Costing out a cruise vacaton

[paulred]

I have learned so many good tips on cruise Critic, so I am paying back by giving some things that I have learned.

 

REPOSITIONING CRUISES: The greatest cruise bargain.

 

Cruise lines need to reposition ships from their summer crusing grounds to their winter crusing markets. So ships that cruise the Mediterranean, Northen Europe, Alaska, Atlantic Canada and the Orient, will set off for the Carribbean, South America, The Mexican Riviera and the South Pacific. They don't go empty.

 

These usually happen in early spring and the reverse in late fall. They don't appeal to a lot of people. Families with school aged children and education workers never have the time off. Some folks don't like a week or more at sea. Air fare, being one way, is more expensive. This translates into rates so good you can get a balcony cabin for less than $100 per night PP.

 

I discovered these cruises by accident. I saw an ad for Carnival Freedom. What caught my eye was the price - $899 for 14 days! I didn't even care where it was going, the value looked amazing. Then I found it went from Florida to Rome. I soon found a dozen others that went from Florida or South America to the Med or Northern Europe. Most were at savings of over 50% off the same length of ordinary cruising.

 

My DW and I had been discussing plans for our 40th anniversary. A cruise was one option. Going to Europe, either Italy or Austria also sounded good. Going to Italy by cruise was just icing on the cake, and that was before I figured out the costing.

 

Airfare from Toronto to Rome was costing out at about $3000. Zoom Airlines had a great deal for about $600, but good things never last, and they Zoomed away last summer. Later, I found other options, but thats another tale.

 

We got a balcony on Solstice for $1600, with an OBC for the gratuities tossed in. We booked early because it was fully refundable up to Feb 1, 2009. We have no early booking remorse because the price of this cruise has actually gone way up since then.

 

I searched air fares for 6 months and finally snagged an Air Canada seat sale, Toronto to Ft. Lauderdale for $165.CDN. It was cheaper than flying from Buffalo after the exchange is factored in.

 

Rome to Toronto was a problem, because Zoom no long was flying. But then, I discovered that flying through London made it so much cheaper. Its all about competition. Rome to Toronto, not a lot of choices. Rome to London - $100. (and on British Air no less). There are about 20 airlines that fly this route, so competition keeps the price down. (tip - look at the extras, bag fees, taxes etc before you book and get the real comparative price)

London to Toronto on Air Transat is $350CDN (209 british pounds) There are also good deals London to New York, and of course from there back to any US city.

 

At those savings you could afford a few days in London and still come out ahead. In our case, we have friends near Gatwick, so we have some catching up to do with them.

 

If you add it up, we are getting the cruise, including the meals and entertainment, plus the airfare to and from, for less than the average cost of airfare to and from Rome. Such a deal.

 

I hope this gives you ideas for your next vacation.

 

Paul

 

p.s I also went around the world for about 1/2 price.. but that's another story

[cb at sea]

They are a great value, if you can get the airfare at a really cheap price. If you have to pay "one way" fares, tho, it can really rack up the cost!

[firefly333]

I know someone who did open airfares, where they have up to a year or two years to use the return leg of the flight. So they book the ta in the fall to match the spring ta and use the backwards open leg of the airfare they booked.

 

Not real clear how to do this, so it might not be the right terms. They said they did real well airfare wise.

[momofmeg]

I know someone who did open airfares, where they have up to a year or two years to use the return leg of the flight. So they book the ta in the fall to match the spring ta and use the backwards open leg of the airfare they booked.

 

Not real clear how to do this, so it might not be the right terms. They said they did real well airfare wise.

 

I know Kewlguy would do that-an dhe would do TA's in the spring and again in the fall-but he has posted that the "rules" have changed and now those tickets are much more expensive-so now it is not the "deal" it was.

 

We booked a TA last year4 for our 25th. we got a mid ship balcony on deck 6 for $2350 TOTAL for 2 people. We used our skymiles and so it cost us $25 (booking fee) to fly from Atlanta to London-LOL!

 

Now we spent 3 days precruise in England and we also booked nicer excursions-it cost us $300 to see Stonehenge and Bath during a precruise stay in England; and it cost us $350 to go to Versailles from our la Havre port. Our hotel in England ran us $200 a night. One simple lunch in England at a coffee shop type place-nothing special-where we had soup, a half sandwich, coffee and pie; cost us over $50 in US money-LOL! after that meal I stopped "computing" and doing the exchange rate-I did not want to know anymore and I pretended the pounds were dollars-LOL! I knew we had the money saved to pay for it-so I did not want to obsess about how it would have been much less at home.

 

So, all together we spent around $5000 total for that trip -but we were away from home 16 days. I did not think that was bad and as we had budgeted much more, we had decided since this was our 25th we wanted to be able to buy and do what we wanted.

 

This past spring with the money left over, that we had saved for that trip, we booked a 6 night special on the Westerdam. That cruise was also a super price-simply because the ship repositioned the next week and we lost one port from the normal cruise itinerary.

 

Anyway-long story short-we loved the TA-and we hope to do one again-even if the airfare will be more expensive. We know it will be worth it.