Norwegian Star - last minute change of itinerary

[Meekofigaro]

On 9/11/2019 at 12:26 PM, wbc12345 said:

Does anyone know if the ship made it to Kotor this week? Trying to gauge if it truly is every other week or if they have found a solution to get there every trip. 

I sail on the 13th and we were notified that we are Not going to Kotor, leaving Venice at 8:30pm.

Our itinerary shows the update. 
my PCC showed it was for the 13th and 20th sailing . 
 

 

[klcardella]

4 hours ago, Meekofigaro said:

I sail on the 13th and we were notified that we are Not going to Kotor, leaving Venice at 8:30pm.

Our itinerary shows the update. 
my PCC showed it was for the 13th and 20th sailing . 
 

 

They did go this week, so keep us updated if Kotor is actually cancelled on your trip,  and I will update about the 20th saling.  My TA is planning this trip for next year, and thinking about changing their originating port to Athens to avoid this problem, so maybe not something that will be resolved anytime soon.

[Meekofigaro]

So we did not make it on the sailing of the 13th to Kotor. 
We were given the leaving time of 8:30 from the Harbor Master. I guess there are 5 leaving slots that they rotate the cruise ships thru. 
It takes 45 minutes  for each ship to get out of the port with the pilot boats. And another 45 for the tugs to get back. 
We were told we we have to go 28 knots to make it to Kotor and the ship is max 24. So once there , there are are 3 tender slots... one is 20 minute ride to shore next out is 30 minutes out and the other is 45 out . The shore is too rough and can scratch the ship to port at Kotor. 
So if we went we would have gotten off to just have to turn back.

They still do the Tech stop to be out of the EU for the taxes for us on board ( so we do not have to pay them the whole cruise) 

Hope this explains a bit better! They did a great job explaining it to us all! 

[ollienbertsmum]

They explained it better to you than they did to us on 15th September.  They must be getting better.  What I didn’t understand is why we could not have had the technical stop at Kotor, the scenery is much better than Bar.  Anyway it is a nice cruise even without Kotor. 

[ctkathchick]

I have been following this post we leave out of Venice on the 3rd of November how much advance notice were you given and were you able to board the ship later or still needed to be onboard at the normal time? Thanks

 

[ppcox]

On 10/21/2019 at 7:17 PM, ollienbertsmum said:

They explained it better to you than they did to us on 15th September.  They must be getting better.  What I didn’t understand is why we could not have had the technical stop at Kotor, the scenery is much better than Bar.  Anyway it is a nice cruise even without Kotor. 

We were told in September that the cruise to Kotor is a passage similar to a fjord and takes time to cruise . Bar was an easy stop and staff tendered just to have a non EU stop to avoid tax.

[ollienbertsmum]

5 hours ago, ctkathchick said:

I have been following this post we leave out of Venice on the 3rd of November how much advance notice were you given and were you able to board the ship later or still needed to be onboard at the normal time? Thanks

 

 

There was no notification about changing the onboard time.  I am trying to think back when the muster drill was - I think it was 4.30 pm.  So I think they must have kept it the same time.  

[ctkathchick]

Thanks

 

[Jayneykul]

We have returned from the Star today, it did not go to Kotor. Also the time in kephalonia and Dubrovnik was cut short! We had to be back on the ship by 1.30 in kephalonia and 12 in Dubrovnik which meant queuing for the shuttle bus at 11! No explanation given by NCL. I doubt we will book again with them as it is to big a risk to take that they just alter itineraries like this. For anyone going to Dubrovnik with them do yourselves a favour do not use the shuttle bus it is €15 pp it took 55 minutes waiting in line to get on 1 coming back. A taxi is €14 for up to 8 people fixed price. It is a disgrace . Guest services are not interested if you complain either!

[ollienbertsmum]

Oh that does sound disappointing.  We felt that Dubrovnik was short enough a stop anyway - it was just such an early start (although given the way the crowds built up going early was good).  

 

The taxis were the best value in Dubrovnik weren’t they - I didn’t realise until after I had bought my shuttle ticket.  In your case it would have been better to walk back I think!! 

 

I can understand why the itinerary was changed due to the Venice departure, but leaving two ports early sounds odd - unless they had some sort of mechanical problems that meant that you had to go more slowly.  Then you could have had an explanation.

 

[Meekofigaro]

14 hours ago, Jayneykul said:

We have returned from the Star today, it did not go to Kotor. Also the time in kephalonia and Dubrovnik was cut short! We had to be back on the ship by 1.30 in kephalonia and 12 in Dubrovnik which meant queuing for the shuttle bus at 11! No explanation given by NCL. I doubt we will book again with them as it is to big a risk to take that they just alter itineraries like this. For anyone going to Dubrovnik with them do yourselves a favour do not use the shuttle bus it is €15 pp it took 55 minutes waiting in line to get on 1 coming back. A taxi is €14 for up to 8 people fixed price. It is a disgrace . Guest services are not interested if you complain either!

 

We were also explained for the early departure from Croatia had to do with getting back to Venice as well.. the captain is given a time frame to get into port. So to make that , for us it was 6:30 I think it was we had to pull out early to make the window or the ship would have had to wait another two hours to pull back into Venice. 
We got to Croatia early so we actually got on to shore by 7 am from the tender so we took advantage of the  full morning we had there then got in line before 11:30 as the Line gets long to get on the tender back. 

[OzCanuck]

43 minutes ago, Meekofigaro said:

 

We were also explained for the early departure from Croatia had to do with getting back to Venice as well.. the captain is given a time frame to get into port. So to make that , for us it was 6:30 I think it was we had to pull out early to make the window or the ship would have had to wait another two hours to pull back into Venice. 
We got to Croatia early so we actually got on to shore by 7 am from the tender so we took advantage of the  full morning we had there then got in line before 11:30 as the Line gets long to get on the tender back. 

 

Tendering is definitely the better option at Dubrovnik I think.  Possibly the only port in the world where one can say that... We were on the 2nd tender after they started calling numbers (it was opened up to anyone until they started calling).  Drops you right at the city gates so no dealing with taxis or shuttles.  

[azdmelani]

16 hours ago, Jayneykul said:

We have returned from the Star today, it did not go to Kotor. Also the time in kephalonia and Dubrovnik was cut short! We had to be back on the ship by 1.30 in kephalonia and 12 in Dubrovnik which meant queuing for the shuttle bus at 11! No explanation given by NCL. I doubt we will book again with them as it is to big a risk to take that they just alter itineraries like this. For anyone going to Dubrovnik with them do yourselves a favour do not use the shuttle bus it is €15 pp it took 55 minutes waiting in line to get on 1 coming back. A taxi is €14 for up to 8 people fixed price. It is a disgrace . Guest services are not interested if you complain either!

 

We were on the week before you, and tendered into Santorini, Mykonos and Dubrovnik.   The tender process was a nightmare, and three  out of 5 port days I was up super early trying to get tender tickets.   The Dubrovnik day was especially frustrating, getting on line at 5 (!)AM and having the first person in line get 42 tender tickets totally obliterating group 1.  We almost missed our excursion because of this.   Not the only issue with NCL we encountered by far, but having to be on an additional schedule put a damper on our vacation.

[OzCanuck]

5 minutes ago, azdmelani said:

 

We were on the week before you, and tendered into Santorini, Mykonos and Dubrovnik.   The tender process was a nightmare, and three  out of 5 port days I was up super early trying to get tender tickets.   The Dubrovnik day was especially frustrating, getting on line at 5 (!)AM and having the first person in line get 42 tender tickets totally obliterating group 1.  We almost missed our excursion because of this.   Not the only issue with NCL we encountered by far, but having to be on an additional schedule put a damper on our vacation.

interesting. They were tendering for almost an hour before they called group 1 because we were so early at Dubrovnik. We are platinum so didn’t worry about tickets.  Forgot about that ...

[azdmelani]

1 hour ago, OzCanuck said:

interesting. They were tendering for almost an hour before they called group 1 because we were so early at Dubrovnik. We are platinum so didn’t worry about tickets.  Forgot about that ...

True but by the time my mom and I switched places in line to get ready for the day they had discontinued that express tender service. Being platinum was definitely helpful but we had VIPs waiting with us in our group as well.

[Jaclyn1945]

Do you think the time in Dubrovnik was shortened because of the time change in Europe on Sunday? I'm also on the Nov. 3 sailing, and keep wondering if our stop in Kotor will be impacted. 

[azdmelani]

23 hours ago, Jaclyn1945 said:

Do you think the time in Dubrovnik was shortened because of the time change in Europe on Sunday? I'm also on the Nov. 3 sailing, and keep wondering if our stop in Kotor will be impacted. 

Ours had to do with the number of ships docking in Venice.  We needed to leave earlier to be within our time window.