No Excursion Cruising

I'm not much for excursions. On my last cruise many years ago my husband and I just walked and shopped. I'm going on a cruise solo in October and may do one excursion. The other ports I likely won't even get off the ship (the ports don't excite me). On our family cruise next April we will be doing excursions with the kids.

This is true. I know for them this cruise is much more about the ship. My husband and I are the type that we like to do things and get to know our port. We don't do as many land based Caribbean vacations anymore because we get bored by day 3 and end up renting a car to go exploring. Since we both love the water we generally enjoy snorkeling. Maybe I need to find a compromise and pick a beach with good snorkeling opportunities.

If that's really the case, why not avoid the compromise and let your kids stay on the ship while y'all go off and enjoy the port-of-call? Save a bit of money in the process, too! Well depending on how much the 21 year old drinks.

If we're on a typical Caribbean cruise, we might do one excursion out of all the ports.

Same here.

After so many cruises, we've learned we like hotel day passes more than anything else. By the time our kids were the OP's kid's ages, we were all SO over snorkeling!

We don't cruise just to sit on a beach somewhere (We live 10 minutes from the beaches of Malibu, California and we don't cruise to escape cold weather or to get a tan). So, we, generally, like to take tours in most ports. Of course, it all depends on the port. In some ports, especially ones we know well, we are very comfortable just venturing out on our own. Any excursion in such ports might, for us, be a waste of time. In most ports in Europe...or Alaska...or Australia/New Zealand... we will generally look to arrange or join small group private tours. We find the big bus cruise line shore excursions to be lacking in several respects. But, that's us...

As to traveling with kids/teens--especially 19 and 21 year olds (we cruised with our daughters from the ages of 3 and 5 up until not that long ago--and they are now 31 and 33), our answer, at least once they became teens, was to give them the option of doing something DIFFERENT from what we were doing--as long as what they chose to do was an organized tour excursion. We didn't really want them wandering around, say, Mexico or Jamaica on their own (learned our lesson once in Cabo, but that's a long story for another time). But, at times, they've wanted to go horseback riding and we didn't, so we sent them off on a horsey shorex while we visited the Tequila Distillery in Puerto Vallarta, for example. We did let them venture out on their own in Ketchikan, Alaska when they were about the same age as your kids--after all, at that age, they go off on their own all the time back home...and we were in the US of course...and all they did was go shopping in town and return to the ship...The girls were clearly capable of doing this entirely on their own.

Sure, it is a nice family thing to share tours together, but, on a cruise, we're spending so much time together anyway that a few hours doing our own things in port is no big deal...Consider the location...the activity...and the maturity and responsibility level of your kids. Heck, at 19 and 21, our daughter were both away at college and pretty much on their own to make their own decisions without us anyway...and our older daughter was at UC San Diego where kids often forayed into Mexico to drink and party...and she survived that without incident...

It all depends on the itinerary. We rarely do excursions in the Caribbean any more, but I can't imagine going to Alaska, Europe, or any place exotic just to stay on the ship.

Just wondering how many people cruise without doing any excursions at all ? We have done some where we only do excursions at some ports, or in places like Bermuda where we have done our own thing, but we normally try and fit in at least one snorkeling excursion per cruise. I ask because we are taking our adult children (19 and 21) and neither of them seem to be all that interested in doing anything "planned" except chilling on the beach.[/quo

 

Heck, out of our 15+ cruises (not counting our Alaskan cruise in 2010) to the Caribbean, the last two 7 day cruises we (my wife, my sister and I) did not even get off the ship. We had done the beaches and walked some in the local business in Mexican cities and visited Nassau/Freeport and Ste Marteen on previous cruises. So they love the ship when most are off sightseeing and I enjoy checking out every nook I can walk to inside and walking around the outside. My wife still works and has a lot of stress and uses the cruise to 'unwind and refresh'. She will sleep as long as she wants too then she and my sis will enjoy the pool and hot tub. I'm not a sun worshiper, so while they enjoy it, I'm off checking out the beauty of the ship. As I always say, 'That's what is so GREAT about cruising, everybody can find something and do their OWN thang!' Of course we aren't

teenagers, either ! :)

 

Mac

Question...if you don't go on excursions, do the itineraries matter to you (for those just staying on ship)? Couldn't the ship just go in circles in tropical climate?

Question...if you don't go on excursions, do the itineraries matter to you (for those just staying on ship)? Couldn't the ship just go in circles in tropical climate?

Sometimes we get off the ship and hit a favorite restaurant or bar, so the itinerary does matter somewhat, even without excursions at every port.

Drink package causes me to stay on board a little more often also, so does tendering which is annoying even with priority tendering

We didn't do any excursions on our first cruise last month and my niece, currently on Harmony, stays aboard at ports (so far). We did go ashore but just explored on our own. I am not much of an "organized excursion" person but when I do land based vacations, I frequently book a tour. There is so little time in port.

I just did a nine day cruise and only did one excursion in Charleston which I booked on my own: palmettos carriage ride which was great. the cruise was wonderful

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Same here.

 

After so many cruises, we've learned we like hotel day passes more than anything else. By the time our kids were the OP's kid's ages, we were all SO over snorkeling!

We have grandkids that age and we still love to snorkel at every opportunity. :cool: But maybe my avatar gave it away!

Question...if you don't go on excursions, do the itineraries matter to you (for those just staying on ship)? Couldn't the ship just go in circles in tropical climate?

It matters of course. We never stay on the ship as we love swimming and snorkeling, we love beautiful views. Sometimes we rent a car to drive around to our favorite places.

Actually if island is drivable we don't take tours even on the first visit, we just research poi and drive there. For example in St Martin, Barbados, Antigua and some others we've done just that.

In Europe we often take hop on hop off buses, or just walk around to poi and enjoy atmosphere. For some more distant cities we can take ships or private tour.

Question...if you don't go on excursions, do the itineraries matter to you (for those just staying on ship)? Couldn't the ship just go in circles in tropical climate?

Interesting idea...

I would imagine the ports must cost the cruise line a good bit of $$$ in rent/lease/docking, etc.

If they could do a "sea-days only" sailing (i.e. go out of Tampa & just putter around the Gulf of Mexico for 4 days) at a significantly reduced rate I would jump on that! :cool:

I don't like more than 3 seadays in a row. Actually prefer not more than two. We will have tree 3seadayers this year, as we sail from NYC and Baltimore to Caribbeans.

Interesting thread. We have done over 30 cruises and have never stayed on the ship. I think I would like it but the DH gets restless. So I always plan something for each port of call. Sometimes it's a ship excursion, sometimes private and sometimes a cab to a beach.

I can't count the number of times we've been to Cozumel for example but I can always find something different or interesting to do or go back to a favorite place.

As we get older we might stay on board...the DH picks where he wants to cruise to and then I do all the planning. I am just happy to be on a cruise while he likes to visit places. Works for us.

We very seldom do excursions with the ship. About all we do is scuba dive at some ports but, usually with a non ship company.

If we do go on an excursion, we would go just to be with our friends.

Same here - it's nice to stay aboard and have the boat to ourselves!

Agreed!. We've done the excursions we wanted to on previous cruises. We didn't get off the ship last time! Love having the ship to ourselves.

We hardly do any excursions ,we have been to all the islands

and some many times . We usually just get of walk around , get a drink , maybe go to beach if close and get back onboard .

I always scuba dive if possible. Since I usually travel solo, I stay on the ship if not diving.

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Depends on our itinerary.

Our last two cruises, we only got off the ship once.

But the TA/EU we had shore excursions booked in each port.

Labadee not worth an excursion but the Atlantis submarine at Cozumel wow!

Still like getting off and have done favourite places. Not a lie on the beach guy but love snorkelling so when we get into port we will either grab an excursion or just go off the beach

I am a very active vacationer who plans more activities than can humanly fit into a day, but when we do Caribbean cruises I typically stay on board. I don't like beaches (too much sand!) or water sports (too wet!) and I'm over shopping (costs money!). DH likes SCUBA, so he does that and I get in some good reading while he's gone. Every once in a while I'll step off the ship to take photos, but it has to be a pretty compelling subject.

I would say this also has alot to do with having taken AMANY Caribbean cruises over the years. When we first started these sailings, I did visit the islands and took in what they had to offer...but it got pretty repetitive.

Question...if you don't go on excursions, do the itineraries matter to you (for those just staying on ship)? Couldn't the ship just go in circles in tropical climate?

For me it depends who is with me? If i'm by myself that means I came to relax and i could stay at sea for 7 days and be okay with that. I just need a quite warm space with a view and my kindle. If i'm with my kids, I'd do excursions or at a minimum explore the local area so that they can experience different countries and cultures. If it is just my husband and me, it could go either way.