Our cruise ship will be in Naples on Nov 11/07 and our family group of 11 is planning to visit Herculaneum in the morning. Since Nov is off season, will all the houses at the Herculaneum site be available for public viewing? Would an audio guide be adequate OR should we hire a licensed guide in advance who will ensure that the "must see" houses will be available for our viewing on Nov 11?

Any suggestions as to how we can optimize our visit of Herculaneum?

Herculaneum is much smaller than Pompeii, and easily "doable" in 2-3 hours.

We found the audio guide to be very good, but if you need 11 of them, it might be cheaper to hire a personal guide (I have no experience of such and so cannot help with recommendations)

Thanks.

What I am worried more is if some of the houses are closed to the public during off season. To view them, you have to make reservation in advance.

Any info on this one from other forum members?

http://www2.pompeiisites.org/databas...A?OpenDocument
This might help. Note the last admission is at 3:30pm Nov - March

Thanks