Tuesday, April 9, 2024

13 ways to snag cruise ship suites for less

cheapest way to book a cruise

In the Caribbean, these months also fall during hurricane season, which keeps some people away from both land resorts and cruise ships in the region. To try your luck, you'll want to ask about an upgrade at guest services. Since the crew there will spend embarkation day fielding many questions and complaints from grumpy, travel-weary cruisers, your best bet may be to head to your assigned cabin.

For budget-friendly options: Priceline

cheapest way to book a cruise

As a cruise-only company, CruiseDirect doesn’t deal in flights, hotels, or rental cars, allowing it to focus its full capacity on helping you find the best cruise deal possible. On the site, you can search by destination, departure port, month, length of cruise, and cruise line. There’s real-time online chat and a contact number for support from a cruise expert. If you aren’t quite ready to buy, you can “heart” cruises to save them as favorites to refer back to later. It’s got an attractive, inspiring landing page, and its newest function, “Explore Ship-tinerary pages,” lets you browse full ship profiles, details, photos, and itineraries. Many cruise lines offer discounts for booking drinks packages, Wi-Fi plans and shore excursions online in advance of your cruise.

To book a vacation package with an airline or hotel

Wave season is hyped up, similar to “Black Friday.” Sure there may be good offers — but not enough to keep us from booking a good deal when we see one a different time of year. Compare this rate with a 8-night Eastern Caribbean cruise aboard an older Royal Caribbean ship — Adventure of the Seas. We found this cruise departing Port Canaveral during the same month (April 2024).

cheapest way to book a cruise

CostcoTravel.com

On many ships, the least expensive cabins and most expensive suites often sell out first and quickly. Additionally, you can rack up points for perks that might eventually include free or discounted upgrades. For instance, if you reach the top Diamond status with Carnival Cruise Line's Very Important Fun Person loyalty program, you get a one-time free cabin upgrade. Cruise line sales are the easiest way to score cheap or free upgraded accommodations. Various mass-market brands will run periodic promotions, especially during the fall and winter "wave season" sale periods. You might also see discounted upgrades offered on cruises during shoulder seasons, such as immediately after children return to school in the fall.

$2,352 pp — 8nt Luxe Italy & Croatia Balcony: exclusive $250 back, up to $1,150 OBC + free drinks & tips

You can sign up for price alerts, which will notify you by email when the fare on your selected itinerary drops. Expert travel tips, dream destination inspiration, and timely travel news delivered to your inbox daily. We are a team of global travelers and cruise enthusiasts with several combined decades of experience in providing world-class luxury travel to our clients. This bonus value is an estimated valuation calculated by UP after analyzing redemption options, transfer partners, award availability and how much UP would pay to buy these points.

Avoid Sailing In The Summer

3 ways to book a cheap Royal Caribbean cruise - TheStreet

3 ways to book a cheap Royal Caribbean cruise.

Posted: Sun, 31 Mar 2024 07:00:00 GMT [source]

For any cruises listed, Cruise Critic does not guarantee any specific rates or prices. When shopping for a cheap cruise, you’ll notice that there are low “headline” fares mentioned. So a 7-day cruise might go for $559, but the total cost is much higher — often three times as high — by the time you actually buy the trip. Where they differ sometimes is that some places will offer things like onboard credit or rewards for booking through them. In our hunts, Costco seems to be the king in this department. If you’re a member, then you can book through Costco Travel.

Whether you have general travel points, airline miles, or a cruise line’s credit card, earning points and then redeeming those for cheap cruises is easy once you earn enough points. Some travel agents have access to group rates, which will give you a cruise fare that is lower than advertised rates. Even if a particular sailing or itinerary does not have a lower cruise fare, you can still score a cruise deal with travel agent promotions.

Expedia.com

The cheapest room on the ship is an inside cabin, so choose one of those rooms if you want to spend less on your next sailing. You'll get access to the same pools, restaurants, shows and activities as the folks in the balcony cabins; all you're missing out on is a window and some more floor space. Some people actually prefer inside cabins for amazing sleep in the pitch dark and because they spend all their time out and about on the ship and are never in their room.

Unfortunately, there’s no one site that always offers the best cruise deals. Most of the OTAs like CheapCaribbean.com, Cruises.com, or Priceline offer the same prices. The difference usually comes when you factor in extras like onboard credit or free gratuities. To get the best deals on a cruise, it’s important to know which website is offering the most bonuses. The base price of your cruise will be the same from website to website 9 times out of 10, so you’ll need to find the website that’s offering the best bonuses like onboard credit or free specialty dinners.

There, the fare will be what you see elsewhere, but they offer Costco Shop Cards as an incentive. If you want a cheap cruise, however, avoid sailing in the summer. During this time cruise lines see higher demand as more people look to travel. If eating and drinking are how you spend your money on a cruise, you may save by bundling your purchases.

• From time to time, unique offers such as additional onboard credit may be made available. CheapCaribbean.com is an online travel agency that specialises in providing vacations to destinations in Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean. The website, which began operations in the year 2000, takes great satisfaction in the excellent customer service it provides to customers located in the United States. Their customer service representatives, who they refer to as “Beachologists,” are accessible around the clock to assist you in making arrangements for the Caribbean trip of a lifetime. First, prices on websites are quoted for the lowest-tier interior cabin. If you choose a higher-end room like a balcony, then that price will be higher.

CruiseDirect is an online travel agency that focuses exclusively on cruise vacations. You are able to conduct a speedy search for cruises on this website according to your preferred location, cruise line, port of departure, or last-minute offers. You can choose from a wide variety of cruises, ranging from those that are affordable to those that are luxurious and from mega-ships to riverboats.

For example, if you book through CostcoTravel.com, then contact them first for any price drops you see. It’s possible that if you book one day, the next day the price may go down. The good news is that the price is unlikely to move much (unlike airfare). With a focus on cruising, they are able to better serve cruise passengers — including having staff that you can call directly to help you book. We think so as they can help you look at every cruise available to find one that fits. Smart cruise shoppers use them to look at all their options and see what sort of incentives they have for booking through their site.

The higher the accommodation category that you book, the more perks and benefits you’ll have access to during your stay. Keep in mind that in order to qualify for many of the extras you may see offered, you will need to book either a stateroom with a balcony or a suite. Cash-back and onboard spending bonuses are often related to your stateroom level as well. This means that if you book an interior or ocean view cabin, you are not going to get anywhere near the amount that is stated. If you are able to be flexible with your travel plans, you should look through their collection of price reductions, offers available at the last minute, and the greatest cruise prices.

However, you might find the cruise booking portion of the agency’s website a bit clunky. For this reason, some users just use the website to browse their cruise options and then they call Travelocity directly to book their chosen option. Traditionally, the wave season promotional period was from January through March; however, some lines are running versions of their promotions year-round. If you want to be among the first to know about such deals, consider signing up for email alerts from your preferred cruise lines.

It will save you money on your next cruise if you do some pre-cruise planning instead of being spontaneous once on board. Costco is a retailer that offers exclusive products and pricing to its members. Through its Costco Travel website, members receive exclusive prices and benefits when booking hotels, rental cars, cruises and travel packages.

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