Cruise paying for your hotel, CA to FL?

[CruiseIsGood]

I'm flying from California to Miami for a cruise and wanted the cruise line to take care of the flight, so I told my travel agent (very experienced with cruising and hosts cruises quite a lot) that I wanted to fly in a day early. He said the cruise line would automatically do that and pay for my hotel, and shuttle me from the airport to the hotel then to the pier.

 

Does anyone have experience with this? For the full price he quoted for cruise line air, if that includes hotel it's a pretty good deal, especially since I'm travelling solo and don't want to worry about dealing with all the transportation details.

[mjt2890]

Never heard of that, but with them being a TA I can seem them doing that kinda stuff frequently.

[packandgo]

We are flying in from the Bay Area in January and we chose the cruise air since the cruise line included in the cost of airfare our stay at the Hyatt Regebcy in Miami the night prior to the cruise and all the transfers from the airport, to the hotel, to the pier, and back to the airport after the cruise. It is a very good deal because if I had of even gotten cheaper air fare on my own, after you add in the hotel and transfers cost, it would have been more expensive.

[CruiseIsGood]

From my current calculations that's the case too, cheaper. So I'm wondering why everyone does their own? Is it lack of control of the flights and hotel you stay at? Right now I don't know my flight times or hotel, but I'm thinking as long as I get there the night before, I really don't care.

[wrp96]

Lack of control is one reason.

 

Also, some people assume that cruise air is automatically more expensive so they don't even bother to check the price.

 

Plus some cruiselines will not pay for your hotel even if they have to fly you in a day ahead of time due to flight schedules (Carnival apparently is one if I've been reading the post on their board correctly the last week).

[Hollyhawk]

The ONLY time we took the cruise air package RCCL flew us in on the red-eye from Oakland Ca. to Miami. We got to the airport at 1: 00 am day of cruise. No one to meet us. We had to call the hotel; wait half an hour for the shuttle, get to the Marriott no room service at this time. It sucked, I was tired and hungry in the morning, only to have an early wake up and be herded like cattle to a bus.

 

Not a nice way to start a cruise!

[lindanick]

This might not always be true. The cruise lines can easily put you on the red eyes out of CA. Your would arrive in Ft. Lauderdale or Miami at 800am the day of the cruise. This is not good.

 

Linda

[LHT28]

what cruiseline gives you a hotel room for free ?

 

The only time we had a free hotel was with Orientlines all the other we paid extra for the hotel if we went the night before.

[packandgo]

what cruiseline gives you a hotel room for free ?

 

The only time we had a free hotel was with Orientlines all the other we paid extra for the hotel if we went the night before.

 

Royal Carribean.

[packandgo]

Also, I think they mainly just include the pre-cruise hotel when you are flying in coast to coast as we are from Calif., Oregon, Washington, and Alaska because you are talking about a 5-6 hour flight (even longer if you have to make connections and change planes), plus there is a 3-hour difference in time from the west coast to the east coast. Therefore, it would almost be impossible to be on the ship by sailing time if you flew in the same day. Also, there usually are no red-eye's flying in from our area.

[caribbean dreams]

 

Plus some cruiselines will not pay for your hotel even if they have to fly you in a day ahead of time due to flight schedules (Carnival apparently is one if I've been reading the post on their board correctly the last week).

 

Last year We were offered the cruise air through Carnival and it did include an overnight hotel say in San Juan. (flew from California)

 

We chose not to take the offer, after checking out flights and hotels we found for our group of 5, 2 hotel rooms in Old San Juan and air, it would only cost us $2087 total (flight $359 ea. $244 2 hotel rooms, $48 taxi to and from)

carnival wanted $600pp extra for the package which totaled $3000. so we saved $913 booking everything ourselves.

[packandgo]

With RCI I think they just include the hotel with fights from the west coast to Florida only. As a matter of fact I booked a cruise next year leaving from Bayonne New Jersey and I checked with cruise air to see if they would include a pre-night stay and they stated it did not and we would have to book and pay for the hotel separately. We are flying in to Boston next month and still not offered to include the hotel cost. Both of these destinations are on the east coast. Maybe since most of their cruises originated from the Florida area in the early years, maybe they have contracts with these hotels to include the hotel stay with your airfare Therefore, on these cruises we booked the airfare independently/