience.

This is why we booked an NCL tour for the first day.  It was Dead Sea and Masada.  We still got to experience everything and the slight delay didn't ultimately affect our day.

The next day, we had a wonderful private tour with Guided Tours Israel.  It was nicer having the private tour and getting to pick what we wanted to see.

[gdynkin]

If the ship is moving from the Ashdod port (which you went through immigration) to the Haifa port the next day, do you have to pass through immigration again in Haifa?

[IgKh]

12 hours ago, gdynkin said:

If the ship is moving from the Ashdod port (which you went through immigration) to the Haifa port the next day, do you have to pass through immigration again in Haifa?

 

No

[wineoclock]

We had our passports checked on the ship daily. 

[marylizcat]

On 11/12/2022 at 10:00 PM, wineoclock said:

We had our passports checked on the ship daily. 

Yes, they still checked the passports to see you had your gate pass every subsequent day. But that didn’t delay things like the first day. You could get off anytime you wanted to, not in numbered groups. Somebody came onto the ship and checked as you were leaving. The first day you were processed in the terminal building.

[Markanddonna]

Disembarkation was the worst ever. The luggage is left outside and the lines are crazy long. 

[Markanddonna]

On 11/11/2022 at 6:18 PM, Crazy planning mom said:

We visited these ports recently on the Norwegian Jade.  We experienced some delays due to the immigration experience.

This is why we booked an NCL tour for the first day.  It was Dead Sea and Masada.  We still got to experience everything and the slight delay didn't ultimately affect our day.

The next day, we had a wonderful private tour with Guided Tours Israel.  It was nicer having the private tour and getting to pick what we wanted to see.

We booked a private tour with Guided Tours Israel because we had been with them before three times. We had two vans of 13 and15 people with different guides. I arranged for a special accommodation with the interview process and we were on time gettinf off in Ashdod. So much better than the more expensive ship excursions with large groups.

[Tin can]

On 11/9/2022 at 4:53 PM, marylizcat said:

I wanted to post on here just to warn others of what to expect on first arriving in Israel. I was unaware of the problems and would have planned differently if I had known. We were on Odyssey of the Seas, a very large ship. Quite possibly on a smaller ship, these problems would have been much less. 
 

After the ship was cleared, RCI excursions were the first allowed to disembark. Everybody else, on independent excursions had to leave in ‘group’ order.  This number was determined by your ticket, similar to a tender ticket, which was distributed on an earlier sea day. This meant that in a group minibus, it was necessary to wait for everybody to slowly arrive before the tour could depart. It took until 10.30 am for this, after disembarkation started at 8. This meant that the tour returned very late to the ship. Fortunately we were in port overnight. If it had been a one day call, the tour would have had to be abbreviated.

 

On subsequent days, there was not the same problem. Everybody was allowed off at the same time.

 

If I had my time again, I would either do a totally private excursion or a ship’s excursion on the first day.

 

(This all rather reminded me of visits to St Petersburg in the old days!)

 

Thank you for explaining that the Royal Caribbean disembarkation process is similar to tender tickets. Quite a few posts mention issues but not how it actually worked.

 

We are looking for 2024 and quite fancy Jerusalem DIY from Ashod. I don't suppose you remember roughly how much full day RCI Jerusalem excursions were?

 

My guess is quite expensive so just trying to do some quick maths to see whether putting that cost to get a suite (and a concierge giving out tickets) would be close enough to consider.