Pride Of America excursions

Aloha, cruisers!

We are booked on the Pride Of America cruise around the Hawaiian Islands in March next year. Does anyone know roughly how far ahead of the cruise the excursions become available? I did phone NCL to enquire and was told that excursions for this cruise open up much earlier than other NCL cruises, so to just keep checking. Can anyone please tell me what their experience was, as to how early they booked excursions for this cruise?

Are there any particular recommendations as far as excursions for this cruise? One that we definitely want to do is sunset at Haleakala on Maui. We are on Maui for two days, and thought that the next day we would just explore the town of Lahaina, shops etc. Is there much there to see?

Mahalo! :)

I sail in about 3 weeks. I'll have a nice review then

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Hawaii is a great port to DIY every island, rent a car and do your own thing, no need to book through NCL.

Lovely!! Enjoy your cruise, and thankyou! :cool:

I live on Maui. NCL docks in Kahului and Lahaina is about a 1 hour drive each way. I'm not sure it's really worth the drive just to hit the touristy shops of Front Street. There are rental car agencies nearby. You may want to rent a car and go to a beach (or I'm sure NCL has a beach excursion too). Haleakala is amazing at Sunrise or Sunset. It's cold up there, bring layers.

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Hawaii is a great port to DIY every island, rent a car and do your own thing, no need to book through NCL.

We also did Hawaii DIY. We got idea from Hawaii Port of Call Forum.

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We cruised on POA last year and suggest you check out Roberts Hawaii. Our writeup and images can be found here --> Hawaii 2016 You'll find information on our experience with Roberts there. If you are an amateur photographer, check into Blue Hawaii Photo Tours while in Honolulu for any pre-cruise stay you may have planned. Have fun....

Thankyou Joe for your reply. I did go via your link and read your terrific review and looked through all your photos. Loved it! :cool: By the way, I'm from Australia!

Hawaii is a great port to DIY every island, rent a car and do your own thing, no need to book through NCL.

Thanks for that advice!

I live on Maui. NCL docks in Kahului and Lahaina is about a 1 hour drive each way. I'm not sure it's really worth the drive just to hit the touristy shops of Front Street. There are rental car agencies nearby. You may want to rent a car and go to a beach (or I'm sure NCL has a beach excursion too). Haleakala is amazing at Sunrise or Sunset. It's cold up there, bring layers.

 

 

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Thankyou, your reply was very useful!!! And what a beautiful place to live!

We also did Hawaii DIY. We got idea from Hawaii Port of Call Forum.

 

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Thankyou!

We cruised on POA last year and suggest you check out Roberts Hawaii. Our writeup and images can be found here --> Hawaii 2016 You'll find information on our experience with Roberts there. If you are an amateur photographer, check into Blue Hawaii Photo Tours while in Honolulu for any pre-cruise stay you may have planned. Have fun....

Thankyou Joe for your reply. I did go via your link and read your terrific review and looked through all your photos. Loved it! :cool: By the way, I'm from Australia!

The Darryl and Linda mentioned in "The Tourists" section of my webpage were also from Australia. They are on FB and it says they are from Ashtonfield, New South Wales. They were among those who came to Hawaii on the Carnival cruise I mentioned.

Anyway, hope the information is helpful as you plan your cruise. Looking forward to hearing about it next year....

We sailed the POA last September. We took the road to Hana tour through valley isle excursions. It was spectacular. Also took the helicopter tour of the volcano at Hilo through Blue Hawaiian. Don't miss this! Do not book through the ship. It is cheaper to book outside the ship.

Leave a day or two in between to stay on the ship and relax!

We did book the Pearl Harbor tour through the ship as they included airport drop off.

Have a wonderful cruise!

Aloha, cruisers!

 

We are booked on the Pride Of America cruise around the Hawaiian Islands in March next year. Does anyone know roughly how far ahead of the cruise the excursions become available? I did phone NCL to enquire and was told that excursions for this cruise open up much earlier than other NCL cruises, so to just keep checking. Can anyone please tell me what their experience was, as to how early they booked excursions for this cruise?

Are there any particular recommendations as far as excursions for this cruise? One that we definitely want to do is sunset at Haleakala on Maui. We are on Maui for two days, and thought that the next day we would just explore the town of Lahaina, shops etc. Is there much there to see?

 

Mahalo! :)

We're on the POA March 20 of next year and that was exactly my question.....how soon do shore excursions become available? Whenever I ask, someone always tells us to book own own excursions, which I am not interested in doing. I've been to Hawaii half a dozen times and I just want to show DH around the islands with the convenience of the ships excursions. Yes, it may be cheaper but I'm not interested in saving money when I'm on vacation. So, when will the excursions thru NCL be available for next March?

We sailed the POA last September. We took the road to Hana tour through valley isle excursions. It was spectacular. Also took the helicopter tour of the volcano at Hilo through Blue Hawaiian. Don't miss this! Do not book through the ship. It is cheaper to book outside the ship.

Leave a day or two in between to stay on the ship and relax!

In our experience though, the majority of POA passengers are go-go-go type of people who don't want to miss a minute of time on shore. What days are you thinking of in regards to staying on the ship and relaxing?

We stayed on board the day we were in Kona. Yes it's a go go go kind of trip but don't run yourself ragged. I suggest getting a balcony if you can swing it so you can sit with a glass of wine and enjoy the beautiful scenery.

Nothing wrong with booking ship excursions. I would suggest you skip the ship luau. It was hot, crowded, and the food was terrible.... unless you want to be herded like cattle...

You can read my review here if you like:

http://click.email.cruisecritic.com/?qs=8d90e85d2d3a5bbd8e8befd45062971ee83af57941b824194dc7fa743528444c095be7ef13a39d31406313508372baa6

We sailed the POA last September. We took the road to Hana tour through valley isle excursions. It was spectacular. Also took the helicopter tour of the volcano at Hilo through Blue Hawaiian. Don't miss this! Do not book through the ship. It is cheaper to book outside the ship.

Leave a day or two in between to stay on the ship and relax!

 

We did book the Pearl Harbor tour through the ship as they included airport drop off.

 

Have a wonderful cruise!

We are booked to do the Road to Hana with Valley Isle this October. I read a lot of reviews before we selected them. Thanks for the heads up! :D

Valley Isle was awesome. Part of the reason I picked them was their ability to accommodate my special diet.

Keep in mind that the national park service now requires reservations at Haleakala if you want to be up top at sunrise. so you might want to do the ships excursion for that... or if you're going to diy it, make your reservations up to 60 days in advance at the NPS website.

As others have already said, Hawaii is very easy to DIY with a rental car.

have fun, whatever you do

We're on the POA March 20 of next year and that was exactly my question.....how soon do shore excursions become available? Whenever I ask, someone always tells us to book own own excursions, which I am not interested in doing. I've been to Hawaii half a dozen times and I just want to show DH around the islands with the convenience of the ships excursions. Yes, it may be cheaper but I'm not interested in saving money when I'm on vacation. So, when will the excursions thru NCL be available for next March?

I still can't find an answer to when they will be available to book. I just keep checking!

I still can't find an answer to when they will be available to book. I just keep checking!

I believe someone on another thread mentioned 100 days out for Suites and 90 days for everyone else.

Actually, my excursions were available over a year out. The 90/100 day timeframe is for when you can book dining reservations at the specialty restaurants and the Liberty Dining Room.

I believe someone on another thread mentioned 100 days out for Suites and 90 days for everyone else.

That is for dining reservations. There is no set schedule for excursions.

Excursion availability can be very random. Over a year out on some cruises and very late on others. Even on the same cruise, excursions can become available at different times for different ports.

I would expect Hawaii to be available relatively early. All that can really be done at the moment is just keep checking.

My experience is after final payment or 90 days out. I can't remember if it was sooner for us as we were in a suite, but we had plenty of time to book excursions and dining.

Thanks for the info!

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