Cruise lines providing expensive flights?

[Velvetwater]

I think if you are booking a round and return flight you will find deals cheaper than the cruiseline but if your flight arrangements are different with flying to one airport then having to return from another booking on your own is expensive.

 

We are booked on a panama canal cruise with Carnival that starts in Tampa and ends in LA, to book those flights ourselves it would be £1,450 pp ($2100) but to book with Carnival it costs us £1050 pp ($1500) so a huge saving.

 

The downside is we cant book their priority boarding program as weve booked flights with them...which does not make sense.

[Nebr.cruiser]

Of course, anyone flying from the UK to almost anywhere gets hit by the large departing flight tax (I believe referred to as ADP or APD) which depends on the distance travelled - which drives clever travelers to cross to France or Ireland to catch their long distance flight. So, in addition to being forced to pay higher cruise fares, their government adds that additional burden, making it almost twice as expensive for a Brit to cruise as for a US resident.

 

We actually avoid traveling through Heathrow, for instance, because of this tax. We normally use FF miles, so it's definitely worth it to fly into or out of somewhere else. The last one-way I tried to book that went through Heathrow had over $700 in taxes!

 

From where we are, it's incredibly difficult to find flights that don't make a stop in Heathrow, except, possibly, in the summer months, for almost anywhere in Europe.

[Happy ks]

It's been years since we purchased cruise/air. Our first cruise was before they had Choice Air, EZ Air or other cruise line programs. At that time, we had a red eye flight outbound, torture. The first 2 days of the trip were really hard since we all had to catch up on sleep. So much for 3 days at Disney World. Plus, we were not seated together, they split us up from our kids, 6 and 9 at the time, that was astonishing. Some very nice strangers agreed to change seats so I could be close to them, my husband was about 5 rows ahead of us. Our 9 year old son was in the row behind me, at least I got to sit next to my (very shy) 6 year old daughter. It did not make for good memories, the seating arrangements were this way both directions. The flight home was at 4pm, yes we had transfers from the ship…we sat at the airport from 10 am to 4 pm.

 

I always check the cruise lines airfare to compare. This next cruise, purchasing our own air was $150 less per person for the same flight.

 

There have been times when the the cruise line comes close, and there is the fact that many times it includes transfers. But I think it is a better personal choice for us to have more control over seat assignment, ground transportation, etc… We always fly in the day prior to a cruise and we like to stay over a day or two if we can.

Edited March 15, 2014 by Happy ks