The ship is in port for nine hours. Spend them well.
What Ephesus costs from the Kusadasi pier. Whether a private driver in Livorno beats the coach the ship sells you. How much of the Amalfi coast fits between Naples and all-aboard. Reviews of the excursions cruise passengers actually book.
Four port days worth walking down the gangway for.
The excursions that fill first at four of the busiest calls on this site: what each costs, and what the day actually involves.
01KusadasiSkip The Lines PRIVATE EPHESUS TOUR &On Time ReturnThe marble street, the Library of Celsus and the terrace houses, on a private car that leaves before the coaches load.
02LivornoFlorence & Pisa, Accademia & TowerTwo cities in one long day. Ninety minutes to Florence, an hour back through Pisa, and the Accademia booked before you land.
03KosFull Day Boat Cruise to 3 IslandsThree islands off the Dodecanese with a swim stop at each. The day that beats anything on shore in July.
04SkagwayFull-Day Tour of the YukonOver the White Pass into the Yukon and back down the same railway grade. The one Alaskan call that earns a full day.
Six cruise ports, and the day ashore each one is really for.
A pier twenty minutes from a Roman city, a container berth with Florence at the end of the motorway, a caldera you climb out of, and a terminal you can walk into town from. The call sheet decides the day.
Italy is four ports and three cities you already know the names of.
Livorno for Florence and Pisa, Naples for Pompeii and the coast road, Civitavecchia for Rome. Same flag, three completely different days, and the drive each way is what decides which one you can actually do.
A private guide has you back at the gangway first.
Ship excursions move in coach-loads and leave when the last seat is filled. A private car or an eight-seat minibus sets its own start time, skips the assembly point in the terminal and puts the return in the booking.
The excursions cruise passengers book more than any others.
Every port-day review →Across every port on the site, these are the days out that fill first and stay full through the season.
1
Skip The Lines PRIVATE EPHESUS TOUR &On Time Return
Meet your English-speaking guide at Kusadasi cruise port and ride in a private, air-conditioned van to Ephesus, the House of the Virgin Mary, and the Temple of Artemis. Guides such as Fatih, Dicle, Tuna, Banu, and Zeynep have tailored visits to different ages, walking abilities, and interests.
From · $39
Read our review →
2
PRIVATE EPHESUS TOUR FOR CRUISERS: On-time Return and Skip-Line
from $29
3
Full Day Boat Cruise to 3 Islands
from $35
4
Daintree Rainforest, Mossman Gorge Small-Group from Port Douglas
from $190
5
Timanfaya and Green Lagoon for Cruise Passengers
from $58
6
Calypso Outer Great Barrier Reef Cruise from Port Douglas
from $227
7
PRIVATE TOUR FOR CRUISERS: Mary’s House (Meryemana) and Ephesus
from $29
8
Ephesus & Artemis Tour for Cruisers WITH ENTRY TICKETS
from $20
Ephesus is the reason the ship calls at Kusadasi at all.
Twenty minutes inland: a marble main street running downhill to the Library of Celsus, a theatre that held twenty-five thousand, and terrace houses under a modern roof. Every ship in the Aegean is doing it the same morning, so the start time is the whole game.
Every Ephesus excursion →
The clock the whole day runs on.
A ship waits for its own excursions and for nobody else. Independent operators answer that with a guaranteed return: a written promise to have you at the gangway before last call, and a plan for the day the coast road backs up.
What a day ashore actually costs.
Every excursion on the site sorted by price, from the shuttle into town to the private car with a guide waiting at the terminal door.
Old-town walks, site entry, the port shuttle and the short boat trips off the pier.
The full-day standards: Ephesus, Florence and Pisa, Pompeii and the coast road.
Private cars with a guide, reef boats, and the calls where the good thing is a long way inland.
Three things a port day gives you that a fortnight on shore does not.
You arrive at dawn with the light behind the town, you get one shot at what the port is known for, and you leave before it turns into a queue.
Ruins at opening time
Half the great classical sites of the Mediterranean sit within an hour of a working cruise berth: Ephesus above Kusadasi, Pompeii under Vesuvius, the Acropolis over Piraeus. A ship puts you at the gate before the coaches from the city hotels have finished breakfast, which is the only hour of the day the marble is empty and the stone is still cool.
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A national park between tides
Some calls exist because of what is behind the town. Volcano country above Hilo, the lava fields inland from Arrecife, rainforest an hour north of Port Douglas. These days are long and they run on a schedule written around the last tender, which is why the operators who do them well quote the drive time before they quote the price.
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A swim, then back aboard
On a hot Aegean or Caribbean call the smartest port day is the least ambitious one: a boat out of the harbour, an anchorage nobody can reach by road, a ladder into the water and lunch on deck. You see less of the town and more of the coast, and you are alongside again with salt still in your hair.
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Four excursions that are gone before the ship leaves home.
Timed entry at the big sites, one dock and four thousand passengers, boats with a dozen seats. None of it scales to a ship arriving all at once, so the good operators sell out weeks ahead of the sailing date.
- 01Skip The Lines PRIVATE EPHESUS TOUR &On Time ReturnEvery ship in the Aegean calls here on the same rotation, and the private guides who guarantee the return are a small pool.
- 02Naples Shore Excursion Mt Vesuvius and Pompeii Day TripEntry runs on timed slots and the site closes early in winter. The morning slots go first because they are the only cool ones.
- 03Calypso Outer Great Barrier Reef Cruise from Port DouglasThe reef pontoons take a fixed number of swimmers a day and the ship is not the only boat coming.
- 04Timanfaya and Green Lagoon for Cruise PassengersPark access is capped and the coach convoys are booked as blocks. Turn up on the day and you are looking at it from the road.
At a tender port the day begins with a queue for the boat.
No berth, so everyone goes ashore by lifeboat and the ship's own excursions get the first tenders. The answer is a later start and a shorter day: something that meets you in town rather than at a pier you cannot promise to reach by nine.
By port — where the ship ties up
By kind of day — ruins, coast road, water or wheels
Barcelona to Kusadasi: the six calls almost every Med itinerary includes.
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