Disney Magic Med Cruise - Booking Excursions

[FindingMerida]

I'm feeling completely out of my depth planning this! Give me Fastpasses and ADRs any day at this point

We are on the 7 night Med cruise on 30th June this year. I have booked places on some Disney excursions, but everywhere I read up people are saying it's cheaper to book with 3rd party tour companies. Makes sense.
Except can I find anything cheaper? Nope! We are a family of 5 so a lot of tour companies ask for a minimum of 8. I understand the Disney excursions are going to be coaches rather than minivans but I can't justify the extra cost after spending so much on the cruise in the first place!
Our kids are 9, 9, and 8 so not so easy to entertain other than with technology - I don't want to spend hundreds of Euros and have them moan the whole time they want to go back to the ship!

Any advice from those who have been there, done that? Or I don't suppose there's a family of 3 out there doing the same cruise that wants to team up?!

My main concern is Rome I think as there's so much to see and it'll be a long day.

[danisleigh]

We have always just got the train into Rome and done it oursleves! I prefer to do this and we can come and go as we please and if we want to come back early we are not tied to a tour group.

[Gill H]

We did our first ever cruise on the Magic last year round the Med and it was fab. We did a mix of things...

At Naples we went to the cruise port on the free Disney coach, and then went over to a little marquee run by a company called Pompeii Sightseeing. We had found them on the web and they looked good. They run HOHO buses to various places including Herculaneum, Pompeii, Sorrento etc. We had decided on Herculaneum and that was 15 Euros each for a return trip. It dropped us right outside the entry building.

Entrance was 11 Euros each. We had planned on just hiring an audio guide. However, an English speaking tour guide approached us and said she was just about to start a tour, and if we wanted to join there would be 8 people which meant it would be 12.50 Euros each.

This was so worth it! We were there about an hour and a half with her and she really brought the place to life. That day it was tipping down solidly the whole day, and to be honest we would have given up very quickly otherwise. She also made a huge effort to involve the children in the group particularly.

I can't remember how much Disney wanted for the same trip but it was a heck of a lot more than 38.50 each!

As we were the only ones in the shuttle coming back, we asked our driver to drop us in the middle of Naples rather than back at the ship. We walked around for an hour or so (still in torrential rain) as we wanted to seek out some special places for pizza and snacks which we'd seen on Paul Hollywood's 'City Bakes' show. The pizza was worth the soaking!

As for Rome, we figured that we didn't want a four hour round trip on a coach to spend six hours somewhere hot and crowded. We priced it up, and we could afford to spend a week in Rome another year pretty inexpensively if we went off season, which would mean not having to deal with the heat, and being able to be at places first thing in the morning to beat the crowds. (Check Hannikins' excellent trippie for advice!) Whereas it will be many a year before we can afford a Disney cruise again. So we skipped Rome entirely and had a wonderful day on the ship.

For Pisa we did a DCL excursion to see what they were like. It was fine and I'm glad we did it, but we could have got public transport easily. Again, we decided on Pisa rather than Florence, as I would want at least 2 days to see Florence, at a quieter and cooler time of year. (Would love to go but not been yet!)

For Villefranche we had planned to just bimble about and see the beach and the town. However, because of high winds the ship didn't actually dock there as the tenders wouldn't have been running. So instead we had a sea day that day. The following day we docked at Marseille instead, and got the free coach into town. There were excursions but we just wandered about a bit. I think if we'd had children with us we would have made the effort to book something - there was a little train at the harbour you could go on to various places.

Check out my trippie (link in my sig) if you like. There are some other cruise trippies on here too. Also there are YouTube videos which may help. It's quite a few years old now but the wonderful Phil, Emma and Ben did a Med cruise on the Magic, so check their videos out.

[FindingMerida]

Originally Posted by Gill H

We did our first ever cruise on the Magic last year round the Med and it was fab. We did a mix of things...

At Naples we went to the cruise port on the free Disney coach, and then went over to a little marquee run by a company called Pompeii Sightseeing. We had found them on the web and they looked good. They run HOHO buses to various places including Herculaneum, Pompeii, Sorrento etc. We had decided on Herculaneum and that was 15 Euros each for a return trip. It dropped us right outside the entry building.

Entrance was 11 Euros each. We had planned on just hiring an audio guide. However, an English speaking tour guide approached us and said she was just about to start a tour, and if we wanted to join there would be 8 people which meant it would be 12.50 Euros each.

This was so worth it! We were there about an hour and a half with her and she really brought the place to life. That day it was tipping down solidly the whole day, and to be honest we would have given up very quickly otherwise. She also made a huge effort to involve the children in the group particularly.

I can't remember how much Disney wanted for the same trip but it was a heck of a lot more than 38.50 each!

As we were the only ones in the shuttle coming back, we asked our driver to drop us in the middle of Naples rather than back at the ship. We walked around for an hour or so (still in torrential rain) as we wanted to seek out some special places for pizza and snacks which we'd seen on Paul Hollywood's 'City Bakes' show. The pizza was worth the soaking!

As for Rome, we figured that we didn't want a four hour round trip on a coach to spend six hours somewhere hot and crowded. We priced it up, and we could afford to spend a week in Rome another year pretty inexpensively if we went off season, which would mean not having to deal with the heat, and being able to be at places first thing in the morning to beat the crowds. (Check Hannikins' excellent trippie for advice!) Whereas it will be many a year before we can afford a Disney cruise again. So we skipped Rome entirely and had a wonderful day on the ship.

For Pisa we did a DCL excursion to see what they were like. It was fine and I'm glad we did it, but we could have got public transport easily. Again, we decided on Pisa rather than Florence, as I would want at least 2 days to see Florence, at a quieter and cooler time of year. (Would love to go but not been yet!)

For Villefranche we had planned to just bimble about and see the beach and the town. However, because of high winds the ship didn't actually dock there as the tenders wouldn't have been running. So instead we had a sea day that day. The following day we docked at Marseille instead, and got the free coach into town. There were excursions but we just wandered about a bit. I think if we'd had children with us we would have made the effort to book something - there was a little train at the harbour you could go on to various places.

Check out my trippie (link in my sig) if you like. There are some other cruise trippies on here too. Also there are YouTube videos which may help. It's quite a few years old now but the wonderful Phil, Emma and Ben did a Med cruise on the Magic, so check their videos out.

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Oh Gill! You've done the unthinkable When I casually suggested skipping Rome you should have seen the horror on my husband's face
I'll have a read through your trip report tonight

[FindingMerida]

Originally Posted by danisleigh

We have always just got the train into Rome and done it oursleves! I prefer to do this and we can come and go as we please and if we want to come back early we are not tied to a tour group.

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We usually DIY it in places we visit - I've never done an organised tour before. But I know my whole day would be ruined by clock watching and panicking about getting back to the boat on time That's just me, I know most people can be much more relaxed about these things!

[caj]

We missed Rome too! It's on my bucket list ... but hope to go for a long weekend as just adults!

In fact, at villefranche we walked round to the beach, spent time in the sea. Naples was also beach although not a nice one. We did herculaneum as dcl tour ... fab guide. Well worth it. And other than that we stayed o the ship.

I have a trippie, but it only has a few days photos in it as photobucket ditched them.

[FindingMerida]

Originally Posted by caj

We missed Rome too! It's on my bucket list ... but hope to go for a long weekend as just adults!

In fact, at villefranche we walked round to the beach, spent time in the sea. Naples was also beach although not a nice one. We did herculaneum as dcl tour ... fab guide. Well worth it. And other than that we stayed o the ship.

I have a trippie, but it only has a few days photos in it as photobucket ditched them.

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Do you have a link to your trippie?
We've heard the beach at Villefranche is good but I'd really love to visit Monte Carlo

[Buggles94]

Hi
We did the DCL Med cruise a few years ago now and it was absolutely amazing - our first cruise. Children were both under 10 I think and we did 2 excursions: Monte Carlo (fab - we did the one with the little train) and the Pompeii and Sorrento one (again fab)... Both expensive from what I remember so on the Rome day we just went for a little walk by the port... It was also great to have some ship days... So much to do!
Hope this helps a little bit...
Have an amazing time

[Buggles94]

ps see you are doing the DLP Run Magic weekend too - will be there with my Mum this year!

[caj]

Originally Posted by FindingMerida

Do you have a link to your trippie?
We've heard the beach at Villefranche is good but I'd really love to visit Monte Carlo

See more...

Try this...

https://www.thedibb.co.uk/forums/sho...d.php?t=751031