Coming to this conversation a bit late. On our Vancouver to Singapore cruise on Mariner this fall, we found the tour desk to be vastly improved. Most of the tours were well run. The information about them and the knowledge of the tour desk was much better than on our previous Regent cruises.

On the Alaska portion of the cruise, we chose many of the paid excursions. They were definitely subsidized, providing a bargain to us. Once we reached Asia, most of the excursions we took were the free ones. Sometimes the buses were crowded but some of that involved traveling in third world countries where infrastructure is not as sophisticated.

However, by the end of 52 days (actually by the time we reached Hong Kong), we had used up our tolerance for bus excursions. Next time, we'll be making more of our own arrangements. It's not a reflection on Regent or the tour desk but more an indication of our changing travel preferences.

If free excursions were eliminated, I doubt that it would result in much of a fare decrease from Regent.