knighty33

Booking a taxi for the 4 of us was definitely my plan. Found what seems to be a pretty reputable company that, yeah, work out very reasonably for a group of 4 for what you get. Pico do Arieiro was on the list of things to see and I wanted to know what'd be a sensible walking route around there that was in the region of 2-3 hours so that's a great suggestion you've given me to work with. Thanks so much for the input, it helps a lot!

Yep, already been investigating what travel insurance would be best for us, especially with the added headache of potentially cancelled cruises due to last minute positive covid tests, but appreciate the note for sure, I know a lot of people overlook getting good insurance. In Europe we have EHIC cards which I've fortunately never had to make use of but as far as I've always understood it's generally a simple way to deal with any medical emergencies. Nice to hear from someone else who's done that particular itinerary. It's interesting because I had a look at what the Emerald is doing this year and it does non stop British Isles tours until the 10th of October where it dry docks for a couple of weeks, then does the canaries cruise then shoots off to America from the rest of the year so it seems like quite the unique itinerary. And being after 2 weeks dry docking sounds like it could be a good thing (nice and clean, fresh paint etc) but I have no idea heh. The cable car was certainly on my list of possibilities if it proves difficult booking an excursion properly up the mountains.

Will be a bit disappointing leaving my clown shoes at home but I'll try and survive! Thanks Daniel!

Thanks to both of you on the comments. I guess I didn't phrase many things in the form of questions, more just general points about age range and such haha. I'll look at posting in the roll call for more specific port questions, but I really appreciate the comments thus far

...as in, first ever cruise that is, not the first on Princess specifically! Hopefully this post isn't too self indulgent, I didn't really know what would be the most ideal place to post it! We're probably somewhat outside the standard cruising clientele, but greatly looking forward to our cruise even if I'm extremely paranoid and nervous that everything will go wrong as I always am. Our group is 2 brits and 2 americans all in our 30s who have been a tight friend group for over 10 years online now. We last met up probably over 8 years ago in the UK, and had been planning on doing something like Japan a few years back but, well, we all know what happened to the last few years. I've always wanted to do a cruise, mainly because I find the engineering and sheer scale of cruise ships to be so impressive and love the sea. Flying has always been one of my favourite parts of travelling abroad for this reason too, though I'm not quite sure a cruise ship can satisfy that 20 second take off thrill I love so much! After looking around a lot and evaluating various destinations / cruise operators, I found the 26th of October Emerald Princess itinerary to the canary islands. To be honest, my first thought with the canary islands is "horrible drunk brits in tenerife" so it had never really been on my radar, which I see now was a very faulty point of view having spent the last week or two looking deeply into what there is to do on the islands, and while madeira had only ever been an island I was aware to having spent time to learn every single world capital a couple of years back, it's now one of the spots I'm most excited to visit. As a group we're pretty relaxed and certainly not the partying type, hoping to spend some good quality board gaming time on our travels. However, I am the kind of person that likes to blend in, and truthfully one of the things that makes me most nervous is our group sticking out like a sore thumb. I've always struggled with feeling like my tastes and outlook on life sit in an awkward spot between younger and older people, though I tend to get on better around old people especially since I live with my two 90 year old grandparents. I understand Princess does maybe tend to skew on the mid to older side of things, but it'd be nice to know how much of an outlier our group is! I'm a very very obsessive researcher to the point that I tend to over worry myself in making sure everyone else is having a good time at the expense of my own but I'd rather over than under research something, so I have a few very newbie questions. Firstly, I'm not really interested in any cruise organised excursions. My plan is something a little different on each port call. Vigo - We will probably just enjoy a walk around the city Madeira - I plan on booking a private excursion either to visit the peaks in a bus/taxi or walk it (really that one depends on my group, I’d love the walk!) Tenerife - We plan on visiting Siam Park by hiring a car at the port which seems like it should be very easy and much cheaper than the cruise excursion to Playas de las Americas and give us more time too Gran Canaria - No solid plan here yet Lanzarote - Possibly private excursion to visit the national park Lisbon - Most likely just explore the city on our own For disembarking the ship, I understand of course that an 8am time is not going to mean you can walk off exactly at 8am if it’s busy trying to get people off. Would it be sensible to assume at least by 9am we could feasibly be off the ship? For embarking at the end, how much time is sensible to leave as a buffer? 6pm makes a lot of things quite tight, but we don’t want to be the silly people getting left behind due to cutting things too close! Hopefully this is an appropriate spot for this post, wasn’t sure if it’d be best here, first time cruises or in the roll call thread.