Lack of excursions - is this normal?

We have a cruise coming up in about 3 months on NCL Escape. First time with NCL. We are trying to book excursions, and the options seem to trickle in slowly. Only 3 months out and just 36 options for 4 ports. Our RCCL cruise 11 months out has hundreds of options already. Carnival was similar, all the options there when we booked 6 months out. But NCL, almost nothing just 3 months out.

Does NCL normally just trickle excursions in, and at what point can we expect everything there so we can actually browse through and make selections? How many days out is normal?

Yes, NCL does tend to trickle the excursions through over time. I’ve had cruises in the past where some ports have been available over a year in advance and others only a few months.

Having said that, there seem to be particular issues lately. Questions about cruises with few excursions listed are being posted just about Daily lately. Maybe it’s because of disruption due to the hurricanes.

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We're on the March 3rd Escape cruise and noticed that too. As the other poster noted it's because of the change of itinerary. There will be a lot of other ships in Jamaica, Grand Cayman and Nassau so I'd assume there's not many additional tour operators available. Through the message boards on CC I've read other's suggestions and booked our own beach club in Grand Cayman privately. I'd suggest you do the same to decide what you'd like to do in the various ports. Some more excursions may show up but there's no guarantees.

Would be nice if NCL had an official statement on the matter. Just waiting and waiting and not knowing anything.... When Royal changed our itinerary for our cruise last month, the excursions popped up quickly. I just don't really buy that as a good reason for NCL, as other cruise lines don't seem to have the same problem. NCL has a whopping 2 excursions for Nassau... come on!

What about GSC. I know they are supposed to be opening up a Haven area, from some reading it seems like we'll probably miss this by weeks... ugh... (Late Feb). Is there cabanas or any premium options available for purchase or for Haven guests?

NCL has been cruising to Alaska for a number of years but there are NO shorex available for 2018 yet. They put shorex on when they are available. Sorry, but like me, just have to wait and keep checking.

I have my Australia cruise this January and its a 10 day with 6 ports and only 32 excursions and hasn't changed in the last 8 months. usually they open way more around the 60 day mark but have not. I called NCL yesterday and the Shore Excursion dept said these seem to be the only excursions they plan on offering which was really strange since my Greek Isles cruise this Spet 2018 already has 100 excursions available. and the options feel like slim pickings too.

I have my Australia cruise this January and its a 10 day with 6 ports and only 32 excursions and hasn't changed in the last 8 months. usually they open way more around the 60 day mark but have not. I called NCL yesterday and the Shore Excursion dept said these seem to be the only excursions they plan on offering which was really strange since my Greek Isles cruise this Spet 2018 already has 100 excursions available. and the options feel like slim pickings too.

That's a shame. Excursions are a big deal for me, it's pretty much why we cruise. We enjoy a unique activity in each port and never stay on the ship. If this is the norm for NCL, I'm not sure their product would be for me. Which is unfortunate as we booked the Haven and I think the Haven is awesome compared to other lines suite offerings... just falling so short on the excursions sucks. How can they only come up with 2 in Nassau? That's nuts. I'll hold out some hope and maybe in the 45 - 60 day mark a bunch of stuff will start popping up. We'll see :)

I have my Australia cruise this January and its a 10 day with 6 ports and only 32 excursions

I don't know which of the two Jewel cruises you are doing in January but I can give you some idea of the shore excursions. While on the Jewel from Honolulu to Sydney I actually proof read all the excursions being offered from all the New Zealand ports. (I don't know how many changes of grammar, spelling or punctuation actually took place!!)

New Zealand is a small country but distances between places of interest are quite large. I think the cover that NCL is providing for their visits to NZ ports is quite a reasonable set of shorex. When I looked at them any others I could think of would have entailed lots of travel, a night ashore and then going from one port to the next. The only "simple" one I think they missed would have been a helicopter flight from Mt Maunganui to White Island.

I’ve noticed the same thing for our March 5th cruise to the Western Caribbean on the Jade. On our Hawaii cruise last year, excursions were available months in advance.

Also weird is that I only see 7 or 8 excursions while others see 34. I’ve tried different browsers and doing mock bookings but the particular excursion I want ( Maya Key) does not show up for our sailing. It’s really frustrating. Calling shorex desk was pointless. No help there.

If other lines can offer shore excursions after the hurricanes why can’t NCL?

I’m thinking of booking with Victor Bodden on my own in Roataan.

When are on the Epic in February (24th). I got letter saying they have not gotten all the shore excursions set yet due to the fact they changed our cruise from eastern to western. I am wondering if there will be two ships their private island. There are no excursions available there yet.

I think the general lack of upcoming cruises' shore excursions can be put down to all the work that is having to be done post hurricanes rearranging those cruises in the very near future..

We sail in 25 days and just got shore excursions for Mazatlan a few days ago. The Hurricanes did not help the expediency of the shore excursions becoming available.

A previous poster was mentioning Alaska in 2018. Shore excursions for Alaska 2018 sailings will start to open in January according the shore ex dept rep I talked too a month ago on my weekly call to NCL about the Mazatlan shore excursions prior to them becoming available.

We have a cruise coming up in about 3 months on NCL Escape. First time with NCL. We are trying to book excursions, and the options seem to trickle in slowly. Only 3 months out and just 36 options for 4 ports. Our RCCL cruise 11 months out has hundreds of options already. Carnival was similar, all the options there when we booked 6 months out. But NCL, almost nothing just 3 months out.

 

Does NCL normally just trickle excursions in, and at what point can we expect everything there so we can actually browse through and make selections? How many days out is normal?

From: Norwegian Communications Centre

Sent: September 18, 2016

Subject: Shore Excursions

Recent itinerary changes have caused delays in updating available shore excursions in some ports of call. We apologize for any inconvenience. Please check back later or book your excursions once on board. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

We sail in 5 days and there is on 39 shore excursions for the entire cruise. Epic 12/2 sailing.

From: Norwegian Communications Centre

Sent: September 18, 2016

Subject: Shore Excursions

Recent itinerary changes have caused delays in updating available shore excursions in some ports of call. We apologize for any inconvenience. Please check back later or book your excursions once on board. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Is the sent date of "September 18, 2016" correct....or possibly a typo? I don't recall there being these problems last year..but maybe there were?

Joe

Is the sent date of "September 18, 2016" correct....or possibly a typo? I don't recall there being these problems last year..but maybe there were?

 

Joe

I never noticed the date it's on our current cruise in Jan under MY NCL message

Odd That's the date we have booked this cruise

We sail in less than 2 weeks. One port has no excursions. Other ports added new excursions in just the past couple weeks. They will probably add more "last minute" but no guarantee every port will have options.

So these failures with excursions isn't just my cruise. Interesting. And kind of lousy. That's not normal, and hurricane excuses don't fly. I sailed royal less than a month after the hurricane, switch from east to west, and a full listing of excursions were available right away.

Seems NCL is simply failing at this. Hopefully more pops up as we get closer because it's not really acceptable.

Have to chime in that if you cruise to solely,

go on ship sponsored excursions only,

tis not a unique cultural adventure with 100 other people :eek:

I will say if one is older or disabled that ship excursions only is probably the way to go :D

My cruise is in 80 days, 4 stops, 6 excursions on line. For GSC the only thing available is a large cabana rental. Nothing else. There has to be something going on in corporate for such limited amounts of excursions.

The stops are all the usual NYC to FLA/Bahamas, with the addition of Miami. For Miami there are no excursions listed at all

Breakaway's 12 day sailing leaving Sunday only has excursions for 3 of the 6 ports. Frustrating since we don't like the itinerary post-hurricane and cannot even see what we might be able to do. And one is a routine port - Port Canaveral. No excuse. They say we will be able to book on board, so it will be a scramble to figure it out and book.

Breakaway's 12 day sailing leaving Sunday only has excursions for 3 of the 6 ports. Frustrating since we don't like the itinerary post-hurricane and cannot even see what we might be able to do. And one is a routine port - Port Canaveral. No excuse. They say we will be able to book on board, so it will be a scramble to figure it out and book.

We're on the Gem Saturday with only 7 excursions for 1 port and none for the other 3.[emoji848] Already booked 2 locally![emoji6] Enjoy!🥂

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Have to chime in that if you cruise to solely,

go on ship sponsored excursions only,

tis not a unique cultural adventure with 100 other people :eek:

 

I will say if one is older or disabled that ship excursions only is probably the way to go :D

Was there a debate about the unique cultural aspects of excursions that I totally missed?

Breakaway's 12 day sailing leaving Sunday only has excursions for 3 of the 6 ports. Frustrating since we don't like the itinerary post-hurricane and cannot even see what we might be able to do. And one is a routine port - Port Canaveral. No excuse. They say we will be able to book on board, so it will be a scramble to figure it out and book.

Such a failure by NCL. I figured it was just my cruise, but to find that this is "normal"? We'll see how the cruise goes, I'm still very much looking forward to it, but as someone who really enjoys excursions at every port.... it's not looking good for NCL.

I agree that only two options for Nassau is a bit ridiculous; have you considered doing a private tour? Since you mentioned Haven, do you have the $50 per cabin credit per port? You may still be ahead booking private. There are many good tours that are never offered by any cruise line. Though I could understand if you had a bunch of OBC wanting to book through the line.

NCL is finally offering 12 excursions for our Cuba cruise. The prices are shockingly higher than we can book on our own. They want $600 for 2 people to do a 3.5 hour car tour. I have a longer tour booked privately for 200 CUC (about $200 USD) and can be up to four people for that flat rate. So def no bargain using cruise line