New England cruises
 

I'd like to hear from anyone who's been on a New England cruise. Did you get to see very much of New England (or Canada)? What were your favorite ports of call? Any chance of seeing whales from a cruise ship or taking a whale watching tour on a day off the cruise ship? What cruise lines do you recommend? Any other general advice? Ou party would include Mom and Dad, Grandma (that's me) and a four-year-old.
step_saver

Whales are usually not seen. And the whale watch tours are not as good as going out of Gloucester or Cape Cod. I live here and travel by land everywhere, so makes a difference. Bar Harbor is very nice, and Boston is historic, the Duck tour is fantastic. :) Nova Scotia and New Brunswich also excellent. Consider at least 7 days.

Don't know if we'll have time to do seven days, but we'll make sure the ports you mentioned are on our tour.
We'll definitely keep in mind the Duck tour for Boston.
Thanks for the suggestion.

Hello Step_Saver- A few years ago we took a 10-day cruise on Royal Caribbean r/t Boston. It was fabulous!!
We have gone on many whale watching tours, but the one out of Bar Harbor was the best experience!! A mother and her teenager (humpback as I remember) played around the boat for almost an hour before we had to head back to the ship. It was amazing. That was the first part of October and we were told it was late for whale watching.
In Quebec City we did 2 excursions off the ship, the city tour in the AM and the countryside tour in the afternoon. Both were wonderful.
In Halifax we took a tour out to Peggy's Cove. It was beautiful, but it takes awhile to get there and back.
St. John, NB was one of my favorite ports. Our excursion included the Reversing Falls and St. Martins where we saw the Sea Caves and had a lovely lunch. Such friendly people!!
We spent two days in Boston precruise. I had booked a fall foliage tour with Grayline that was very good although too early for real color. The next day we took the Bean Town Trolley for hop on hop off touring.
Of course we didn't have a four year old and I'm sure you won't want to travel on a bus for long periods of time.
My grown daughter and I are cruising out of NYC this October on a 6-day New England/Canada cruise. I can't wait! And the Duck tour in Boston is on our to do list!

BudgetQueen....What exactly is the "duck"tour? Is it those ducks that live in the upscale hotel? Just wondering....

Hope this is at least partly on the subject, but is whale watching out of Boston seasonal? I know the whale watching tours run year-round, but someone told me not to bother in July, because there will be no whales at that time.

Thanks, panamaguy, for your terrific enthusiastic and informative report on your cruise. Just the kind of things I wanted to hear about.
Did you arrange your sight-seeing tours through the cruise line or did you do that independently?
We have been dilly-dallying in making final plans, but we probably would be going in late September or October.
I'm sure you and your daughter have a wonderful trip.

Seaslife, I know just a little about duck tours because they have them in Phila and DC. The "ducks" are amphibious vehicles (I believe war surplus), and the tours are partly on land and partly in water. (Sometimes they come with honking sound effects, or maybe those are just souvenirs kids enjoy using to annoy other tourists.)
You can google Boston duck tours, as I did, thanks to Budget Queen. Looks like a wonderful way to see Boston.

Oops, panamaguy. Sounds like I don't speak the English language. Meant to say
"I'm sure you and your daughter will have a wonderful trip." There was a thunderstorm coming, and I signed off in a hurry.