Santorini - how long is tender from ship to old port ?

[brockmom]

Hello

We have a 8:45 am excursion - meeting spot in the Old port where we get off the ship tender.
How long is the tender ride? We will be meeting our tour guide for the speed boat And not using the 

cable cars . Kind of wondering what time we will need to leave the ship ?

any suggestions

thanks. ,

[CruiserBruce]

Depends on how many ships are in and arranged around the caldera. Could be 10 to 25 minutes, not counting loading and unloading the tender.

[PurpleTraveller]

When you get onto a tender may be of more concern than the length of the tender ride. What time is your ship arriving? Depending on your arrival time it will be important to plan to get your tender tickets as early as possible to get on one of the earliest tenders possible unless you have some sort of priority. After arrival it may take a short while for the tender services to start and you may have to wait to get on a tender. The tender ride is usually about 10 to 20 minutes long depending on how far the ship is moored from the dock.

 

Edited September 3, 2023 by PurpleTraveller

[brockmom]

Thank you both ! 

[Hlitner]

Santorini tenders are large shore-based boats (cruise ships do not use their own tenders).  Loading/unloading can take some depending on the age/speed of passengers.  That actual ride time is no more than 10 minutes.

 

Hank

[brockmom]

9 hours ago, Hlitner said:

Santorini tenders are large shore-based boats (cruise ships do not use their own tenders).  Loading/unloading can take some depending on the age/speed of passengers.  That actual ride time is no more than 10 minutes.

 

Hank

Ok great to know. Thanks

[budmeister]

On 9/4/2023 at 12:45 AM, brockmom said:

Hello

We have a 8:45 am excursion - meeting spot in the Old port where we get off the ship tender.
How long is the tender ride? We will be meeting our tour guide for the speed boat And not using the 

cable cars . Kind of wondering what time we will need to leave the ship ?

any suggestions

thanks. ,

 

[budmeister]

Hi. We did this this week. We had to book an excursion to oia to get a tender to this port. We got off the tender and told tour guide we would not be getting on the bus, and got are tickets for the cable car ride down.

 

Our excursion was set for 7:30, with

A meeting time of 6:45 in the theater.  We left at 7:15 on the first tender and got off at 7:50. I had booked my taxi for 9:20, not knowing how it would all go. I feel we got lucky. There is a nice Cafe for breakfast and coffee. 

 

 

[giginevelyn]

On 9/16/2023 at 12:16 PM, budmeister said:

Hi. We did this this week. We had to book an excursion to oia to get a tender to this port. We got off the tender and told tour guide we would not be getting on the bus, and got are tickets for the cable car ride down.

 

Our excursion was set for 7:30, with

A meeting time of 6:45 in the theater.  We left at 7:15 on the first tender and got off at 7:50. I had booked my taxi for 9:20, not knowing how it would all go. I feel we got lucky. There is a nice Cafe for breakfast and coffee. 

 

 

We were thinking of doing this here, and in Naples, Italy, just so we can get off first to meet our early excursions. What did the tour guide say when you told them you were not actually joining the tour? You also said you got cable car tickets for the return. Do you mean you bought them in advance? 

[Hlitner]

On 9/16/2023 at 1:16 PM, budmeister said:

Hi. We did this this week. We had to book an excursion to oia to get a tender to this port. We got off the tender and told tour guide we would not be getting on the bus, and got are tickets for the cable car ride down.

 

Our excursion was set for 7:30, with

A meeting time of 6:45 in the theater.  We left at 7:15 on the first tender and got off at 7:50. I had booked my taxi for 9:20, not knowing how it would all go. I feel we got lucky. There is a nice Cafe for breakfast and coffee. 

 

 

Bravo :).  As very independent travelers, we have the utmost respect for folks that "think outside the box" and enjoy DIY travel.  I have never heard of anyone who booked an excursion and than intentially blew-off the entire tour!  In Santorini, on a crowded day, it is an excellent option to avoid the expected congestion at the cable car.  Of course, the downside is you still had to deal with the Cable Car queues to get down to the return tender.  

 

Taking what you did to a different level, some excursions are now going back to the ferry port (Athinios) which you refer to as the "old port."  One wonders if folks could book that kind of tour, leave the tour as soon as you get ashore, and than rejoin it later in the day in order to use the return tender from Athinios (thus entirely avoiding the cable car/donkey train mess)?

 

Another thought (thinking out loud) is that the cable car congestion has become such a bottleneck (folks can sometimes queue for hours) that perhaps cruise lines should operate simply "tender excursions" to Athinios!  Of course that does mean that the island would need to increase their buses to/from Athinios and more taxis would need to service the pier.

 

Hank

[budmeister]

4 hours ago, giginevelyn said:

We were thinking of doing this here, and in Naples, Italy, just so we can get off first to meet our early excursions. What did the tour guide say when you told them you were not actually joining the tour? You also said you got cable car tickets for the return. Do you mean you bought them in advance? 

 

[PurpleTraveller]

11 hours ago, giginevelyn said:

We were thinking of doing this here, and in Naples, Italy, just so we can get off first to meet our early excursions. What did the tour guide say when you told them you were not actually joining the tour? You also said you got cable car tickets for the return. Do you mean you bought them in advance? 

 

In Naples the ship docks and you simply walk off the ship. There would be no need to book a ship excursion to get priority to disembark. 

 

Cable car tickets are included in most of the ship excursions in Santorini and are given to you either at the end of the tour or when you leave the tour.

 

[Nebr.cruiser]

On 9/16/2023 at 12:16 PM, budmeister said:

Hi. We did this this week. We had to book an excursion to oia to get a tender to this port. We got off the tender and told tour guide we would not be getting on the bus, and got are tickets for the cable car ride down.

 

Our excursion was set for 7:30, with

A meeting time of 6:45 in the theater.  We left at 7:15 on the first tender and got off at 7:50. I had booked my taxi for 9:20, not knowing how it would all go. I feel we got lucky. There is a nice Cafe for breakfast and coffee. 

 

 

That's more or less what we're doing, except we are doing a local tour from Oia because we have a specific town we want to see.  It will drop us off at Fira, then we'll use the cable car ticket from our 'On Your Own' tour.  Since we are in port until 10, I don't expect big lines when we get back to Fira.  The last time I was there our tour stopped between Oia and Fira for the sunset.  There were no lines that late in Fira.  Also, we're the only ship in port, at least as of now.

[gcmv]

@budmeister I have the same in mind as you did as there are 6 ships in Santorini with us.

What company did you choose for the taxi transfer? Would you recommend them?

 

The only "problem" is, that the "cheapest" ship excursion is 115,-- Euros each person - that means 230,-- Euros for a tender to Athinios port ... 🤔

 

[gcmv]

@budmeister Sorry, forget post #14 as it is not allowed to name companies here in this forum ...

[marazul]

6 hours ago, gcmv said:

@budmeister I have the same in mind as you did as there are 6 ships in Santorini with us.

What company did you choose for the taxi transfer? Would you recommend them?

 

The only "problem" is, that the "cheapest" ship excursion is 115,-- Euros each person - that means 230,-- Euros for a tender to Athinios port ... 🤔

 

Just saying.  A one way flight from Athens to Santorini in the first week of October starts at 45€.  It takes 25 minutes. If at all possible, consider going to Santorini for a day or two before or after the cruise.  No donkeys, no cable cars, no six ships in port.

[budmeister]

32 minutes ago, gcmv said:

@budmeister Sorry, forget post #14 as it is not allowed to name companies here in this forum ...

Even if you actually used them? My excursion set it up. There is a company at the Athinois Port. Maybe you could google which one it is, or an image. I also used SAN... Tran...  in Santorini. I think that would be fine as well. 

 

I got lucky- the Oia on your own was only 67 a person. I paid it because I really wanted to go on the sailing excusion I had, and there was no other way.

 

 

[budmeister]

On 9/24/2023 at 6:07 AM, giginevelyn said:

We were thinking of doing this here, and in Naples, Italy, just so we can get off first to meet our early excursions. What did the tour guide say when you told them you were not actually joining the tour? You also said you got cable car tickets for the return. Do you mean you bought them in advance? 

The tour guide was surprised, but it was not an issue. The tour included tickets for the cable car ride down, so I asked for them and she gave them to me. 

[StCroixCruiser]

On 9/3/2023 at 5:45 PM, brockmom said:

Hello

We have a 8:45 am excursion - meeting spot in the Old port where we get off the ship tender.
How long is the tender ride? We will be meeting our tour guide for the speed boat And not using the 

cable cars . Kind of wondering what time we will need to leave the ship ?

any suggestions

thanks. ,

Keep in mind most cruise ships only allow their guests in suites or those booked on tours through the ship to get on the first tenders after arrival.  Everyone else stands in line to get tender tickets, and then stands in line to board their tender.

[gcmv]

Just a short update from my side:

On the Oceania Marina we were allowed to join the very early tenderboats of the shipe-xcursions to the new port.

The only precondition was, that we booked a private tour starting from new port. So I booked a private taxi tour to Oia (starting at the new port!) one day before our arrival and was happy to be in Oia at 9:15 a.m.

We left Oia at 10:30 and had a wonderful and silent time there before the crowds of 4 vessels fell in this little town.

At about 3:00 p.m. we walked down slowly on the donkey path in 25 minutes - no problem at all as the temperature was about 22 degrees celsius.

What a great day and experience! Thanks a lot Oceania Cruises for their extraordinary support of independent guests!🙂