These last minute cruise prices are insane!

[P.A.]

I thought there was last minute deals but I guess not these days. $4000 for inside passage to Alaska. Wow!! 😝

[nycruiser80]

Demand is very high for cruises and travel in general. Since demand is high that will drive prices up. 

[Boku]

Now that Princess guarantee early booking prices be the cheapest there isn’t a lot they can do on the actual fare.

[Roz]

When I retired, I was looking forward to taking advantage of last minute discounted fares.  With rare exceptions, they don't exist on any line. 

[cruzsnooze]

Alaska is a popular cruise and usually sails full. 

[Moondogy]

Plus the new prices include tax and port charges where in the past it was added on when booked.

[dockman]

A quick look at one of the big online sellers shows quite a few 7 day alaska cruises from about $700 up in september 2024...lot on NCL with a few on other lines.  So there are still sep bargains avail with a bit of searching...and as said prices now include port taxes...don't expect perfect weather in late sep.

[wolfie11]

1 hour ago, Roz said:

When I retired, I was looking forward to taking advantage of last minute discounted fares.  With rare exceptions, they don't exist on any line. 

The discounted fares have always been a way to fill the ship so as many people as possible are on board.  Based on my experience from my last few cruises, the cruise lines are now using casino comps to fill the ships rather than potential last minute passengers.

[sunviking90]

This is the first year in a long time that Alaska is virtually sold out. We live locally and always watch for the last minute deals. Having said that, usually by mid August, there is very little left. June is the time to be finding the clearance prices on Alaska. We saw B2B on the Grand 14 days back in early June for July 31 sailing for $700 Canadian plus about $600 port inside cabin. Thought about it over night and it was gone. 
We did find one for late August on HAL 14 days for a great price that we booked late June.
In general the best deals are always the one ways from Vancouver to Whittier or reverse, because they require flights. Celebrity still had a few of these available recently, but not any to match up for B2B.

[Cruisemeister2002]

Don't know if it's cheaper booking early rather than late. I booked our next cruise around a year ago and saved £1300 or $1670 on the last prices available as the ship is now sold out. I also booked four excursions when they came out. If I booked them now it's $120 more. So a total saving of $1790.

[geoherb]

2 hours ago, Boku said:

Now that Princess guarantee early booking prices be the cheapest there isn’t a lot they can do on the actual fare.

 

The best price guarantee doesn't apply to any sale prices after the final payment date. For instance, you can sail on a 16-day cruise for $849, which includes taxes and port fees.

[memoak]

When ships are sailing 95% full you are not going to see and last minute deals. There is no incentive to the line

[JF - retired RRT]

1 hour ago, dockman said:

A quick look at one of the big online sellers shows quite a few 7 day alaska cruises from about $700 up in September 2024...lot on NCL with a few on other lines.  So there are still sep bargains avail with a bit of searching...and as said prices now include port taxes...don't expect perfect weather in late sep.

We went to AK in Sept. and would never do that again. It was cold, rainy, windy, overcast. We saw 2 eagles, tons of DEAD salmon and a couple of seals. Bigly disappointed.

[dockman]

28 minutes ago, JF - retired RRT said:

We went to AK in Sept. and would never do that again. It was cold, rainy, windy, overcast. We saw 2 eagles, tons of DEAD salmon and a couple of seals. Bigly disappointed.

To be fair i went to alaska this year july 6 to 20...from about july 9 to 18 the weather was absolutely horrible with wind rain cold and fog....speaker on board said it was worst july weather she had seen in 15 years ...sept u expect some bad weather but not so much in july...reminder that alaska weather offers no gurantees....

[billco]

35 minutes ago, JF - retired RRT said:

We went to AK in Sept. and would never do that again. It was cold, rainy, windy, overcast. We saw 2 eagles, tons of DEAD salmon and a couple of seals. Bigly disappointed.

These are from our Alaska cruise on the NCL Encore in October 2022. Had a great time despite some rainy weather. Looking forward to our upcoming Alaska cruise on the Discovery Princess from Seattle to Vancouver in September followed by a transpacific cruise on the HAL Noordam from Vancouver to Tokyo.

 

[memoak]

53 minutes ago, JF - retired RRT said:

We went to AK in Sept. and would never do that again. It was cold, rainy, windy, overcast. We saw 2 eagles, tons of DEAD salmon and a couple of seals. Bigly disappointed.

Rain in Alaska ?  Heaven forbid

[555]

4 hours ago, Roz said:

When I retired, I was looking forward to taking advantage of last minute discounted fares.  With rare exceptions, they don't exist on any line. 

It seems that all the cruise lines are sold out pretty much on every trip lately. It might be a long time before we see the fire sales of years ago. 

[voljeep]

11 minutes ago, 555 said:

It seems that all the cruise lines are sold out pretty much on every trip lately. It might be a long time before we see the fire sales of years ago. 

it will be interesting to see how the CB sells out of Port Canaveral.  6 and 8 day cruises to the same cookie cutter Caribbean destinations as Port Everglades.  Maybe the Villages is the target market??

 

the newest MEGA cruise ships are doing the 3-4 day weekend, weekday cruises...

[555]

2 hours ago, voljeep said:

it will be interesting to see how the CB sells out of Port Canaveral.  6 and 8 day cruises to the same cookie cutter Caribbean destinations as Port Everglades.  Maybe the Villages is the target market??

 

the newest MEGA cruise ships are doing the 3-4 day weekend, weekday cruises...

We always drive to Ft Lauderdale and wouldn't consider Port Canaveral, especially for the CB which I dislike anyway. 

 

[Thrak]

9 hours ago, Roz said:

When I retired, I was looking forward to taking advantage of last minute discounted fares.  With rare exceptions, they don't exist on any line. 

 

When we retired we had "thought" we would take advantage of some of the crazy low "drop and go" prices. Instead, we just continued booking early and watching the prices go up an up and up and, near the end, the "drop and go" prices were higher than we had paid by booking early.

[P.A.]

Thanks for all the responses. I'm disappointed. Maybe I should look for next year. I was just hoping to escape this Oklahoma summer heat!

[Thrak]

5 hours ago, voljeep said:

it will be interesting to see how the CB sells out of Port Canaveral.  6 and 8 day cruises to the same cookie cutter Caribbean destinations as Port Everglades.  Maybe the Villages is the target market??

 

the newest MEGA cruise ships are doing the 3-4 day weekend, weekday cruises...

 

6 and 8 day cruises are crazy short. I can't even imagine doing  3 to 4 day cruises. Anything less than 10 days seems like a lot of fuss for very little return.

 

Full disclosure: We did a 4 day to Vancouver and a 4 day to Catalina Island when I was working as they were the only things that would fit with my wife's work schedule and my work schedule at the same time. Waaaaaaaaay too short. We also booked a 7 day coastal once but it connected as a side to side with a 19 day so that wasn't bad.

[jlawrence01]

16 hours ago, P.A. said:

I thought there was last minute deals but I guess not these days. $4000 for inside passage to Alaska. Wow!! 😝

 

There were tons of GREAT deals available in May 2024 within 2-3 weeks of sailing.  There were several opportunities for Vancouver - Whittier-Vancouver round trips for $500 + fees and taxes on both Celebrity and NCL.  Unfortunately, we could not sail in May due to medical reasons.

 

There were some deals for September cruises throughout June.  However, those dried up around the July 4th Holiday. 

[Globaler]

17 hours ago, P.A. said:

Thanks for all the responses. I'm disappointed. Maybe I should look for next year. I was just hoping to escape this Oklahoma summer heat!

If you gamble at all - save it for your cruise. Get great discounts going forward!

[ldubs]

On 8/13/2024 at 8:53 AM, memoak said:

When ships are sailing 95% full you are not going to see and last minute deals. There is no incentive to the line

 

I'm missing some obvious thing here.  How would having 100 or more additional customers not be of any value?