Visby, Sweden-Tender Port?

[love2crews.]

Is Visby, Sweden a tender port? 

 

I don't see anything about tendering on the cruise website.  I did a quick Google search and it appears it IS a tender port.

 

Any insight is appreciated.

 

Thanks!

[Desdichado62]

No, it has a new cruise quay so I would claim that it's not a tender port.

[love2crews.]

15 minutes ago, Desdichado62 said:

No, it has a new cruise quay so I would claim that it's not a tender port.

Thank you!

 

[gkkapp]

We were there in July and it is NOT a tendered port.  A rather long walk up the quay, though.

 

<<<Karen>>> 

[Mrs.Dukes]

We were there about 10 days ago. We docked. Really liked Visby!

[DragonOfTheSeas]

We were there on August 7.  Our ship was docked.  Our cruise daily said it was a 15–20-minute walk to town. 

 

However, we spoke with several people that chose to walk rather than take a provided bus.  We took the bus [12 euro] They said it was longer and not a pleasant walk.  At one point you must climb a set of metal stairs, cross the road and back down again in the port. One family told me it was almost more than their mother could do. 

 

My advice is to take the bus and walk from the drop-off point.  You will have enough exercise climbing the streets from the sea. 😁

 

We enjoyed Visby.  It is a unique location.  

Edited September 12, 2022 by DragonOfTheSeas

[gkkapp]

13 hours ago, DragonOfTheSeas said:

We were there on August 7.  Our ship was docked.  Our cruise daily said it was a 15–20-minute walk to town. 

 

However, we spoke with several people that chose to walk rather than take a provided bus.  We took the bus [12 euro] They said it was longer and not a pleasant walk.  At one point you must climb a set of metal stairs, cross the road and back down again in the port. One family told me it was almost more than their mother could do. 

 

My advice is to take the bus and walk from the drop-off point.  You will have enough exercise climbing the streets from the sea. 😁

 

We enjoyed Visby.  It is a unique location.  

It is NOT a 15-20 walk!!  It is at least 30 minutes and up hill.  Not a steep hill but an uphill grade.  Yes, you do need to cross over the busy highway on a metal bridge three flights up and over.  Of course you get to do it again on the way back .  We were there in July and did not see a bus there when we left the ship.  It was there when we returned.  This was a 14 day cruise and Visby was near the end.  Over the 14 days I walked between 100-125 miles (my Fitbit told me!!) so believe me I was tired by then.  But I did it!!!

 

<<<Karen>>>

[Desdichado62]

17 hours ago, gkkapp said:

It is NOT a 15-20 walk!!  It is at least 30 minutes and up hill.  Not a steep hill but an uphill grade.  Yes, you do need to cross over the busy highway on a metal bridge three flights up and over.  Of course you get to do it again on the way back .  We were there in July and did not see a bus there when we left the ship.  It was there when we returned.  This was a 14 day cruise and Visby was near the end.  Over the 14 days I walked between 100-125 miles (my Fitbit told me!!) so believe me I was tired by then.  But I did it!!!

 

<<<Karen>>>

 

Distance is 2 km from cruise terminal to main square so it might be a 20 min walk for some and a 30 min walk for others.

[kpauley]

On 9/10/2022 at 11:24 PM, love2crews. said:

Is Visby, Sweden a tender port? 

 

I don't see anything about tendering on the cruise website.  I did a quick Google search and it appears it IS a tender port.

 

Any insight is appreciated.

 

Thanks!

This may depend on which ship you are on. We were on Voyager of the Seas and docked there on  08/19/22.  However, a NCL ship was tendering.

[love2crews.]

On 9/12/2022 at 3:28 PM, Mrs.Dukes said:

We were there about 10 days ago. We docked. Really liked Visby!

That's great to hear! 

 

We hadn't heard of it until our itinerary was modified to skip St. Petersburg.  

 

What do you recommend doing there?  Did you do a tour?  With the cruise line or independent?  I'd love a local tour company recommendation.

[Mrs.Dukes]

1 hour ago, love2crews. said:

That's great to hear! 

 

We hadn't heard of it until our itinerary was modified to skip St. Petersburg.  

 

What do you recommend doing there?  Did you do a tour?  With the cruise line or independent?  I'd love a local tour company recommendation.

We took a tour through the cruise line. It took you outside the city of Visby, where we visited a fishing village, and saw some ruins, and visited a church. Then it finished with a walking tour in Visby. Visby itself is a really nice walled town. Very easy to walk around the town of Visby itself. We enjoyed the tour. I did a little research and didn’t find much in the way of tours not through the cruise line.

[love2crews.]

40 minutes ago, Mrs.Dukes said:

We took a tour through the cruise line. It took you outside the city of Visby, where we visited a fishing village, and saw some ruins, and visited a church. Then it finished with a walking tour in Visby. Visby itself is a really nice walled town. Very easy to walk around the town of Visby itself. We enjoyed the tour. I did a little research and didn’t find much in the way of tours not through the cruise line.

Thank you for your input!

[jennykelly]

There are two ways to get into town walking which I didn't realize at the time - initially, we just followed everyone else - the uphill/over the metal staircase. However, on the way back, I walked along the water, past all the huge ferries - it was flat the entire way and you did not need to go over the metal staircase. We took a walking tour (look in the Visby thread as more info on this tour is there) - about an hour and a half and learned all about the history. Really enjoyed our day there.

[love2crews.]

3 hours ago, jennykelly said:

There are two ways to get into town walking which I didn't realize at the time - initially, we just followed everyone else - the uphill/over the metal staircase. However, on the way back, I walked along the water, past all the huge ferries - it was flat the entire way and you did not need to go over the metal staircase. We took a walking tour (look in the Visby thread as more info on this tour is there) - about an hour and a half and learned all about the history. Really enjoyed our day there.

Interesting!

 

We'll have to look for the flat, scenic path. 🙂 

[milolii]

On 9/14/2022 at 9:20 AM, kpauley said:

This may depend on which ship you are on. We were on Voyager of the Seas and docked there on  08/19/22.  However, a NCL ship was tendering.

Yep that was us.  It was a short ride. The captain commented we weren't the ship scheduled to tender though. We stayed an extra 2 hours due to the tender requirement, so had plenty of time there.    Considering Visby is a substitute for St.Petersburg, it’s possible more ships will be visiting there, so I would say you could tender. It’s a lovely town. 
 

The time difference was our biggest issue. Visby is on CET. The  day was sandwiched between Helsinki and Tallin both on EET.  So the ship stayed on EET but Visby was on CET.  Very confusing.   

[love2crews.]

16 hours ago, milolii said:

Yep that was us.  It was a short ride. The captain commented we weren't the ship scheduled to tender though. We stayed an extra 2 hours due to the tender requirement, so had plenty of time there.    Considering Visby is a substitute for St.Petersburg, it’s possible more ships will be visiting there, so I would say you could tender. It’s a lovely town. 
 

The time difference was our biggest issue. Visby is on CET. The  day was sandwiched between Helsinki and Tallin both on EET.  So the ship stayed on EET but Visby was on CET.  Very confusing.   

Can you explain the time difference?  

 

Example: The cruise website says we dock at 8am.  If we plan a tour for 9am, 9am is the local time.  How do we account for the ship time vs local time and not be an hour early or late for our tour?

 

[milolii]

I don’t know your ships itinerary. 
 You would  need to know what time your ship is on and if that is different than the time onshore. This is what happen to us. It was a surprise as we had expected to turn our clocks back the  night before.  
 

These are the time zones for different countries in the Baltics.

Sweden, including Visby, is on Central European Time(CET) 

Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania are all on Eastern European Time(EET) which is an hour ahead of CET. 
Our cruise as many others it seems, go back and forth between these countries. Our captain decided to keep the ship(we arrived from Finland) on EET as the next several days of our cruise were in that zone.   So when we arrived at 7am, it was 6am onshore. 

Even though the website says this is what is happening, the Captain makes the final decision.

 

[Desdichado62]

A small correction.  CET and EET are normal time. In the summer half of the year clocks go forward and CET time zones switches to CEST and EET switches to EEST.

[love2crews.]

I didn't realize it is ultimately up to the captain.  That is really good to know!