Are cruises' Shore Excursions worth the money?

You have three choices when your ship comes into port:

• take a shore excursion booked through the ship
• stay on the ship
• wander around the port yourself

I don’t really think the fourth possibility, taking an official tour and paying someone for it but not through the ship, is a good idea at all. You probably won’t save a significant amount of money and you will probably worry about being late back to the ship. But that doesn’t mean that you must pay for a shore excursion. In the vast majority of ports, you can just walk around for 2, 4, or more hours and have a lovely time. It would help if you planned before the cruise left, maybe printed a map.

Look through the shore excursions before the cruise starts; do they offer something you can’t otherwise get, or are they just going to put you on a bus to something you can get to on your own steam easily enough? How does the price compare to the admission fee if you were to get yourself to an attraction on your own? Generally, the ships offer a “low price guarantee” but only for the exact same thing – which you probably won’t find due to combinations of “but ours includes a van ride from the ship” sort of thing. If you don’t think $100 for a one or two hour activity is a good value, then don’t go looking to see if someone else will sell it to you for $80 – just skip it and simply explore the port yourself. Some of the best parts of being in strange places are the serendipitous encounters, the attractions that don’t have websites or sales reps, and the unexpected delights.

Cruising Excursions motto “prices lower than the cruise lines“.

They claim to have over 5000 shore excursions in 100’s of ports Worldwide at prices up to 60% lower than the cruise lines.

Might be worth looking into.

The first question you need to ask yourself is whether you want to take many shore tours at all.

In connection with a cruise ship, there are three basic types of activities: 1) Shore tours 2) performances (usually musical), plus some shows and talks, which often include slide shows of the land tours and 3) the use of amenities such as the athletic facilities (gym, spa, tennis and handball courts, swimming running track) during the day, and c**ktail parties and other social events during the evening (the ship-sponsored events, including alcohol, are free).

Most people can participate in only two out of three sets of events. For many, the cruise is the experience; sailing and sunbathing during the day, socializing at night. They can learn what they want to know about the shore excursions through the previews the days before.

If shore tours are a priority, while shows and socializing are secondary, realize that this is where the cruise makes most of its money. It barely breaks even on board because of all the “free” events. The cruise has the advantage of “buying in bulk” on the more exotic locations and experiences, so keep that in mind. Also, in places such as Russia, you basically can’t go ashore independently of the ship (at least not without a lot of red tape).

There are certain “generic” locations where it makes sense to go it alone. Almost any stop within the United States, for example. Or a tour of Rome, where if you miss your ship, the next stop is say, Naples.

But in most cases, it’s a choice of not going ashore at all, or going with the cruise tours. You might not want to do so every day, and thereby have some days “on,” some days “off.”

_{Given that the answer I wrote here actually fits this question better, I might as well post it again}

There are generally two reasons to book your trips through the cruise line:

1. Not missing the ship
   If you go on an excursion arranged through the cruise line, and they return late, you’re guaranteed that the ship won’t leave until you return. If you go on a third-party excursion, though, that’s not the case. It can cost a lot of money to catch up to the ship in the next port, and it’s all money out of your pocket. Or in other words, you can think of at least part of the surcharge as insurance.
2. Cruise line-guaranteed quality
   This can be more important than you think; on one cruise we had a bad excursion experience and the cruise line was willing to refund part of the cost. Joe TourOperator who knows that you have to be on board at a certain time and then you’ll never be seen again isn’t as likely to want to make you happy.

There’s one other reason to go with cruise line tours: one of the nicest parts of cruising is the instant community that arises, and it’s fun hanging out with some of the same people off the ship, too.

Yeah, the excursions are expensive. But hey, how often do you get a chance to take a helicopter to a glacier and then walk around? I did it on my first trip to Alaska, and while I feel no urge to do it again, it was a great experience and one that I’m happy I did.

When I book tours, I research who the tour is actually with and then go to the company website to check their prices. I have found that when I booked directly with the company that I wanted to do a tour with, they ended up being cheaper than if I went through the cruise line or another tour booking agency. Also, a lot of tours even come with guides so you don’t have to worry about navigating through a city all by yourself.

BUT…I have also found that it is quite fun to just go off by yourself and do whatever you want. It all depends on what kind of experience you are looking for. I enjoy both types so maybe you could try a bit of both and see which one you prefer overall.

Excursions booked through the cruise line are often marked up quite a bit due to the fees the tour companies pay to the cruise line.

Your best bet is to research the ports you’re sailing in to and find a well-reviewed independent company that offers similar excursions, often for much less money. They often have enough experience with the cruise lines to know exactly how long the excursion can take, and will get you back to the boat on time.

One resource I find very useful for taking cruises are the CruiseCritic message boards. They have a forum for each cruiseline, and for each destination port, where you can often get the answer to any question about any ship or port.

EDIT:

Now that I’ve been on a few more cruises since my initial answer, I still stand by it, HOWEVER, I want to add the caveat that you NEED to do your research into the independent excursion providers. Make sure they are VERY VERY well reviewed.

There are many horror stories of people only calling an excursion company and being given many assurances of excursion length and types of activities only to be sorely disappointed, or even worse, miss the boat.