Funroe208

As noted in other posts, every port will have a complementary tour. Some ports have more than one. As an example of the different levels on a Tennessee River cruise last summer, there was a complementary tour of the Quilting Museum in one port that ACL paid the entry fee for. There were low-cost premium tours of Lookout Mountain and The US Space and Rocket Center in other ports. We did not go on any Signature tours on that trip, but an example of a signature tour would be like the Anan Bear Observatory in Wrangell Alaska. You probably know this, but there are no kid programs on these cruises. Based on the one we were on, 60 and up are the usual passenger age. If your family would not be comfortable just watching the shoreline go by on some days these cruises may not be a good fit. Having said that, we are going on another one in June, so ACL does do a lot of things right.

If you have a seawall hotel, you may want to consider taking 23rd street through downtown to get to the port. The last stoplight is manually controlled by the personnel at the entrance but it will probably still be quicker than Harborside Drive. The only thing I will do different next time is to not let the traffic annoy me. Good luck and enjoy your cruise!

There are Police/Guides when you go into the 23rd Street entrance. They will direct you to the correct lane when you tell them you want Express Parking. There is also an attendant at the lot if you forget the QR code they sent you. Some signage but not a lot. I used Google maps satellite views to get an idea before we arrived. We stayed at a hotel on the gulf side of the island. Left the hotel at 10:30am and were at the lot around 11:30am. Traffic was very heavy. Checked in and on the boat at 12:15pm. Hope this helps.

Just left the Express lot this morning. We were one of the first to leave and there were empty parking spots. The lot is not large, but it's right beside Terminal 28. We were driving away from the lot within 5 minutes after leaving the terminal. I have already made a new reservation there for my cruise in March.

I've got a reservation at Express Parking for Sunday. Will let you know after that.

We cruised on the Pride in April with the Walgreens rapid NAAT test. Printed the results just to have and the check-in personnel did not question anything. If I remember correctly, we did have to make a reservation at Walgreens to get the test.