Considering RSSC Japan cruise - excursion questions

[worldtraveller99]

Reading new Regent brochure, Japan cruise looks really interesting. I have some questions please re the excursions:

1) The ship is in some ports from 8.00 am to 7.00 pm (eg). But the free excursions, each to different places, are only 4.75 hours each. Can you book 2 a day, ie one in the morning and one in the afternoon? 

2) If not - why are there almost no 8 hour excursions to see more places? 

3) What else do they expect you to do during the day - surely not just go back and sit on the ship?

4) If I wanted to hire a van / minibus for the day - and what is the difference? Surely the van is not a goods lorry - which is what the word van means in England? Anyway, we are only 2 people. Do people club together to hire a private minibus, and how would we go about doing that?

Thank you for any of your help!

 

[forgap]

Seldom are excursions timed so you can do two in a day.  That being said, I think Japan is best done on a land tour rather than a cruise.  We did both this spring and the land tour was much more interesting and immersive.  

[worldtraveller99]

Thank you. I have, many years ago, toured Japan with a friend and it was a lot of effort eg at that time absolutely no signs were in English. So I thought now that a cruise would get my husband (who has never been) & me to many places more easily, and with less noodles!

 

Does anyone have any answers to my above excursion questions please?

[minotaur]

We're doing a cruise next February/March which includes Japan, and as you say most of the excursions are around 4 to 5 hours. Personally we find that is enough for one day, and a few hours enjoying the facilities on the ship is no hardship!

 

If you want to do more, there are almost always shuttles between ship and city centre so you could explore on your own.

 

What Americans call a van, we would call a people carrier, but I don't have any experience of hiring one on a cruise - sorry.

 

 

[worldtraveller99]

Thank you minotaur - have a wonderful time! Aha a people carrier - I would not have guessed that! Maybe couple do hire that just for themselves, or just find one other couple to have it for the day. I assume it comes with a driver?

[RELS]

14 hours ago, forgap said:

Seldom are excursions timed so you can do two in a day.  That being said, I think Japan is best done on a land tour rather than a cruise.  We did both this spring and the land tour was much more interesting and immersive.  

I was really impressed with your travelogue this spring. Please tell me (again) what company you took your land tour with? This time I promise to keep the info where I can find it again. 

[forgap]

@RELS  we booked with Gate One - 12 days, small group.  Thank you for reading my travelogue.  I write so I can remember details of the sites and my impressions of the towns.  
 

We were fortunate that our group was very laid back and friendly - no difficult personalities emerged during the trip - you know what I mean!   I especially liked the tour as we did things that I never would have stumbled on alone.  Hotels were great, too. 

[mj_holiday]

We did Japan last year as a cruise.  Be sure to take a look at the dock either when you get there or as the ship is leaving, many ports had some entertainment.  If the ship is in port for 11-12 hours and you get back from a tour and have more time, there may be shuttles to take you to city center, there may also be volunteers at a tourist desk that will answer any questions and explain how to get (and return) someplace.  One day the volunteer walked us to a taxi and gave us a piece of paper to give to a taxi driver to get us back to the ship.

[worldtraveller99]

Brilliant! That sounds great, thank you.

[Henk123]

For joining or create a privat group for excursions look if there is all ready a roll call for your cruise or start a roll call yourself and try to find or create a group for excursions.

I must say this happens more on cruises with non including excursions.

Edited August 28 by Henk123

[worldtraveller99]

Will do thanks.

[Portolan]

The official Regent policy is (or was) to require 75 minutes between excursions.  As earlier mentioned, there aren't a lot of opportunities to do this, but we have done so on quite a few occasions including 2 booked (morning and afternoon) on our upcoming cruise in Montreal, 90 minutes apart.  On our 2023 Regent cruise in Japan, there were no opportunities to double-book...or at least of excursions we were interested in.

 

Some years ago in St Petersburg, we did 3 excursions in 1 day!  (because they overnighted in port and had evening excursions)

Edited August 28 by Portolan

[RachelG]

We did a regent Japan cruise last year, and there were several places where we were able to do 2 tours in a day.  Specifically, in Kobe we did two for sure, and I think one other place. 

[worldtraveller99]

Thank you - I guess we will see nearer the time.

[labonnevie]

Just realize that you may find, once you are on board, that the excursion times are different than what you had before boarding. This may prevent a second tour in a given port or it may open the opportunity that was previously unavailable. 
Check carefully all excursion times once on board. They do change. 

[PaulMCO]

Many of the SG (small group -- added cost) tours are longer and likely include lunch. 

Also note that ship really needs to be cleared by customs so an 8am arrival means tours start at 9am.  A 7pm departure means tours come back by dinner hour 530pm.   That does not allow for two tours.

 

Ship arrival and departures are tidal dependent.

 

Best are overnights where you can do a tour and then have an evening tour or go out on your own especially in Kobe.

[worldtraveller99]

Thank you very much - that all makes sense! Hopefully we will find the SG tours - just could not see them on the website at the moment for the new cruises in 2026, just private hire of a "van!"

[papaflamingo]

We did Japan in February.  As others said, you need a specific time between tours to book more than one, but if it's available, then by all means you can book more than one tour.

"why are there no 8 hour tours?"  Well... could be lots of reasons.  Any answer is purely speculative but if you consider that there just isn't that much availability of tours in many ports, Regent needs to provide tours for 700 people (and that's assuming there are no other cruise ships in port), an 8 hour tour can take 30 people, 2 four hour tours can accommodate 60 people. But there are lots of other reasons too. 

"What to do after your tour?"  The port cities are generally wonderful places to walk around for a while.  There will be a shuttle to town.  It's always a joy, for us, to just wander the local area and see what's there.  I tend to research any port where I'll have time to visit on my own and see what's interesting, mark it on a gps map program I have, and then when we go into town I have an idea of places (including restaurants, etc.) that we can walk to.  For us, the "on our own" time is always the best.  

[toseaornottosea]

Which GPS map program do you use?

[Gourmet Gal]

On 8/28/2024 at 5:28 AM, forgap said:

@RELS  we booked with Gate One - 12 days, small group.  Thank you for reading my travelogue.  I write so I can remember details of the sites and my impressions of the towns.  
 

We were fortunate that our group was very laid back and friendly - no difficult personalities emerged during the trip - you know what I mean!   I especially liked the tour as we did things that I never would have stumbled on alone.  Hotels were great, too. 

For the price of a high-end cruise you can easily book a private land tour with a company like Kensington.  We did that on my first trip to Japan and it was fantastic.  You can have them suggest an itinerary or you can create your own going to the cities and small towns you may be interested in.  The transportation is by car or train and you are fully escorted to your train car and if there is a train change someone meets you at that station and escorts you to the next train, waits while you board and will stand there waving until the train leaves.  Kensington will arrange for you to ship your luggage ahead to each hotel so no schlepping.  You can choose how much guided touring to have in each stop and also choose what you want to see.  Kensington will book any hotel you want as well as restaurant reservations. We stayed at the Peninsula in Tokyo, Four Seasons in Kyoto as well as beautiful ryokans in more remote towns.  It’s truly the best way to see Japan.