Shore excursions

Has anyone had luck when booking a shore excursion/tour through Viator? My research tells me they are reputable but I thought I would ask other cruisers who might have first hand experience. Please share your experience-good and bad. We are cruising Austalia and New Zealand.

We always have a lot of OBC so we always reserve excursions with the ship. This time, even though we have a lot of OBC again, I am considering trying this tour route as I am over the herd-type outings. We will just have to figure out what to do with all the OBC.

I sure hope that it was okay to mention the company above...I know it's a no-no to talk about travel agencies but I *think* and hope this was okay.

Thank you!

It is my understanding that Viator is just a consolidator for various tour companies.

We've been to NZ three times (but not on cruises) and just arranged our own sightseeing activities or tours. It's easy enough to do on your own.

If you have some specific activities you want to do, let us know and maybe we can tell you how to do it on your own or what tour companies you can book these tours with directly.

GradUT is correct, Viator is not a sightseeing company just a 'middle man' for other companies.

I know on tripadvisor there's been a lot of talk about problems with booking through Viator in Europe. Specifically, marked up prices and no refunds when tours are cancelled.

To be safe, you might want to just contact the sightseeing companies directly to get the best deal and know you're dealing with the actual vendor.

Viator doesn't give the names of the companies but with the help of google you should be able to find them. IF you see something on the Viator sight that looks interesting to you...and you want to contact the actual company, you can always come back here and ask using the itinerary or other info you can glean from Viator.

we have used viator to go to my Fuji in Tokyo and they were terrific. We also used them in Singapore to go to Santos's island and enjoyed that very much. I think the value was cheaper than booking on your own and have booked them for Nashville tennasee for two tours much cheaper than if I booked seperately.

I also booked them for a two day combo Sydney/ blue mountain tour for February. Hopefully I will be happy with these.

There's less people than the ships tour and well organized. Good value.

As I mentioned we have always either reserved excursions through the cruise line or just got off the ship and walked around DIY. Having said this, I have never paid attention to what time one can just walk off the ship if you have reserved a tour on your own. Also, can anyone remember how soon before the ship sails you are asked to be back on-board?

I am looking into reserving tours on my own or through Viator and I just want to be sure that I am able to meet up with the tour on time and also be able to arrive back to the ship in plenty of time. If the ship arrives in port at 8 am, what time should we be able to walk off the ship or safely meet the tour without too much stress? I ask because a lot of tours start at 8:30 or 9 so I am confused as to how to make this all work. :confused:

Even though the ship tours are over-priced it seems like that might be less stressful in regards to meeting your tour or making sure you don't miss the ship. Any advice is greatly appreciated.

A lot of tours in ports are set up with the cruise ship schedules in mind, but not all of them. That is something I would want to confirm with the company before I booked. If the company works with cruise passengers, they are mindful of arrival and departure times. Their livlihood depends on picking you up at the right time and getting you back to the ship at the right time. If they don't work with a lot of cruise ships, the company has little stake in your schedule.

For example, we did a snorkeling trip (not a ship's excursion) in Honduras that was geared towards cruise passengers, so the operators knew when to expect our arrival and what time we had to be back to the ship. No problems. However, in some place like Cairns or Port Douglas, the snorkeling trips do not depend on the cruise ships, so their schedules may not "mesh" with that of your ship.

Cruise lines may vary, but we just got off a cruise with HAL and were able to disembark at the arrival time stated on the itinerary. (The ship arrived earlier than the stated time and got tied up and cleared by the advertised time of arrival.) We were required to be back on the ship 30 minutes prior to the time of departure.