Inverness,Holyhead (Wales),Belfast, Cork, Dover

[RosieMac8]

I am scheduled for July cruise to British Isles (Royal-JOS 07/23) and was hoping for other's suggestions.  We have been to Inverness and went around the town and did the  Loch Lomond trip to find Nessie in 2019(she eluded us).  I read that the ship docks in Invergordon.  What are some things we can do locally and not too time intensive-(not too interested in touring castles)? A <5km hike(easy) would be nice. I have been researching this trip since October and have not pieced it together yet.  We are doing a land based trip(France/Netherlands) followed by cruise and I am starting to get overwhelmed.

What did you do and really love in Holyhead(Wales)?  I am not too excited by ship excursions.

Ship has not posted excursions for Belfast yet- suggestions?

Suggestions for Cork? any must sees- 

Dover- thinking about doing the Canterbury church - would love to see Dover cliffs- Will cruise ship pass the cliffs as part of the cruise? Also the times listed for the ship in port making long excursions a challenge 04:40am-3:45pm.

 

Thank you in advance for any suggestions.  

 

 

 

 

[Turtles06]

Welcome to Cruise Critic!

 

Apart from other replies you may get here, please do a search in this forum for each of your ports, as most if not all of them have been discussed in other threads.  (Lots of info to be found here, for example, on Belfast, Cork, and Dover.)

 

BTW, from Invergordon, you could visit the Battlefield of Culloden, which is not far from Inverness.  

 

Enjoy your trip!

[John Bull]

Hi, and welcome to Cruise Critic,

 

There have been recent posts on all of those ports, so the first thing to do is to dig them out via the "search" facility

 

Click back to the British Isles/Western Europe forum (or open it in another window)

In the Search box, at the right-hand end of the blue banner above the questions, type the name of a port or city.

Leave "this forum" as it is.

Click on the spyglass at the end of that box.

Give the magic a few moments to work, and it will bring up all the threads which mention that place.

Here's what came up when I tried with "Invergordon"

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/search/?q=Invergordon&quick=1&type=forums_topic&nodes=148

 

And the results for "Holyhead"

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/search/?q=Holyhead&quick=1&type=forums_topic&nodes=148

 

I'll leave you to do the same with your other ports

 

For Dover, the hourly train to Canterbury takes only 30 minutes, but the Cathedral and other places aren't open til 9am so you won't have a lot of spare time in Canterbury.

https://www.canterbury-cathedral.org/

Alternatively consider visiting Dover Castle, one of England's oldest and most-important castles. 1,000 years of continuous use thru to WW2,. Opens 10am,  and well worth 4 hours.

https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/dover-castle/history-and-stories/history-dover/

Dover Castle stands on the White Cliffs, but they're best seen from the sea - so be on-deck for your sail-away.

 

 

BTW I'm not surprised that you didn't see Nessie on your Loch Lomond trip.

Nessie lives in Loch Ness - Loch Lomond is the one with "the Bonnie Bonnie Banks" 😏

 

JB 🙂