Ms

[Stephenwillcruise]

Hi,  considering a cruise with NCL in 2024 for a big birthday. As a previous cruiser the £200 each extra for the drinks package, Wi-Fi, £50 per port off excursions and two meals in premium restaurants sounds like a good deal. I don’t drink booze, partner is a light drinker. Grateful for any comments on this . 
Thanks

Shirley

[cruiserbear55]

37 minutes ago, Stephenwillcruise said:

Hi,  considering a cruise with NCL in 2024 for a big birthday. As a previous cruiser the £200 each extra for the drinks package, Wi-Fi, £50 per port off excursions and two meals in premium restaurants sounds like a good deal. I don’t drink booze, partner is a light drinker. Grateful for any comments on this . 
Thanks

Shirley

   What kind of comments were you looking for?

[jkrislc]

Keep in mind that the drink package includes sodas and non-alcoholic cocktails, so if you enjoy those then it could make sense to still get the package. It only takes about 2 alcoholic drinks or 4 non-alcoholic cocktails. We really struggled with whether or not to get the package as we aren't big drinkers, but with a couple of sodas per day and a couple of non-alcoholic cocktails for dessert, it made sense for us. 

[geleisen]

200 extra means it is about 10ish day cruise?
Do you drink fizzy drinks? The fizzy drink package is about 10 USD per day, so about 100 USD. If you reject the free at sea, you can either take a dining package or skip the dining. If you want the dining, the 2 meal package would cost approximately 107 USD. So just with the specialty meals and the fizzy drinks, you are already at £164. 
If you would take wifi, that costs around 100 quid. 
Though the quickest way to make that money worthwhile is if you plan on taking excursions. So if it is 10 day, let's say there are 7 ports. And if you take the full advantage of the 50 USD at all 7 ports, then that is 350 USD off. 
That is about £280. So for the 400 you pay, you are already getting 280 if you use these credits. 

So I would say consider which of these benefits you would or wouldn't take advantage of if you didn't take the package. 
And if your light drinking partner even has maybe 1 10 USD drink every 2 days, that is another 50 USD. (40 quid)

Now, most of the threads on this topic focus on the US free at sea option, where they can pick and choose and have only the wifi and 50 USD credit and not pay any extra. Since UK bookings don't have that choice, you need to weigh the value of the entire package, so even if the US formula would not make sense for you to pay for the drinks package, in the UK formula, it might make sense for you to take the Free At Sea as a whole, and personally, I think that in most cases, it would. 

[Stephenwillcruise]

10 hours ago, jkrislc said:

Keep in mind that the drink package includes sodas and non-alcoholic cocktails, so if you enjoy those then it could make sense to still get the package. It only takes about 2 alcoholic drinks or 4 non-alcoholic cocktails. We really struggled with whether or not to get the package as we aren't big drinkers, but with a couple of sodas per day and a couple of non-alcoholic cocktails for dessert, it made sense for us. 

Hey, thanks, very helpful. I might be inclined to try some non alcoholic cocktails while on holiday.

[Stephenwillcruise]

2 hours ago, geleisen said:

200 extra means it is about 10ish day cruise?
Do you drink fizzy drinks? The fizzy drink package is about 10 USD per day, so about 100 USD. If you reject the free at sea, you can either take a dining package or skip the dining. If you want the dining, the 2 meal package would cost approximately 107 USD. So just with the specialty meals and the fizzy drinks, you are already at £164. 
If you would take wifi, that costs around 100 quid. 
Though the quickest way to make that money worthwhile is if you plan on taking excursions. So if it is 10 day, let's say there are 7 ports. And if you take the full advantage of the 50 USD at all 7 ports, then that is 350 USD off. 
That is about £280. So for the 400 you pay, you are already getting 280 if you use these credits. 

So I would say consider which of these benefits you would or wouldn't take advantage of if you didn't take the package. 
And if your light drinking partner even has maybe 1 10 USD drink every 2 days, that is another 50 USD. (40 quid)

Now, most of the threads on this topic focus on the US free at sea option, where they can pick and choose and have only the wifi and 50 USD credit and not pay any extra. Since UK bookings don't have that choice, you need to weigh the value of the entire package, so even if the US formula would not make sense for you to pay for the drinks package, in the UK formula, it might make sense for you to take the Free At Sea as a whole, and personally, I think that in most cases, it would. 

Thanks for your reply, I think looking at it, it could well be worth it. I can't get info on excursions at the moment but this years ones didn't in most case rock my boat 🙂 We'd most likely make use of the speciality dining and the wifi. My partner likes to try new drinks without having to buy a bottle, so that will get a little use. 

 

[thedarklord]

58 minutes ago, Stephenwillcruise said:

My partner likes to try new drinks without having to buy a bottle, so that will get a little use.

 I think that's an underrated benefit of the drinks package - there are alwyays some drinks I'd like to try but don't want to waste money on if I hate them. Like Aperol - everyone raves about it it seems. Tried it on the drinks package, hated it, saved me buying a full bottle only to have it live in the cupboard undrunk for the next 20 years.

[Stephenwillcruise]

1 hour ago, thedarklord said:

 I think that's an underrated benefit of the drinks package - there are alwyays some drinks I'd like to try but don't want to waste money on if I hate them. Like Aperol - everyone raves about it it seems. Tried it on the drinks package, hated it, saved me buying a full bottle only to have it live in the cupboard undrunk for the next 20 years.

Yeah, exactly 🙂 It's actually quite cheap compared to the cruises i've done in the past . I can remember paying £800 for 2 people for just a drinks package.