How to Book a Private Excursion Without Missing Your Cruise, According To An Ex-Crew Member
Cruises are a great way to make multiple types of people feel happy and satisfied with their vacation . If you want to focus on relaxation, you can definitely do that with amenities onboard or shore excursions that cater to that. If you're a thrill seeker, many ships have large water slides and even rollercoasters to keep you entertained. Plus, there's never a shortage of shore excursions that will give you a great sense of adventure. Many shore excursions marry the two, offering an aspect of adventure plus a moment of relaxation. Have you ever noticed, though, that the shore excursions offered by the cruise lines tend to be much more expensive than ones that are done privately?
Cruise lines get away with the hike in prices on their excursions for one simple reason: booking through them ensures that you won't have any issues with getting back onboard the ship. If something happens on your excursion that causes you to be late for the all aboard time, the ship must hold in port until your group arrives back.
While I am an avid cruiser myself , I also worked as a performer on multiple cruise lines for many years. I was able to go on excursions through the cruise line for free, however sometimes I wanted to experience something that the cruise ship wasn't offering for excursions. If that's the case for you, I have a few tips that will allow you to book a private excursion without the risk of the ship leaving you in port.
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Choose The Timing Of The Excursion Wisely
When you book your cruise , you will be able to see the exact times that the ship is scheduled to be in port. For most cruise lines, guests are expected to be onboard at least a half hour before the ship leaves. So, if the schedule says that the ship will be in port from 7am until 6pm, you will be expected to be back onboard by 5:30pm. Now, considering this, you should only look at private excursions that would not only fit within that time window, but also offer you extra time in the case that anything does cause a delay in time.
As a crew member , if you miss the cruise ship, the ship will not wait for you–and the same goes for passengers who have chosen to explore on their own. However, for crew members, you will be fired immediately from the job. With that as a threat hanging over my head, I made sure to never ever risk missing the ship.
I personally would only ever book private excursions that were scheduled to get me back to the ship at least two and a half hours before all aboard. This gave me a good amount of buffer room, so if there was any delay like traffic, or someone got injured on the excursion, the two and a half hours allowed for those possibilities to happen. It's much better to be safe than sorry, and if that means your excursion is shorter than you wanted it to be, so be it.
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Companies That I Trust To Book With Privately
I've traveled to over 40 countries on cruise ships, and have probably been on at least 30 private excursions over the years. There are a few companies that I have repeatedly booked with, mainly because they not only offered exciting excursions at a good price, but they also made me feel safe and looked after.
The first company is Get Your Guide , which is an app you can download on your phone. Here, you can book tons of different excursions, from large group options to private tours and everything in between. A similar company that I like is Viator , which offers similar tours to Get Your Guide. Both are widely used, and you will probably end up on excursions with other people from your cruise ship as well.
Another great option that I highly recommend is to book with the popular "hop on hop off" type of companies. Depending on which port you are in, there will be different companies that offer this. Most of the time, these tour buses park in front of the cruise terminal. When you get off the ship, you can easily go up and buy a ticket for the day. Then, the bus will take you around the port or city, allowing you to hop off or hop on whenever you please. In that case, it's important to keep track of time, and stick to the two and a half hour window that I suggested to ensure that you make it back on time.
When cruising on a Mediterranean cruise , we were in port in Piraeus, which is the closest city to Athens, Greece. I did a hop on hop off bus excursion that day, and the bus took passengers from the port directly into the center of Athens. They provided a time table which showed when each bus would leave to go back to the port, and very conveniently, the buses left every 20 minutes or so. I enjoyed a day exploring all that Athens had to offer, and then two and a half hours before all aboard, I headed back on the bus to arrive safely to the ship on time.
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This story was originally published by Parade on Feb 28, 2026, where it first appeared in the Travel section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
