New Cruiser - Hidden Costs of Cruising?

[breemonkey]

Hi Everyone!
I am going on my first cruise on the Legend in June for my honeymoon. My fiancee and I are trying to figure out how to budget our money. We would like to spend most of it doing some really cool excursions. We're not interested in shopping, gambling, purchasing alcohol, etc. My question is, are there any hidden costs we might not know about? We know about the gratuity added and we think that it is a fair amount. Do we need to tip anyone else? If we order roomservice do we need to tip separately?
Thanks for your help!

 

[Cruise4Fun]

I personally have only been on three cruises but I have allways made it a point to tip the room steward at the beginning and anytime we ordered room service I would tip them for every delivery, I even made sure the kids had plenty of ones to tip for room service. Just the way I do it, those people work hard on the ship and I just want them to know that I appreciate all they do for me.

 

[Cruzman]

It is customary to tip a dollar or two each time you request room service. A 15% gratuity for alcohol and soda is automatically added at the time of purchase. Spa services are at an additional charge, as are specialty coffees (except in the dining room on Carnival). There is also an additional charge to dine in the alternative dining room.

 

[Irish Girl]

Since everything is added to your Sign and Sail card, you have to be very careful. You will want to buy pictures since it's your first cruise. These are about $22 for one picture. They take pictures all the time, every night, during the day, etc., so be prepared to only buy the special ones.

Drinks can be expensive too, costing about $7.95 for the drink of the day in the souvenir glass. Refills are a little cheaper somewhere around $5.05 each. If you get the smaller drinks in a regular glass, they cost about $3.95.

Bingo is expensive at $10 a card. Alternative restaurant is $30 per person, but is nice to do at least once. You can only get 1 entree in the alternative dining room. The regular dining room food is very good with lots of selections and you can get as much as you want. If you want 2 entrees and 5 desserts, you can have it just for the asking.

Tips are $10 per day per person and will be added to your Sign and Sail card the first day.

Shore excursions can really rack up the bill. If you book independently and not use the cruise line, it can save some money. There are lots of independents on the pier when you arrive in port. They will have signs telling what the tour is and how much it will be. You don't have to do an excursion in every port if you don't want to. Sometimes it's fun just to walk around and shop or drink. If you do shore exursions, there will be little time to shop in port as they usually take several hours.


Take a lot of $1 bills for tipping porters, room service waiters, taxi drivers, tour guides, etc. Always have small bills for buying souvenirs in port as they don't always have change in USD. I never take anything bigger than a $20 to port. You can always break large bills at the pursers desk on board ship. They can also cash travellers checks for you.

 

[serene56]

I have not ever prepaid a tip to my cabin steward. I leave my tips on the card. If the steward does a great job we will give them more cash at the end of the week. (ex-if i want a lounge chair on my balcony and he gets it for me is going above and beyond what he has to do.)
tipping before he does anything becomes a bribe.

room service 1-2 bucks. Remember they are just delivering your food. THe cabin steward gets 3.50 a day and does a lot more work to get that amount.

Our cruises we spend on average about 300 for two of us. Since it is your honeymoon cruise I am sure you just got tons of photos taken at the wedding. You might want to buy the embarkation photo where they take your pic before you get on the ship. It will have the name of the ship and date on the photo.

Frozen foo foo drinks costs about 5 bucks each. Specialty martinis are almost 8 bucks each.

Bingo will cost 10-20 bucks depending on the game. 1-3 cards one game each.
But sometimes during the week will be a gringo bingo that will get you 10 games for the same 10 bucks. VERY crowded.

Legend has a supepr club that will cost you 30 bucks pp not including drinks.
The supper club is more romatic then the dining room. Dinner is fabulous and worth the money at least once.

To prepay your sign and sail card may I suggest that each pay take 25.00 and buy a funship dollar that you can apply to your account when you board. If any monies are left you get a check the last day that you can cash at the pursers desk

 

[serene56]

I forgot to add the phone number to purchase funship dollars:
1-800-906-7603

please allow at least 10 days to be delivered.

All that information can be added to your bridal shower invitation too.

 

[SandyBeach]

You will want to tip the people handling your bags at the port (if you aren't taking the bus from the airport - then the tip would go to the bus driver who makes sure your luggage gets onboard and takes care of it from there). ($1 to $2 per bag.) FYI...the baggage handlers at the port/pier do not work for Carnival...that's why they suggest you go ahead and lock your back before handing it over to them.

You will want to tip your tour guides and bus drivers (if you can afford it).
We generally trip about $5 to each. (When we have extra funds we make that $5 each...but can't do that every time we travel.)

If you want to be stress free...and since it's your first cruise...I'd suggest paying the extra money to take the Carnival excursions. Get past the first one and then you'll have more of a "feel" for whether or not you want to book your future excursions on your own. We talked to several people who had watched the boat leave without passengers who weren't on Carnival excursions who didn't make it back in time.

Photos....what we did this time was only buy the picture if it was exceptionally good. Go through your pictures on a regular basis and throw out the ones you are sure you don't want (in the designated place). Put the ones you aren't sure about back...and look at them at the end of the cruise to decide. Some will be picked up and put in boxes...but I noticed on the cruise we were just on they put all of them back up on the boards for the last day. We always ask ourselves as we are going through the pictures....is this picture worth $20. (8X10) You may not like your embarkation picture...don't buy it just because it's an embarkation picture buy it because you like the picture! They take tons of pictures and have so many neat backgrounds to have formal pictures taken...it's just fun to go through and see how they come out.

Cokes/pop/soda are considered from the bar so they will have the 15% gratuity added to them, too. I think it's something like $2.58/per can.

There are some specialty cookies, cakes and choc covered strawberries that you can buy for an extra charge....same place as most of the specialty coffees I think.

Tea, coffee, apple juice, orange juice, hot chocolate, punch, lemonade....are all free on the Lido deck and in the dining room. (Most of it is available 24 hours a day as is the Pizza and Ice cream.)

Bottled water is expensive on a ship...do not open the one that is left in your room...it's not free. Same with the stuff in your fridge if you have one. The regular drinking water (tap) they have onboard ship is generally pretty good...I'm a water drinker and haven't had any problem with it at all.

I agree with the $1 for room service. We also don't tip the room steward before the end of the cruise. We use to give them phone cards but they are rather obsolete for them in light of the internet. We've had excellent service with or without the phone cards. We do tip extra at the end of we can afford to and if the person is deserving.

They will ask you to tip the maitre'd on the last night...that is strickly up to you. On this past cruise we very rarely saw the maitre'd so we didn't feel he "deserved" a tip. I know they say he trained everybody and all that stuff...but if you are tight on funds you have to do what you feel is best.

We did tip our dinner-time barmaid for the first time this trip....just a small amount. She added so much joy to our dining experience. She was so excited...apparently she doesn't usually get more than the 15%. (Most of what we ordered were soda pops.)

Since this is your first cruise...I'd skip the supper club. Save that for another cruise when you have extra money to spend. Granted it's a nice dining experience - though some consider it too lengthy - and the service is supposed to be better than the dining room....there is dancing there, too. I'm not sure we felt it was worth the extra money. (We did not go on the ship you are taking though.)

If you don't have luggage yet...buy some that is not black or blue or dark. You will be able to find it much easier at debarkation and at the airport!! We are considering buying bright colored or ugly luggage just to make it easier to find!!

I was trying to watch how much we spent this time...we came away owing about $400. That is less than usual - for us....it still could have been reduced but that did include the gratuities and our excursion in Mazatlan.

 

[serene56]

cans of soda are 1.75 plus 15% gratuity. $2.02

Strawberries delivered to your cabin will cost 12 bucks for 6 choc covered strawberries---but wait til you get onboard and visit the specialty cafe and get 5 of those great suckers for 3.00 (great to buy before heading to a show)

they also have cakes like black forrest cake or strawberry shortcake. Cakes here are a lot better then what they serve for dessert in the dining room or buffet. Slices sell for 2.00- 3.50. Cookies are nice and warm and are 1.00 each. Milk shakes are 3.95 each.

 

[LHP]

Remember that you are allowed to bring your own soda and bottle water in your carry on. Carnival allows "a reasonable amount" which for us has always been 2 12 packs of soda and a 6 pack of water.

If you are flying to your port, do not try to pack this in your suitcase that is checked. There is just to great a chance that these cans will bust and leave your suitcase in a mess.

If you are not flying in a day ahead (which I highly recommend that you do, if possible) then simply have the taxi driver stop on the way to the port to pick up a couple of 12 packs and water or sometimes there are stores near the port itself that you can grab these from.

Remember you can also purchase them at ports and bring them back on the ship.

Congrats and have a wonderful cruise.

 

[snorkelman]

the above posters did a good job discussing the extras. Most people don't realize how they will be paying extra for a bottle of water as they get off the ship in port or for the specialty coffees.

One small comment about tips. The porters often do not deserve much of a tip. If you are lucky, they will lift your luggage from your vehicle and onto their carrying machine. That's it. Since I always lift my own luggage out of my vehicle myself, it is that much less work. nevertheless, I ALWAYS tip these people about $4-$5 just to keep them from selecting my bag to open. You gotta figure that out of the hundreds of people that each porter comes into contact with each day, some people will be real jerks both verbally and stiffing them from a tip. THESE will be the people who get their luggage lost/misplaced/broken into.

As for room service, I distinctly remember on one of my cruises watching a video in the cabin about the ship and the zoomed in to show the passenger giving the room service person TWO one dollar bills, so I have to assume that $2 is the expected amount rather than the $1-$2 as suggested above.

To each his own about tipping, as I am aware that my $4 for 4 bags is below what some people tip.

Finally, if you go on any type of excursion, expect to get some pressure to tip the people who are giving the excursion. No matter that you and your spouse just spent $250 for the excursion, the cruise line takes a big part of that so the local who does all the work only gets a small portion of that and they will let you know and they ALWAYS make sure to tell you about the 7 kids that they have to put through school.

It seems that every person you encounter in the islands will be looking either to sell you a product, a service or begging for free money. Some ports are worse than others, so expect it.