Overall Cost

[doublesided]

I know you said you haven't gotten to drinks yet, but for your future planning: we really under-estimated the cost of alcoholic beverages on board and almost immediately wrecked our budget with the soft cooler + beer special that was offered upon embarkation. (The cooler is awesome though!). Didn't really ruin the trip, per se, but since DH had a surprise dinner at V&A planned for after the cruise , I know he was a little nervous about how much we spent right off the bat. In the future, we will never embark without our allotment of carried-on alcohol because nothing ruins the magic for us quite like having to spend $7 for a domestic beer! haha. So if that's your jam, maybe budget for a stop at a liquor store at some point in time between the airport and the terminal?

What is the deal with the soft cooler/beer special? How much is it and what does it include? Thanks.

 

[littledebbie335]

What is the deal with the soft cooler/beer special? How much is it and what does it include? Thanks.

We cruised in May 2018, so some of this information may be a little off. Hopefully more recent cruisers can correct me!

When you board on embarkation day, the bartenders on deck will offer you the special. Basically, you can preorder beer (I believe in 12 or 24 packs) to be delivered to your stateroom in a souvenir soft cooler filled with ice. The price was slightly lower than buying the beers individually (I think it was around $6/beer). Options were somewhat limited but included basic domestics or some "fancier" beer like Blue Moon for a slight upcharge. We were able to mix 6 of one type and 6 of another. Our cooler of cold beer was waiting for us in our stateroom once staterooms were ready, and it allowed us to enjoy a cold beer (or two) on our verandah as we sailed away, which was really nice.

The bag includes a bottle opener keychain. One of the nice things was that all the beer came in aluminum bottles, which made it beach friendly for our Castaway Cay day.

I don't have a picture of the bag handy, but if you're looking on Google, it's a khaki colored bag with blue trim.

 

[cadien]

When we disembarked on Castaway Cay, they were selling the coolers on the dock too. I think they had both beer and water options.

 

[cgolf]

When we disembarked on Castaway Cay, they were selling the coolers on the dock too. I think they had both beer and water options.

Have they finally offered ciders for gluten free folks? Was bummed when they allowed beer to be brought on but ciders were disallowed, which is essentially a gluten free drinkers version of craft beers.

 

[dcassetta]

Have they finally offered ciders for gluten free folks? Was bummed when they allowed beer to be brought on but ciders were disallowed, which is essentially a gluten free drinkers version of craft beers.

I have not yet seen canned or bottled cider, just draft.

 

[cgolf]

I have not yet seen canned or bottled cider, just draft.

So you can at least get cider onboard. If my memory is right, there wasn't any onboard in 2016, draft or bottle. So one could do the big mug, if they still do that, and have cider during the cruise?

 

[dcassetta]

So you can at least get cider onboard. If my memory is right, there wasn't any onboard in 2016, draft or bottle. So one could do the big mug, if they still do that, and have cider during the cruise?

I do not know if it is available in all the bars, but O'Gills (or 687, Crown & Fin) all have Angry Orchard, and maybe one other. People have commented that the beer mug works for cider, but I have never done a beer mug, so have no firsthand knowledge.

 

[RedSox68]

Boarding the dog?

UGH -- I always forget to include that in my budget at first. Sometimes that can cost as much as your trip

 

[YawningDodo]

Re: trip insurance, if you're booking on a credit card it's worth checking whether you have any kind of travel insurance built in on the purchase. If not (or if you read the terms and find it's not sufficient), it's not terribly difficult to shop for a separate travel insurance policy online (though I forgot the name of the website I used for comparisons last year). I figure it's worth it with how much I'm paying; you'll want to check and see whether it covers things like missing the ship due to flight delays (that's the big one that scares me).

UGH -- I always forget to include that in my budget at first. Sometimes that can cost as much as your trip

Hrf, yeah. Pet boarding basically doubles the price of all our local weekend getaway trips. It doesn't feel like quite as big of a hit on a cruise, where there are far bigger expenses to make it look smaller, but man....

 

[Ladybugx87]

Btw, you no longer need cash for room service tips. Now you can write their tips in On the order slip.

Thanks for sharing this! I had been hoarding $1 bills any time I actually used cash in preparation for this summer - glad to know I can stop that for room service purposes.

 

[RedSox68]

Btw, you no longer need cash for room service tips. Now you can write their tips on the order slip.

As far back as I can remember, you always could write the tip on the room service slip -- but I just love handing them cash and seeing how happy it makes them. We never put our tips on the charge card at restaurants either - we always like handing the waitress the tip personally.

 

[Cruising Engineer]

As far back as I can remember, you always could write the tip on the room service slip -- but I just love handing them cash and seeing how happy it makes them. We never put our tips on the charge card at restaurants either - we always like handing the waitress the tip personally.

We do the same thing, cash money. A friend of mine told me, when she waited tables she loved cash tips. She was automatically charged 8% of the total check as "tip" for income tax purposes no matter if she got one or was stiffed. If she got a tip with the CC, the whole tip was included as income. So if she was given a 20% tip in cash, the 8% kicked in as she kept the rest. If you server is really, really good, give them cash and they can keep more of it.

 

[RedSox68]

We do the same thing, cash money. A friend of mine told me, when she waited tables she loved cash tips. She was automatically charged 8% of the total check as "tip" for income tax purposes no matter if she got one or was stiffed. If she got a tip with the CC, the whole tip was included as income. So if she was given a 20% tip in cash, the 8% kicked in as she kept the rest. If you server is really, really good, give them cash and they can keep more of it.

That -- and the fact that at several local places we eat, we know for a fact that the tips are taken off the table by other guests (seen it and reported it) and by the busboys. I know a lot of times they have to kick in a percentage of their tips for the crew, but I'd rather have them do that on their terms rather than have someone take it out from under them and have them think we didn't tip!

 

[diznymom]

Food for the day before and the day after the cruise.
Gas money to get home.
Double your allowance for souvenirs.
Tips for room service -- cash. We have never received a slip to sign.
Chargeable snacks - like popcorn, canned soda, candy, specialty coffees

 

[RedSox68]

Food for the day before and the day after the cruise.
Gas money to get home.
Double your allowance for souvenirs.
Tips for room service -- cash. We have never received a slip to sign.
Chargeable snacks - like popcorn, canned soda, candy, specialty coffees

Just love the fact that they (finally) have fresh popped popcorn.

 

[lilmc]

Souvenirs and pins add up for us stupidly fast (everyone seems to find a new hoodie and a new T-shirt that they need and then there’s the cute stuff at Castaway Cay that is different and they need that TOO and not INSTEAD)

I’m a wuss and only like stupidly weak and fruity drinks, so alcohol isn’t a big one for us as I stick with the cheaper Drink of the Day options.

The photo package can (and should because of the discount) be bought ahead of time. It can be cancelled before the last night if you don’t think you’ve gotten enough pics to make it worth it. We seek out photo ops and have some of best family pics we’ve ever taken.

My hubby brings VIA Starbucks packs so we don’t do specialty coffee. I’m addicted to Trader Joe’s Kettle Corn, so we also bring our own