British Isles Fav Excursions

[MEC004]

Decided to book the 7-Night British Isles in September.

What are some of your favorite port excursions to do? We love history and seeing cool sights.

 

[diablodancer]

I live in central Scotland and would recommend Edinburgh Castle and Holyrood Palace for the Greenock stop, personally. It’s a bit of a bus ride both ways but that would be the best looking at the port excursions if you’re into history and you should also get to see the historic Royal Mile which connects the two

 

[merfsko]

Not an excursion, but if you're comfortable exploring on your own, we did a "museum crawl" in Glasgow for the Greenock port and had a blast! Everything was easy to access by transit (train into the city, then their subway) and foot.

The Glasgow Museums are all free (although we did donate) and we did Scotland Street School, Riverside, St Mungos, Provand's Lordship, and a quick peak at Gallery of Modern Art (mainly because we wanted to see the Wellington statue with the perpetual traffic cone on it's head outside of the museum). Depending on your group, you could totally do fewer, or check out different ones instead.
https://www.glasgowlife.org.uk/museums

 

[Uncle Scrooge Fan]

Decided to book the 7-Night British Isles in September.

What are some of your favorite port excursions to do? We love history and seeing cool sights.

Decided to book the 7-Night British Isles in September.

What are some of your favorite port excursions to do? We love history and seeing cool sights.

just booked that cruise. cant wait!! Thanks for asking the question

 

[Chipmunkmaniac]

I personally found the BI the most disappointing route out of all the European itineraries that I've been on. I found most of the stops very similar (I could not stand anything Titanic related after that week) and and had hoped to see more of the countryside...

 

[MnkyGirl]

If you're ok venturing out on your own and you enjoy WWII history, then I would recommend Western Approaches in Liverpool. It was really a highlight for us on the BI cruise last year. VERY well done, easy to walk to from the port as well.
Also, for the Portland stop you can easily see a lot on your own. They run a free shuttle from port that has 2 stops. The first shuttle stop is right outside of Portland Castle and right around the corner was Castletown D-Day Centre. Both were great things to do, we especially enjoyed the D-Day Centre because they let you interact with everything in the museum. The second shuttle stop is in Weymouth which is an adorable beach town full of it's own history. It was a lot of fun to just wander the town and the beach in the morning and grab a quick breakfast before going to the castle and museum.

 

[ldo]

We greatly enjoyed the BI (other cruiseline) and plan to do another BI cruise. We did the following in 2018.
Belfast: Belfast shore excursion tour to Giants causeway (small minibus-16 persons) with stops along the way (castle ruins, rope bridge, coastal views/town) with odysseycoachtours.co.uk-excellent.
Cork: Blarney/Kinsale Tour with eCoach (eTicket@eCoach.ie) large bus tour--basically transportation and commentary along the way. inexpensive and very good. We did not stand in line to kiss the Blarney stone, but viewed Blarney castle ruins and walk around beautiful grounds and went into the manor house on the grounds. Kinsale is a cute town with great fish/chips. It'd also work to just do Blarney 1/2 day and then walk around Cork.
Portsmouth-never been, but have been to Stonehenge and Salisbury village and Salisbury Cathedral--my pick if available.
Greenock--hard choice between Stirling castle and Edinburgh. I'd pick Edinburgh with castle. Also wander down the side street that was the inspiration for Diagon Alley Harry Potter.

 

[MEC004]

Thanks everyone! We booked a couple through DCL and the are venturing off.

Belfast-Giants Causeway through tour company (16 people max)

Greenock-Edinburgh by train through DCL and then Edinburgh Castle (might go By the inspiration for Diagon Alley thanks)

Liverpool-Renting a car and driving to Wales. We are going on the aqueduct and then a castle near Llangollen

Cork-Kinsale and Cork through DCL

Portland-Stonehenge through DCL unless the private tour I am waitlisted on opens up then Stonehenge, Salisbury, and a ride up the Jurassic Coast

 

[hmsTigger]

Haven't read anything about phone charger adaptors for UK
Going frew days in advance Wil we need a special one for UK when off the ship?

 

[RACHEL_GB]

Haven't read anything about phone charger adaptors for UK
Going frew days in advance Wil we need a special one for UK when off the ship?

I know someone has mentioned adapters on the other thread but yes an adapter is definitely a good idea because only the more modern hotels will have USB-A charging points (USB-C for Apple products virtually non existent). Some trains and buses have USB-A now too but better not to rely on that

 

[ldo]

We used USB-C with an adapter on the train and it got fried. USB-C was fine for under 1 hour charging--but I left it plugged in for 2-3 hours and now zippo! Definitely take a "slow charger" cord. Many trains and even some of the tour buses had the UBS-A outlets.

 

[hmsTigger]

We used USB-C with an adapter on the train and it got fried. USB-C was fine for under 1 hour charging--but I left it plugged in for 2-3 hours and now zippo! Definitely take a "slow charger" cord. Many trains and even some of the tour buses had the UBS-A outlets.

The hotel in London had USB-A and the airlines too. I did not try to charge on the trains or buses. Is your phone ok?

 

[ldo]

Phone fine, adapter fine, USB-C and/or cube=toast. We had a USB-A+cube with us, good as we had 2 more weeks!

 

[hmsTigger]

Phone fine, adapter fine, USB-C and/or cube=toast. We had a USB-A+cube with us, good as we had 2 more weeks!

Did you enjoy the trip? You were on the cruise? Which were your favorite excursions.