Shore excursions are an integral component of a cruise holiday which plays an essential role in making your cruise experience truly memorable. After all, one of the key deciding factors of choosing a cruise is the destinations / ports that you will be visiting. Shore excursions add to the cost of your holiday – while its important to explore each destination to the fullest in the available time, it is also important to keep an eye on the costs.
Basically, once you arrive at a destination on your cruise holiday, you essentially have three choices to see the destination:
- Explore the destination on your own by walking around, hiring a local cab to take you to the key sights or getting a hop-on-hop-off bus ticket (if available at the port)
- Pre-purchase the shore excursion from the cruiseliner - that can be done prior to boarding your cruise OR onboard the cruise atleast 24 hours prior to arriving at the destination (subject to availability of the excursion). Cruiseliners usually offer multiple excursion options for each destination and guarantee to bring you back in time before the ship departs for the next destination. Shore excursions purchased from the cruiseliner tend to be expensive especially if there is a family of 3 or 4 members travelling
- Pre-purchase shore excursion from reputed tour operators who specialise in offering shore excursions at the main cruise ports. In most cases, this option works out cheaper than the shore excursions offered by the cruiseliners. Some excursions are very popular and have limited inventory for eg: helicopter tours in Juneau so it is recommended to pre purchase the excursion, whether from the cruiseliner or from a private tour operator.
Our cruise consultants would be glad to advice you on the best combination from the above three options for your cruise holiday. We present shore excursions offered by reputed tour operators in regions like Alaska, Caribbean, Europe, Pacific Islands and the Middle East.