Good news. Regent has changed its policy on booking multiple excursions. Previously (i.e., beginning March 2nd) you could only book one excursion per passenger per port online. Additional excursions could only be booked once on board the ship. Now, while you still can only book one excursion per port online, you can call Regent before your cruise to book additional excursions in a particular port. When you log in online to book excursions, the web site now says:

"In order to allow every guest the opportunity to book shore excursions for each day of their cruise, only one (1) shore excursion per day may be reserved online. To book additional tours, please contact Regent Reservations at 877-505-5370 (inside the U.S. or Canada) or 1-954-940-7460."

I called Regent to test this policy change and was able to book a second excursion for Skagway on my upcoming Alaska cruise. My excursion summary now shows two reserved excursions for Skagway.

I think this is a good move by Regent. It would have been chaotic on board as potentially hundreds of passengers attempted to modify, cancel or add excursions for their cruise.

I think this is good, and a reasonable accommodation! Good for Regent for allowing a change in policy! On my several trips to Alaska, I have wanted more than one excursion in a port.

Thanks Dave. Very useful information. I also noted that they updated our booked excursions and seemed to have completed the listings for the ports on our cruise. I may call for a couple more excursions in the Baltics.

Now if we can only get Regent to let us use our cruise credits for those excursions with fees, we'd be all set.

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Eugene

Let's hope this will happen, Eugene!

Dave: Thanks for the information - shall pass it along to my trusty travelling companion.

Eugene: I totally agree - can't understand why we can't use the cruise credits for on line bookings.

Just a quick confirmation of Dave's report: I called Regent today and was able to add a second excursion on the day I wanted, as advertised. Yea! It was simple and quick; who needs that newfangled Internet thingy, anyway? ;)

Ever since we started talking about a possible Mariner cruise to Alaska nearly a year ago, the three top excursions we wanted to do were Tracy Arm, a whale watch, and a helicopter landing -- and now with the changes in Regent's policies, we're booked on all three and I can relax about this. No more wondering if our excursion tickets will be in our door when we board; no more envisioning a quick dash to the tour desk as soon as I board to see if I can add an extra excursion. I just did a little happy dance, and I'm comfortably settled into happy camp! :D

Eugene, I hope Regent makes a similar change to allow people who have shipboard credits to book excursions by phone against their credits, and then we'd have bunch more people join me here in happy camp. It's a good sign that they seem to be making some changes fairly quickly in response to customer requests and/or their programmers completing more complex capabilities of the new computer system; the limit-one-excursion-per-day policy lasted only 11 days before it was changed. I'll keep my fingers crossed for all of you!

-- Eric

By the way, I e-mailed a very long "letter" to Regent about the use of shipboard credits for excursions. It is clear that Regent (and TAs) are responding to the economic situation by adjusting fares, including "free" excursions, giving shipboard credits, etc., but as I pointed out, what good are the shipboard credits if we can't make good use of them?

For us, that means primarily using them toward excursion fees. One of my concerns is that the parent company realize that the situation is much different than on Oceania, where I'm sure we'd have no problem using up shipboard credits. But for a week-long cruise on the Voyager in the Baltics, involving mostly "free" excursions, shipboard credits pose a dilemma. We have better things to do than spending valuable time at the spa, and we're not particularly interested in ordering expensive wines or buying items at the boutiques.

IMHO, it can't hurt if they hear from others expressing similar concerns.

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Eugene

I have no problem with spending SC at the spa or boutiques but understand your concern. On a 2 week cruise $500 is a spa heaven overdose and with port intensive cruises sorely needed ;)

I just called Regent and added a second Juneau excursion, so now we are all set for the entire week.

Eric, we may be on the same excursions as you for the Tracy Arm-Juneau day. We booked the early morning Tracy Arm catamaran excursion, then a 2:30 Four Glacier Helicopter Adventure in Juneau, then the evening whale-watching excursion at 6:15. Talk about a solid day of sightseeing! I wish they weren't all on the same day -- we'll probably be exhausted by that night! -- but those are the three excursions that are of most interest to us in the whole sailing. Hopefully it all is doable. If anyone thinks not, please don't hesitate to give me your opinion.

Yes, Priscilla, it sounds like we'll be spending 14 hours together that day! I agree with you that it's a shame all these highlight excursions all fall together, but I'm delighted we'll be able to do them. We certainly wouldn't have sprung for all three under Regent's old excursion pricing. Now all we have to do is hope that the weather is at least decent that day, and that we can figure out when to fit eating into the touring schedule!

-- Eric

No leisurely onboard meals for us that day, Eric! That's for sure. I read somewhere, if I remember correctly, that Regent supplies the Tracy Arm catamaran with breakfast/lunch fare, so that's a good thing. Somehow I never seem to miss a meal on a cruise!

As you say, fingers crossed for good weather on June 6.

Things may certainly have changed since 2005, but there was a "continental" breakfast available in the theatre before embarking the catamaran (too early for me to think about food,) and there were some sweet rolls and beverages on the catamaran. A few hrs later, they put out some "finger" sandwiches and cookies, I think. The hordes descended and I was lucky to get 1 sandwich! So I wouldn't count on a lot!

We had a whale watching tour with Capt. Larry @ 2:30 so we had time to have lunch on the ship as I believe we returned about 1 PM.

We had already planned on room service dinner and were glad we did so!


Good luck with your 3 excursions - I'm sure you'll enjoy!

We are on Sea to Sea and I had booked one excursion a day for St. Petersburg two weeks ago. I was back online today and I was able to book an second excursion for each day. I did not have to call Regent.

Susan

Susan, very interesting. I see where it allows you to book in the PM if the AM excursion allows for it, and I assume vice versa. But if you need to change anything that you have already booked, you still need to call.

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Eugene

Thanks for the information Susan. The Regent web site is certainly a work in progress. :D

There are no times posted for the excursions on our cruise. How do you know if you can book the second excursion without knowing the times?

Jay

Jay,

You have to get into the "Already Booked" section of the web site in order to see the excursion times. Hope this helps.

We now have three excursions in one day! :ohmy:

Peterhof in morning, then 75 minutes until Yusupov Palace and Canal Cruise in the afternoon, then one hour until Grand Imperial Evening of the Tsars. A 15 hour day. :D

With 8.5 hours the first day and 7 hours the third, we will see all of St Petersburg that we can.

Thank goodness you and Arlene are "kids" you'll handle it with ease - once you get old, and require a nap during the day, those long days are history BUT I so envy you!!! :hug: :hug:

Joanna, I haven't got our updated invoice yet but I think C2C will end up being one of our best deals ever on Regent. You and Tony should consider joining us for one or both weeks.

dave,

Been there (done that)

There are no times. However, excursions are "free" and we are over 120 days out. I will keep checking to see if anything changes.

Jay

Jay,

I'm curious. When you enter the Already Booked section what do you see? I see a summary of my booked excursions and a drop down list of the various ports on my cruise. When I select a port, I see detailed descriptions of all the excursions, their price and check boxes for all the available times for each excursion. What do you see?

I see that on the Already Booked page, it now says:
Last weekend, when they first started allowing people to book multiple excursions per day via telephone, I successfully booked an excursion which returns a half-hour before another excursion we had previously booked. The Regent representative who made my booking made no mention of the timing being an issue, and the charge for the add-on excursion went through, so their computer system didn't block it. Do you think I should be worried about having enough time to make it to the second excursion?

Could someone refresh my faulty memory: how long before the listed excursion time do they ask you to assemble in the theater?

If you're returning to the ship from a previous excursion or being out exploring on your own, is it always necessary to re-board the ship to go to the theater in order to exit the ship as a group to assemble on the pier? Or is it ever possible to return to the ship and just wait at the foot of the gangway to join up with your group as they come off? I know they usually take attendance in the theater to make sure everyone is accounted for, but I'm wondering if it's possible to tell the tour desk in the morning before leaving the ship that you'll be meeting them on the dock instead of inside the theater?

I've never had so much to do ashore that these issues ever came up for us before; clearly our past Regent cruises haven't been nearly as port-intensive as our upcoming trip to Alaska! ;)

-- Eric

Marc,

I know you will love it all and I will pray that ou do NOT have 90 temps that we had in 2001! First day, did 2 tours, including canal, soaking wet, from the heat.. Next day, I did all day tour by myself, including Hermitage, Peterhof, etc., etc. and was really dragging back onto the ship. No AC except buses, minimal. But I wouldn't have missed it - fabulous sights!

"I'm curious. When you enter the Already Booked section what do you see? I see a summary of my booked excursions and a drop down list of the various ports on my cruise. When I select a port, I see detailed descriptions of all the excursions, their price and check boxes for all the available times for each excursion. What do you see?"

Dave,

We are on the Oct. 30th Istanbul to Rome. When I go on the Already Booked section I see everything you see except for times. I am just thankful that I was able to book excursions this far out. However, I would not complain if I could book a second excursion if time allowed.

Jay

Jay,

That's strange. It looks like there was a problem when Regent loaded the excursions for your cruise into their system. I'd give them a call. Good luck.

Dave

Eric,

On the two Regent excursions we did last November, I don't remember having to assemble in the theater. Instead, we assembled near the buses about ten minutes before the tours were scheduled to start. It may be a different procedure in Alaska, so hopefully someone who has been on an Alaska cruise will chime in.