Will Norwegian get you back on time?

Will Norwegian get you back on time, if you book one of their excursions (instead of a 3rd party one)? I'm looking at two activities for Puerto Chacabuco, one at 3 hours, one at 5 hours. The schedule says we arrive at 10am and leave at 5pm. That would seem to not leave enough time for a 5 hour tour. What I've read here is that it could take 2 hours to get off the ship and you should be back 2 hours before departure. For that schedule it seems a 3 hour activity is more appropriate.

Any thoughts, please?

Will Norwegian get you back on time, if you book one of their excursions (instead of a 3rd party one)? I'm looking at two activities for Puerto Chacabuco, one at 3 hours, one at 5 hours. The schedule says we arrive at 10am and leave at 5pm. That would seem to not leave enough time for a 5 hour tour. What I've read here is that it could take 2 hours to get off the ship and you should be back 2 hours before departure. For that schedule it seems a 3 hour activity is more appropriate.

 

Any thoughts, please?

There is plenty of time for that tour. The 2 hour thing only applies on embarkation and disembarkation days. On port days you will get off the ship at around the stated arrival time and need to be back 30 minutes before departure.

Regardless, an excursion booked through NCL will get you back in time anyway.

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The 2 hours to get off the ship and be back 2 hours before departure does not apply to port of call . This only applies to homeport

During a port of call stop, you can usually get off the ship 15-30 minutes after the ship is fully docked to the pier.

Read the freestyle daily, there is something called an All Aboard Time. This time can range from 30 minutes to 60 minutes before sail away time.

For a 10am to 5pm port stop, you can get get off the ship around 10:30am and be required to be back on board by 4:30pm. This plenty of time to do both tours

Norwegian shore excursion has a guarantee you will make it back to the ship, they can make the wait for you if needed.

The ship will not leave if they have excursions booked through them still out.

I was on the Scape in 2017 and we waited more than 1 hour for an overdue excursion in Cozumel arriving by ferry boat on the same dock

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Will Norwegian get you back on time, if you book one of their excursions (instead of a 3rd party one)? I'm looking at two activities for Puerto Chacabuco, one at 3 hours, one at 5 hours. The schedule says we arrive at 10am and leave at 5pm. That would seem to not leave enough time for a 5 hour tour. What I've read here is that it could take 2 hours to get off the ship and you should be back 2 hours before departure. For that schedule it seems a 3 hour activity is more appropriate.

 

Any thoughts, please?

The two hour time blocks are only applicable at initial embarkation and final disembarkation. If you book an excursion with NCL, the ship will not leave port without you. If you prefer the 5 hour excursion then that is the one you should book.

Will Norwegian get you back on time, if you book one of their excursions (instead of a 3rd party one)? I'm looking at two activities for Puerto Chacabuco, one at 3 hours, one at 5 hours. The schedule says we arrive at 10am and leave at 5pm. That would seem to not leave enough time for a 5 hour tour. What I've read here is that it could take 2 hours to get off the ship and you should be back 2 hours before departure. For that schedule it seems a 3 hour activity is more appropriate. Any thoughts, please?

The 5 hour tour is fine. You can be on the dock shortly after 10 am. And all aboard is at 4:30 pm and should an NCL tour run late, the ship will wait for you.

If you read the brochures and other collateral for the excursions sold by the cruise line, they should include words that say they guarantee you will make it back to the ship, even if the ship has to wait.

It's well known that you can save money by booking excursions with 3rd parties. The biggest downside or risk of booking with a 3rd party is the risk that if they don't get you back on time, you'll be stuck. That risk is non existent with ship sold excursions.

Just a "for instance senario", we were on a British Isles cruise on ncl Star, Sept, 2015 and there was a tour from Rotterdam which left early morning and was to return by 5PM. Well, there was a terrible accident on the main highway that the tour bus would have taken and many tour buses were delayed as well as private tour vehicles.

DH and I had returned well within the time of departure but we had many friends who were still not back to the ship; the Star waited another 2 hours for the rest to return b/c they'd rec'd info of the highway blockage due to the accident.

Our friends were very grateful that the ship had waited for all to be aboard. I suspect it was the ncl TOURS that had the most impact but was nice they waited the extra time for the others as well.

Will Norwegian get you back on time, if you book one of their excursions (instead of a 3rd party one)? I'm looking at two activities for Puerto Chacabuco, one at 3 hours, one at 5 hours. The schedule says we arrive at 10am and leave at 5pm. That would seem to not leave enough time for a 5 hour tour. What I've read here is that it could take 2 hours to get off the ship and you should be back 2 hours before departure. For that schedule it seems a 3 hour activity is more appropriate.

 

Any thoughts, please?

Another thought in addition to the ship waiting is that taking a NCL excursion is a way to get off the ship before the herds. They generally have you meet some where on board and then escort you off.

Normally, the ship will delay departure if its own excursions are late. I've never experienced this, but it has been reported on these forums that in extremely rare cases, the ship cannot wait for its own tours due to exceptional travel delays. In those very rare cases, NCL is 100% responsible for all costs of getting you to the next port so you can rejoin the cruise.

Please bear in mind that most of the longer private excursions I've been on have been in texting contact with the drivers of the cruise ship tours to ensure that we don't arrive later than them (if they're running a little late, the private excursions have a bit more leeway since the boat will allow everyone to reboard prior to sailing). We always take private tours and have never had a problem returning late, but we also have travel insurance which I hope would protect us if this happened (we travel with small kids so we need travel insurance in case of a medical emergency).

Another thought in addition to the ship waiting is that taking a NCL excursion is a way to get off the ship before the herds. They generally have you meet some where on board and then escort you off.

This applies in ports where ship tours have priority disembarkation - which in the 2018 season includes St. Petersburg, and with some lines includes Santorini and other ports). In Santorini, it could be quite advantageous to take a cruise tour since you get the tender first, and can be bussed to the hilltop instead of waiting on line for the funicular or donkey ride. The lines through customs in St. Petersburg could be 1-2 hours, so priority disembarkment with a cruise tour could be quite valuable. However, private tour passengers can choose to depart later on day one and start earlier on day two so they have the same amount of time in the city without waiting in line.

In ports where everyone can disembark at the same time, independent passengers can often get there more quickly since it takes awhile to get everyone boarded on cruise tour buses. We disembarked in Stockholm and travelled directly to Vasa prior to the cruise tours arriving, and the museum was completely empty when we arrived and crowded when we left. The same thing happened at the Hermitage since all passengers were able to disembark from St. Petersburg at the same time 4 years ago (this not true anymore since cruise ship passengers now have priority in disembarkation). Some of the ports don't allow you to give priority to cruise tour passengers. You'd need to research your ports since it varies to see if a cruise tour can help you get to your destination faster.

Will Norwegian get you back on time, if you book one of their excursions (instead of a 3rd party one)? I'm looking at two activities for Puerto Chacabuco, one at 3 hours, one at 5 hours. The schedule says we arrive at 10am and leave at 5pm. That would seem to not leave enough time for a 5 hour tour. What I've read here is that it could take 2 hours to get off the ship and you should be back 2 hours before departure. For that schedule it seems a 3 hour activity is more appropriate.

 

Any thoughts, please?

don't worry; the simple answer is YES

The elephant in the room is why someone would waste money on an NCL excursion in Puerto Chacabuco in the first place. There is absolutely nothing there except pretty scenery, so you will just be riding a bus looking out the window for 90% of your tour. Either take a private tour that does the same thing for half the cost or do it on your own with the local buses for about $15.

We did a NCL tour in Berlin, we were two hours past the time the ship was supposed to depart, due to train mechanical issues. ship waited, they also had the Garden Cafe open and running to feed passengers, we didn't get back until after 11PM

The elephant in the room is why someone would waste money on an NCL excursion in Puerto Chacabuco in the first place. There is absolutely nothing there except pretty scenery, so you will just be riding a bus looking out the window for 90% of your tour. Either take a private tour that does the same thing for half the cost or do it on your own with the local buses for about $15.

Not entirely true. There is at least one NCL nature walk that gets you outside. Some in my roll call signed up for a local activity that is only slightly less expensive than the NCL trip.

The ship doesn't book tours that don't coincide with the time the ship is in port. If it wasn't doable in the allotted time, it wouldn't even be offered by NCL.

The ship doesn't book tours that don't coincide with the time the ship is in port. If it wasn't doable in the allotted time, it wouldn't even be offered by NCL.

Absolutely

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I was on an NCL excursion in Barr Harbor, ME. It wasn't scheduled to be over until a half hour after the "last" tender was supposed to return to the ship. There was no issue at all. We actually got the real last tender, the one that crew were on board. The "last" tender time was for passengers who were just going ashore to do their own thing. I was assured the ship would not leave without us and they didn't.

Yes, NCL held the last tender for us in Belize City when our NCL excursion to cave dive ran late.

The group of NCL passengers that decided to arrange their own bus to do the cave diving wasn't as fortunate. We passed them standing next to their broken down bus on the dirt road that goes into the cave area.

They missed the tender and the ship.