Cruise ship Azura. Anyone arranged their own DIY excursions?

aweebargain

First time cruising for my friend and need to try to keep overall expenditure reasonable. Ship Departs Oct 17th.
Seems going ashore on 'cruise arranged excursions' can prove pricey, especially if going ashore at every port, so any help, suggestions or ideas on how to make the most of the trip without spending an arm and a leg would be gratefully received.
Places the ship will stop include Cadiz, Barcelona, Cannes, Florence, Rome, Alicante, Gibralter.
Have you visited any of these places from the ship? Did you 'go it alone'? Did you go on an arranged trip?
What's the 'not to be missed' aspects of these destinations.
Thank you for reading this.

daveyjp

Specialist cruise sites such as cruisecritic have lots of info on ports you can do alone.

Of those you mention: Barcelona is easy - free bus to the centre, use the Metro to see the sights - a 10 trip Metro ticket is €8.25 and the tickets can be shared.

Rome is difficult as the port is a long way from the city - you can go on the train, but for your first time you may not wish to risk it - the ship doesn't wait for DIY daytrippers!

Mands

aweebargain wrote: »

Places the ship will stop include Cadiz, Barcelona, Cannes, Florence, Rome, Alicante, Gibralter.

Gib, Cadiz and Barcelona are doable on your own without any difficulty. Get off the ship, make your way into town (shuttle bus, taxi, or walk) and then take it from there. Barcelona has a good HOHO bus.

Florence and Rome aren't actually Florence and Rome :-) Your ship will dock in Livorno and Civitavechia. In both places you can make your way to the train station and go into the city in question. The train journeys are long-ish; 45 minutes for one and over an hour for the other. They are well worth doing but it's worth doing some planning, being up early and being ready to head to the station and be prepared for long days. These are not the evenings to book speciality restaurants and the like. Many other people on your cruise will be doing exactly the same thing.

Go see David as he is fantastic

Alicante and Canne I don't know; hopefully someone else can advise.

It goes without saying that it is the individual's responsibility to get back to the ship before all aboard. If they don't make that then they may be able to board at the next port but it is up to them to make it there at their own cost which can be substantial.

As always there's a wealth of information on Cruise Critic, particularly within the Ports of Call forum. There are questions about how to get the train into Florence and Rome every single week, if not more often.

Happy planning,
Mands

nw_man

I agree with the above posters, cruise critic is your friend.

If you register, its free and easy, you can perhaps find the 'roll call' for your particular cruise and find some fellow passengers who are no doubt all discussing the very things you want to find out about.

Also, there are more than likely some folks on there who are looking to share excursions.

Re : the ports you mentioned, Barcelona is walkable from the port, Florence is Livorno as mentioned above and you can easily do a full day trip D.I.Y style to both Florence and Pisa.

Rome is a fair way from the port, we did the train. Just dont be late back.....