Royal Oasis excursions-AVOID

[yuvraj]

Everyone has their reasons why they do or do not book cruise line sponsored excursions - it doesn't add anything to this post to waggle a judgmental "told you so" finger at the OP. Things can go wrong on a private excursion too (although less common).

 

I agree. (y)

[Iamcruzin]

This is one of the down falls of booking a 6000 passenger ship. The Caribbean is becoming as crowded as Manhattan with all of the cruise lines building more and more Mega ships. Even booking private tours you run the risk of not being able to get off of the ship in time. I'm sure that the cruise line excursions have priority over those who just want to get off of the ship and grab a taxi.

[Beachammo]

Some of the best entertainment on a cruise is to sit near the cruise excursion's desk when leaving a port.

 

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[Clarea]

Some of the best entertainment on a cruise is to sit near the cruise excursion's desk when leaving a port.

Might be almost as good as being near Guest Services at the end of the cruise and hearing all the reasons why people cannot pay their bill. Monarch B2B guests had to wait there before being walked off. Entertaining.

[CapeGal]

"I am D+ with Royal Caribbean."

 

Is that an entitlement card?

 

Ok---this has got to stop. We all have opinions and make our vacations to please ourselves. No reason to mock and argue.

[CapeGal]

Some of the best entertainment on a cruise is to sit near the cruise excursion's desk when leaving a port.

 

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My kind of entertainment! :D

[ryano]

Ok---this has got to stop. We all have opinions and make our vacations to please ourselves. No reason to mock and argue.

 

Good luck with that. It is about to where its happening in every thread now. Its no wonder this place is looked down upon so bad by all other social media cruise related outlets. All you can do is report the post. It may or may not be dealt with. My experiences are the latter.

[Cinders411]

This is concerning....We are sailing on Oasis for the first time for a B2B this fall. We have only booked a couple of ship excursions but, still....Certainly, some things to think about.

[George C]

I really dislike rccl shore excursions, all they care is getting there cut from the tour company, in general they are over priced and over crowded

[dadofjessie]

Why did you book an excursion through the cruise line to begin with?

 

That is a total "Rookie Move" on your part..

 

Come on, there are lots of reasons to book excursions through the cruise line, one of which is the feeling of security that the ship will not sail without you.

[cruzeluver]

Regardless of cruise line (we sail many) we have all but given up on line-sponsored excursions. We watch as hundreds are crammed onto buses and catamarans are filled to capacity. There is a good deal of standing around and waiting, and you are at their mercy when they tell you you will be making a brief restroom stop on your tour that just happens to have an attached gift shop. ;)

 

We research independents and if they have great reviews here and on Tripadvisor, they get our business. We have done virtually the same excursions as others who booked through the ship yet their catamaran had 50 people while ours had ten. They got to spend 30 minutes snorkeling at one spot while we had two hours at multiple stops. Their tour included a bottle of water. Our's included lunch an drinks. They paid a lot more.

[setsail]

Love this voom drama, makes really good print. Hope you went to the spa with your full refund

[Langley Cruisers]

Many people here are painting ship excursions with a wide brush. When we did our Med cruise some years ago (and had never been to Europe before), we decided to bite the bullet and take only ship's tours, knowing we would pay more. It set our minds at ease. They were among the best tours we've ever taken. We had an absolute blast. The guides and drivers were courteous and professional and we learned so much and had so much fun. :D

 

Perhaps it was the itinerary - the area - but those ship tours were phenomenal. We would do it again in a heartbeat, so please do not discourage those who have done the research and decide to go with ship sponsored excursions. It's a personal choice.

 

Having said that, obviously this OP does have several complaints about this experience and I am not defending that. :)

[JaniceB]

Was going to book an excursion in Cozumel when I cruise on Oasis because of the shear number of cruises going there that day. I guess I should take my chances and do a private one like I usually do.

[DrD]

I generally do a mix of private and ship excursions. Last year on Oasis we did the Xplor excursion and it was great, no complaints.

 

I do wish they wouldn't wait for late people, I understand they don't want to deal with people demanding their money back even though it's stated you have to be on time, but it sucks to have to wait in the hot sun because some people can't be on time.

 

For this reason I often book private tours. It's worth the money.

[KansasK]

I have mostly done cruise sponsored shore excursions and I agree with the OP that too many people can be booked for the size of the boat they have to board. I don't know if this is because the estimate is based on smaller size people or if people avoid sitting close to someone they don't know. I have been loaded onto vans with two seats on each side and some that pop up in the aisle. Claustrophobic!

 

Our worst cruise excursion was a 2 tank dive out of Jamaica. They arrived with a small wooden boat with Scuba written on the side. What seemed like too many divers boarded it (and here is where we should have decided not to go) and the tanks were on the floor. There were empty ones mixed with full ones. There was no marker on the tanks to be able to tell which was which. The dive sites were not good, which we should have known. They had a two rung rusty ladder to climb back into the boat and had no rope to hang onto as we waited to board the boat again. This is normal so the divers don't have to swim against the current to stay by the boat. When we got back to the pier, they banged this wooden boat into the concrete pier and we thought it would sink, and all we managed to get off quickly in case it did. I took a picture of the boat at the pier. We went to the dive shop and they said we should have had a large two level dive boat and asked for the picture. We think they took the good dive boat out on a snorkel run that day.

 

I have had some good cruise excursions, too, but the bad ones stick in your mind.

[StolidCruiser]

The Shore Excursion services manager initially informed that he was called by the fast cat person (St Thomas) and went out to the dock and looked at the boat-and did not understand as he saw many empty seats. After I calmed down, I told the excursions manager that that was impossible as the catamaran was sailing away with us on the dock as the very rude fast cat person was placing the call. At no time did we see a Royal shore excursion representative down on the dock. We also had many pictures of the jam-packed boat with no places to sit. They did refund me my cruise excursion $, but still a ruined day.

 

FYI-we usually do not book via the cruise line, however traveling with other family members who will only book via the cruise line (worried re missing the boat, etc).

 

The Oasis is a wonderful ship by the way. We are really enjoying the ship. Just be very careful booking excursions via the ship as you will probably end up with a larger than usual "cattle-call" situation. We were able to find a last-minute, private excursion in St. Martin though, so looking forward to tomorrow.

 

How did your other family members, who goaded you into booking the ship-based excursion, feel about the experience? Were they pushed to the back of the line, go without seats, get into a debate with the skipper and be left standing on the dock alongside you?

[BillOh]

Our worst cruise excursion was a 2 tank dive out of Jamaica. They arrived with a small wooden boat with Scuba written on the side.

 

I have had some good cruise excursions, too, but the bad ones stick in your mind.

 

 

This is appalling as they always say when any question is asked about an excursion, "The safety of our guests comes first" I've been on a couple of excursions Royal had never checked out, or at least not often enough.

[jpcello]

Sorry your day was ruined. As to what others have said about not booking excursions through the cruise line, I travel with someone with a disability. The only way to guarantee an accessible excursion is to either book through the cruise line on their accessible excursions or pay an outrageous amount of money for a private tour. Some people don't have the luxury of jumping into a cab dockside.

 

If my sister isn't joining me on an excursion because of accessibility issues and I end up going myself (which I have), I feel safer on a cruise sponsored excursion.

[Luv my furbaby]

I book with the cruise line if it is a long excursion or a distance away. I want to make sure that I get back to the ship on time. Otherwise I book on my own.

[SRF]

Well, we DO have CC to start threads for reviews of RCI excursions. Maybe even have the moderators start a sub-forum for excursion reviews. If they get to be too many, then s a further separation by area might be needed.

[haply]

How did your other family members, who goaded you into booking the ship-based excursion, feel about the experience? Were they pushed to the back of the line, go without seats, get into a debate with the skipper and be left standing on the dock alongside you?

Yes