Mediterranean Shore Excursions

[tgrunewald]

Hi all,

We are going on our 1st cruise to the Mediterranean and was looking for some advice around private tour excursions. In the past, I usually use combo of Disney, private and DIY - just depended on if it met our needs around what we wanted to do and price - so I'm comfortable with the 'risks'.

I have been in contact with a few:
BlueGrottoTours (www.bluegrottotours.com)
Shore Excursions in Italy (www.shoreexcursionsinitaly.net)
Barcelona Day Tours (www.barcelonadaytours.com)
Shore Excursions Group (www.shoreexcursionsgroup.com)
Rome in Limo (www.romeinlimo.com)
The Roman Guy (www.theromanguy.com/tours/italy)

Does anyone have any experience with these? Do you have other you recommend? Any other tips/advice?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Mommb]

We have had much better experiences with private tours than large-group Disney tours in the Mediterranean. We enjoyed all of the private tours we took, and would not hesitate to recommend any of them.

We used Barcelona Day Tours after two cruises. They picked us up at the port and dropped us off at our hotel. The first time we went to Girona on a private tour, and the second time we did a small-group city tour that included a long stop at Park Guell.

We had an amazing day in Rome on a private tour with Rome in Limo. We visited the Colisseum, the Panthenon, the Spanish Steps, Trevi fountain, and local pizzeria, among others, and then had a private guide at the Vatican. As you probably know, drivers in Italy don’t go into sites, but our driver was full of information at each stop.

Another company we would highly recommend is Joe Banana tours.
We did a food tour from Salerno (also offered from Naples) that took us to a limoncello factory, an olive oil factory, and a restaurant where we made our own pizzas. we also walked around Sorrento and had a guided tour of Pompeii.
After our cruise ended at Civitavecchia, Joe Banana drove us to Hadrian’s Villa and Tivoli then back to our hotel near the Rome airport. Our driver recommended a restaurant for lunch in the middle of Roman ruins that was a highlight of our trip our trip.

I would say any experienced tour company would be fine, so decide what you want to do and see which companies offer it. You can also get ideas by looking at what is offered — that’s how we found the food tour.

Also, if you have a rewards credit card or other affiliation, check whether you can get a discount on tours. We used our Chase card to book a Gelato/Tiramisu tasting during a pre-cruise stay in Rome.

 

[aggiedog]

I always contact several companies (after combing thru TripAdvisor and cruisecritic) and pick the one that seems the most responsive to our questions. Some obviously send canned responses, others flat out wrong (“info for your Rome request...” when we asked about Naples, etc). Make sure for Italy you’re getting a guide too, and not just a driver, if that’s what you want. They are separate things and legally have to stay in their lane. We used Joe Bananas and had a good experience.

 

[Pens Fan]

Rome in Limo is wonderful. We use them for multiple things on our trip last fall - for both transfers and tours as we spent four days in Rome prior to our cruise. They even arranged a custom transfer/tour for us after our cruise where they picked us up in Civitavecchia and dropped us off in Montepulciano (Tuscany) plus a lovely tour in Orvieto along the way. They were extremely easy to work with during the planning stages and their drivers and guides were wonderful. They also sometimes offer multiple tour and pre pay discounts. I appreciated the later, especially, as it was really nice to pre pay for the tours. One thing we found on that trip was that many Italian and Greek tour companies do not take credit cards. You have to pay the guides in person and in cash, so you'll need to carry a lot of Euros (though they were all very happy to help us find an ATM ) . It was nice that most of the Rome in Limo stuff we could pay ahead of time (short transfers were the exception - still needed Euros for that).

Are you stopping in Naples? There, we used https://www.lovelyamalfitours.com for a great tour of the Amalfi coast and Pompeii and were very pleased.

 

[oufpat]

Out of the tour companies listed, we have only used Barcelona Day tours and I highly recommend them. We used them for a transfer from Barcelona Airport to our hotel after a 4 hour tour, which they did customize for us prior to our cruise. When the cruise was over, we had them pick us up at the port, had a full day tour, and then they brought us to our hotel. They were easy to work with via e-mails pre-trip, their prices were competitive, and their drivers were professional yet very friendly!

 

[TestingH2O]

100% recommend Rome In Limo. They were amazing for our day in Rome.

We used Italy Tours for Kids in Pompeii and also had a great experience. (https://italytoursforkids.com/pompeiitourforkids.html)

In Barcelona we used Real Barcelona Tours (https://realbarcelonatours.com/). They were excellent as well.

I agree with PP who said that private tours are the way to go.

 

[NNPMom]

I will agree and disagree. We took a 7 day Barcelona to Rome cruise.

Barcelona Day Tour was wonderful picked us up at Airport and toured the city, dropping us off at Hotel when our room was ready. Highly recommend them. They even handled our nauseous jet lagged teen who didn’t see a reason to sleep on the overnight flight
Found both Rome tour guide and our B&B via online reviews then spoke directly to them via email and they answered all questions. The guide picked us up at port (with one car for us and one for our luggage that went right to the B&B!) and took us all over Rome giving us VERY personal attention and great dining and touring ideas for the rest of out time there.

BUT
After lots of debate we went with the Disney tours for the most part. Yes the groups were somewhat larger... and somewhat more expensive. However, we had absolute expert professional guides with amazing experience. We were happy with every tour, and most importantly the boat waited for us! We were late coming back from Pompeii - I was LITERALLY the last person walking on the boat with the cast member pulling up the gangway behind me. Of course this is rare, but given we had universally good experiences not a risk I am willing to take again unless only touring the port city.

Only caveat to the above was the Disney photographers who were on the tour with us. Some were good, some seemed like they had been handed the camera that morning... but if you are not on a Disney tour you don’t have a photographer anyway!

Happy touring!