Booking shore excursions - Oct.10 Nautica

[JBVols]

We have reservations on the Oct.10, 2006 cruise from Venice to Istanbul and are interested in taking a couple of the ships excursions in addition several private tours we have already arranged. I know you can book these on line but when would you recommend that this be done? When is the latest these can be booked online? Do you pay for these at the time of booking or when you get onboard? Are these refunded if you have cancel for some reason?

[JBVols]

Can anyone help concerning booking shore excursions online?

[shoshona2]

We have taken three Oceania cruises and except for the tour to Moscow, there wasn't one tour that sold out prior to boarding the ship.

If you are concerned, go to Oceania's website and hit on "excursions" and see if the computer will allow booking at this time for the excursions.

Sheila

[mdmgso]

JBVols,

Which private tours are you taking and who are you using as guides?

We are taking private tours in Venice, Sorrento, Athens, Santorini, Kusadasi and Istanbul. We haven't decide about ship tours yet.

[JBVols]

We have arranged shore excursions in Athens, Santorini and Rhodes with a guide we had last year for eight days in mainland Greece. We will do the ship's tour in Delos. We have arranged with a guide named Levent for excursions in Kusadasi and Istanbul. We will stay an additional two days in Istanbul. Based on comments from this board, I don't think we will sign up any ship toursw before we get on the ship.

[azkitty]

The ship's tours are very $$$ compared to what you can get on your own and they don't always go to and do the things you want. To me they are far too regimented and time oriented. I am not one for getting out very early to meet a tour. When I am on vacation, I want liesurely. We also saw on a recent Nautica cruise where ports and tour times were changed and people were not notified directly and missed a tour. Some did make arrangements ahead for a private tour, and I thought these were a bit costly. For Ephesus, for example, I went to Kusadasi through google and found a company called ******************* that offered a good number of half and full day tours at very reasonable prices. We booked a half day with lunch through them for $39 pp and were pleasantly surprised to be the only ones on the tour. That meant we had our own driver and private tour guide for 6 hours as it turned out. In Istanbul, we stayed at the Hotel Alzer which had a wonderful location across from the the Blue Mosque overlooking the Hippodrome. It has a roof top restaurant and a covered side walk cafe, but is a tiny hotel. You need to ask for a front room there because that has the great view, and is a good size. I heard the other rooms were tiny. The hotel sent a pick-up van for us when we disembarked and they arranged whatever tours we wanted. The half day city tour for $30 pp ended up also being a private one since no one else had signed up.

In Santorini, you can take a public bus that runs the length of the island to a pretty little town for practically nothing. In Athens, we took a bus to the train station and a train to the foot of the Acropolis.

We did everything on our own at our own pace and didn't try to see and do everything. With 10 port days out of 12, tours can be exhusting. It seems to me if you want to really see a country or two, you need to book a land tour (not a cruise) otherwise you end up so tired and everything becomes a blur after awhile.