Saving on land excursions

Been on several cruises, but just met members of Cruise Critic on the last trip. Most were talking about booking their own land excursions and not using the cruiseline for their bookings and this saved them up to 50% on many of their trips. Other than not booking anything until you get off ship and use the locals on the dock, how are these trips booked?

Much of it is passed along by word of mouth. Someone takes the info and contacts the provider. Then, the person posts info about the tour on the Roll Call for the cruises. People respond if they want to join the tour. In most cases, payment is made to the tour guide during or at the end of the tour.

On a cruise that included Catalina we booked our own excursion. It was about 20-30% cheaper than the similar excursion offered by Princess. I could have done it online also but a pet peeve of mine is having to pay a service charge for booking online. I did it on the phone instead and saved the service charge.

If you join the Roll Call for your cruise you will often meet people who are interested in joining together to book private excursions. A group of six to eight people can arrange for an excursion through a private tour company and usually save a significant amount over the cruise line tours (as well as having a more personal tour). We have done this in the past and it works out quite well.

We did La Bufadora excursion in Mexico, and one of the glaciers in Alaska this way. When you get off the ship there will be booths, or in Mexico it was people with signs. You just go up to them, figure out where they will take you, for how long, and how much it costs. Then you pay them. Once they get a big enough group, or by a certain time, you load into a bus and go.

Been on several cruises, but just met members of Cruise Critic on the last trip. Most were talking about booking their own land excursions and not using the cruiseline for their bookings and this saved them up to 50% on many of their trips. Other than not booking anything until you get off ship and use the locals on the dock, how are these trips booked?

Your other alternative is to book independent excursions before you even get on the ship. This is what we do. I do the research on TripAdvisor and on Cruise Critics Ports of Call Forum and contact the vendors individually. Depending on the port and vendor they may ask you or someone on the Roll Call to organize the group or, more frequently in our experience, the vendor will take your individual reservations and ask you to post the info on the Roll Call. We prefer those that ask for no payment until the tour but in the case of a few very popular excursions and vendors we have made partial payment in advance as long as they have a full refund policy if the ship should not make port for any reason.

Added - I just saw that this is your first post. Welcome to Cruise Critic! You can reach the Roll Calls and the Ports of Calls from the home page in case you haven't discovered that yet. http://boards.cruisecritic.com/

Also, google your ports, or get a guidebook...you'll find MANY private excursion operators. If you only want to do a beach, or shopping...you don't need an excursion at all....99% of the time, those sorts of things are VERY easy to DIY.

In Alaska, we used a company called Shore Trips which was recommended by our TA.

Most of the time, we look up private vendors (like Captain Marvin's in Grand Cayman), check their on line reviews and their "if the ship can't dock/tender" policy and go from there.

The cruise line uses private vendors...you just don't know who they use.

OK, there are some instances where using the ship's booking can make a difference. Example, in Venice we booked thru the cruise line because the small boat that would take us to the location tied onto the ship (like a tender, but the ship was docked) and took us thru the canals directly to our location. While this could have been booked as an "on our own," that would have meant getting off the ship and walking about a significant distance to the meeting place, then more walking to the location. The boat in the canal was great!

While Shore Trips had good prices in Alaska, they were outrageous in Europe.

Your other alternative is to book independent excursions before you even get on the ship. This is what we do. I do the research on TripAdvisor and on Cruise Critics Ports of Call Forum and contact the vendors individually. Depending on the port and vendor they may ask you or someone on the Roll Call to organize the group or, more frequently in our experience, the vendor will take your individual reservations and ask you to post the info on the Roll Call. We prefer those that ask for no payment until the tour but in the case of a few very popular excursions and vendors we have made partial payment in advance as long as they have a full refund policy if the ship should not make port for any reason.

 

Added - I just saw that this is your first post. Welcome to Cruise Critic! You can reach the Roll Calls and the Ports of Calls from the home page in case you haven't discovered that yet. http://boards.cruisecritic.com/

All of the above is excellent advice. Another piece of advice would be to RUN and not walk by the shore excursion desk on the ship. Most if not all of the excursions are overpriced cattle herds. You can usually do much better on your own. We always leave a cushion of 1-2 hours before all aboard time in order to avoid worries about missing the ship.

Your other alternative is to book independent excursions before you even get on the ship. This is what we do. I do the research on TripAdvisor and on Cruise Critics Ports of Call Forum and contact the vendors individually. Depending on the port and vendor they may ask you or someone on the Roll Call to organize the group or, more frequently in our experience, the vendor will take your individual reservations and ask you to post the info on the Roll Call. We prefer those that ask for no payment until the tour but in the case of a few very popular excursions and vendors we have made partial payment in advance as long as they have a full refund policy if the ship should not make port for any reason.

 

Added - I just saw that this is your first post. Welcome to Cruise Critic! You can reach the Roll Calls and the Ports of Calls from the home page in case you haven't discovered that yet. http://boards.cruisecritic.com/

I agree, and would add that I prefer those that take a small down payment at time of reservation. Reason being, is there are people who will book several excursions that doesn't need to have a down payment and end up being no-shows at the ones they decided to not go to that day. The tour operator will wait quite a long time for these no shows and in the end, the people who showed up on time, or the ones who showed up at all, get a shortened tour. This happened to me with Bernard's tour in St. Maarten. We missed the first half the tour waiting for people who never showed up.

I think going on your Roll Call is the best way. You get to "know" the people on your Roll call and you can tell if you will get along with them and want to hang out with your new friends on your tour. Actually much easier to break the ice that way, esp for a shy person (IRL) such as myself.

If you book a cruise, or you have one already booked, definitely find your roll call and that is where you can join others on your cruise booking private tours.

The cost is much less, about 50%, the amount or people is extremely less, about 75%, and you get to the tour locations ahead of the big buses.

If you can't find your roll call come back here with your cruise ship name and date of sailing and someone here will help you find it. :)

We did a 45 day B2B2B cruise in 2015 that visited 27 ports. In 23 of those 27 ports, we were doing tours with fellow cruisers - it was wonderful! I joined the Roll Call and met "fellow cruisers" and monitored the posts of all who had contacted private tour companies and were looking for additional folks to meet the quota needed for the GREATLY reduced rates. We saved so much money and had an incredible time with people we saw again on board after the excursion. We will never book the cruise ship's excursions again, as I find them more expensive and not as good overall.

I will mention that there are times you should book through the cruiseline, for example when it is a very long day. Twice we did just that, once for Tulum, another for Lamanai. Both times the group came back well after the sailaway time. For Lamanai we were on the final tender that included some officers. We came back a full hour after sailaway. If we had booked a private company tour we would have been left long ago. The safety is that the ship won't leave 200-300 pax behind.

You do not say where you are going. There are many ports where you can easily explore on your own.

Other than that, I agree that private tours are the way to go: less expensive, more choice, fewer people, etc.

Do your research on the Ports of Call forum as well as Trip Advisor. Check out cruiseport wiki, Tom's Port Guides, and Rick Steve's book about Mediterranean cruises. Google will find these for you.

And for sure follow the Roll Call for your cruise. Others may have done the work for you and are looking for people to join them.

What are your ports of call?

Another option is to research your ports in advance (local library guidebooks), and determine what the attractions are, and how to get there. In many ports you can easily walk to beaches and other attractions. Some ports also have kiosks where you can pick up free maps and other information.

Another option is to research your ports in advance (local library guidebooks), and determine what the attractions are, and how to get there. In many ports you can easily walk to beaches and other attractions. Some ports also have kiosks where you can pick up free maps and other information.

I agree with this partially. I do the research online rather than using printed guide books. They are basically out of date by the time they reach the shelves.

You can also get telephone numbers to call that are more apt to be correct than those found in guidebooks.

Additionally, you get the reviews of others so you can make a more informed decision.

Online searching and roll calls work well for us. I have mostly only booked full day long tours with cruise ship just to be safe.