Eastern Med cruise tours

[Ed Wetschler]

We will be taking a 14 day eastern med cruise and I would like to know if it is relatively easy or even possible to find tours other than private ones on shore without previous booking in order to avoid paying a premium scheduling through the ocean liner company.

Also, I would like  recommendations for specific tour operators, and suggestions [ what to avoid!] for the stops which include Ephesus, , Nafplion, Corfu, Santorini,

Mykonos, and Iraklion. I would think that for Athens, Split and Dubrovnik we can research "walking tours" and see highlights at our own pace. 

         Stan

[Lana Bortolot]

Hello!

You won't need a tour guide for Santorini--it's a small(ish) island. Depending on what your time is like, I'd advise renting a four-wheeler ATV (the transport de rigeur) and seeing what you like on your own. Moist notable sights: Oia (the town) and Ancient Thira for which you don't need a guide. Ditto Ephesus--you can hire a taxi or get on a minibus from the port--not $$.

[Judy Wells]

Stan - You definitely want a guide for Ephesus and there are many tour providers. . www.ephesus-turkey.com, for example, has several good tours from Kusadasi (koo-shah-dah-see). What you see depends on the time you have but I would definitely recommend, in addition to the city itself, the House of the Virgin Mary, the Church of St. John and the Temple of Artemis, in that order. Were I going back - and I've been through the area about 5 times - I would definitely take in the newly opened Terrace Houses in Ephesus, The e-t tour that includes this and all the others plus lunch runs $99 a person for 2-4 people, $84 for 5 or more.
However you might not have time. The only tricky part about taking a non-ship sponsored tour is that you MUST get back before the ship sails. If you are on a ship's tour and get hung up, the cruise line will make arrangements to delay sailing time (not always possible) or get you to the ship's next port. If you've done the booking independently, you are on your own.

[Mary Jo Manzanares]

For Split, I'd recommend hiring a local guide (very reasonably priced) to give you a tour of the Palace. We did this for a couple hours one morning, and were amazed at the things we would have missed if we had not had someone pointing things out to us. We learned a lot more about history, architecture, and culture by having a local share with us. Don't get me wrong, you can walk the Palace on your own, but with a guide you'll get a lot more out of it. There were 4 of us and we allotted 2-hours with a guide, then explored more of the Palace and Split on our own.

[TSC_TRAVEL]

Hi I can recommend you to contact TurkeyTourSpecialist or GreeceTourSpecialist for your shore excursions. They are both offer private shore excursions in Turkey & Greece. The websites are www.turkeytourspecialist.com and www.greecetourspecialist.com

Have a great journey