This year, one travel theme I keep hearing, over and over again, is how travelers are taking longer trips that may involve different segments, combining land and sea. One seamless way to do that is to book a cruise line-organized Cruise Tour that extends your voyage either before or after.
“With cruise tours, there are a couple of big lures,” says Jess Peterson, director of destination experience & itinerary planning, who creates just these sorts of opportunities for Windstar travelers. “We allow you to visit places that are not easy to visit on a cruise like Angkor Wat, Cappadocia, Lake Como, Chang Mai, even Madrid.”
For instance, he says, on trips to Tahiti, “everybody wants to do overwater bungalow.” It’s a popular pre- or post-cruise option where “we deal with all the logistics, transporting you between Papeete and Bora Bora to the Hilton Conrad (a featured location on The Golden Bachelorette’s Windstar series). Because most travelers want the overwater bungalow experience, we don’t throw in a lot of activities, though the hotel can arrange them. Our guests tell us that, since you are combining this with a cruise – which has all the activities – it’s a nice way to have a different experience.”
In other cases, cruise tours to places like Angkor Wat, Kyoto and Chang Mai are filled with extensive touring experiences.
What do you need to know about a pre- or post-cruise land tour? Here are three key essentials.
We do all the work
Windstar’s in-house team scouts and curates the experiences. “We do a lot of work to keep them to the Windstar standard and make sure hotels are of the equivalent caliber,” Peterson tells us. “It’s critical to ensure the same quality that travelers expect from a Windstar cruise.”
Friendships
Everyone on your tour has one thing in common,” he says. “They’re meeting other like-minded guests who are drawn to Windstar’s style of travel. And they’re traveling with a small group.”
Easing travel planning and possible challenges
Windstar’s most popular cruise tours, Peterson says, are its Asian adventures. “When you’re heading to a region that’s far flung and has a potential language barrier, it’s nice to know you’re taken care of.”
Editor’s Note: For more information on Windstar’s Cruise Tour options and destinations, check out our page here.
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