Excursions

Hello,

So today's blog is about excursion's and which one's would be best for a toddler.

We have pretty much decided what we want to see and do in each of our upcoming ports. We have tried to balance sightseeing with fun things for MJ. Some ports we have planned to Do It Yourself (DIY), others we plan to do tours with the cruise ship whilst others we have researched private tour companies and are going with them.

Some ports are English speaking like San Francisco so it is a little easier to DIY and still keep it child-friendly, other ports such as Mumbai or Shanghai are not and can therefore be tricky to get around. A guided tour whether through the ship or with a private company are the way we plan to deal with the language barriers we will come across.

For our Family there are both positive and negative aspects to booking excursions through the ship or going with private tour companies. Private tours allow us to customize our day. We can stop for photo's and bathroom breaks and learn a lot more about the way of life in the places we are visiting. We have done private tours in Madeira and Gibraltar and saw all the same sights as those on the ship's tours at half the cost and in our own time.

The biggest drawback we have found for booking a private tour is that the ship can leave without us if we're not there by the time given for sail off, which is scary!! Only tours booked through the cruise company guarantee that the ship will wait for us if we are late back. There have been times when we have booked excursions through the ship. On our previous cruises we visited Rome, Florence, Pisa, Corfu and Venice using the ship's tour guides.

Also we have to take into account that with private tour guides we are in essence trusting our safety and experience to strangers. We have therefore researched tours guides on sites such as Trip Advisor, Cruise Critic and other sites and come up with a plan of action for the cruise. Nothing is set in stone, but we plan to DIY the English speaking ports such as Sydney, use the cruise company for the ports that are further away from our main sites such as Beijing (that risk of missing the ship) and use private tour guides for some others such as Hong Kong.

Hope you enjoyed reading...

Nicky