Category Archives: Cruising Tips

Cruising Tips

Tips for an Amazing Spring Break Cruise

Leave a comment

Cruise Ship
Image by mezzoblue

Tips for an Amazing Spring Break Cruise

So the dreary winter days of study and concentration are over, and it’s time to take a break – a spring break! College spring breaks offer students a chance to kick back and relax after months of hard work. One way many students celebrate is by taking a spring break cruise. Spring break cruises are fun, exciting, luxurious, and in many ways, safer than traveling to one particular destination while on break. Here are some tips for choosing an amazing spring break cruise.

How to Choose a Spring Break Vacation Cruise

Find a spring break cruise that offers all the party options, entertainment, and amenities you want. Many cruise ships feature a variety of restaurants offering everything from exotic cuisines to pizza and burgers. Also, ask about the entertainment. Does the cruise ship offer modern-day music concerts with the type of music you enjoy? What other types of entertainment are provided? Find out if the cruise has bars, dance halls, a casino, on-board games, and a swimming pool.

Spring Break Cruise Destinations

Popular cruise liners such as Carnival might offer many ships going to different destinations. A popular destination for college spring breakers is the Caribbean. Other popular spring break destinations include South Beach, Hawaii, Panama City, and Cancun. These places have beautiful tropical weather, abundant nightlife, and great beaches. If traveling from the United States or Canada, European cruises usually last two weeks or more, so choose one that will fit in your available time frame. No matter what your destination, being on the cruise ship for the entire trip is not so bad either. Cruise ships usually offer everything you could ever want during spring break!

Choose a Cruise Ship

There are a number of cruise ships that offer spring break packages including Royal Caribbean, Carnival Cruise Lines, Celebrity Cruises, or Costa Cruises. Familiarize yourself with these by researching online before booking a spring break cruise. Shop around to find great deals for the destinations and adventures that appeal to you. Look for all the features you want, and ask a few of your friends to come along. You might receive a discount by ordering multiple tickets. Compare destinations, on-board activities, entertainment, food, and other features before securing a cruise package.

Are You an Adventurer?

Some cruises are geared toward young adults who are seeking an adventure. These may offer parachuting, scuba diving, rock climbing, hiking adventures, or other extreme sports. Book an adventure cruise with a few friends who enjoy the same types of sports. This can be a fun, memorable time with your college buddies.

Cruise Safety for Spring Breakers

A spring break cruise might be your dream come true, but don’t forget about safety. Be careful whom you associate with even while on board the ship. Travel with close friends you can trust and stay with them at all times, especially if you take an adventure excursion or go sightseeing on land. Keep your money and valuables in a locked safe if one’s available. Take a detailed map with you when leaving the boat for a land tour. Also, find out the legal drinking age while on the ship and at its destinations. Have all the proper documentation and identification if traveling to another country. Also, let family and friends know exactly where you’re going, what ship you’re on, and how long you will be gone.

Book your spring break cruise online to enjoy savings and to find the adventure you want. You can check with travel and tour sites such as Travelocity, Expedia, Orbitz, Travelzoo, and others to see which offers the best deal.

Book your next cruise at TopCruiseFinder.com.

Cruising Tips

Family Cruising Enjoys Wave Of Popularity

Leave a comment

Cruise Ship
Image by iamjvan

Family Cruising Enjoys Wave Of Popularity

Family cruising is enjoying a wave of popularity. There’s good reason. Cruise lines now feature a cornucopia of family fun, including sports, art activities, planetarium shows, disco parties, pizza fests, ice skating, youth Olympics, rock climbing, scavenger hunts, wildlife exploration and much more.

Family travel is on an upsurge, according to the Travel Industry Association, with one in four household trips-or more than 170.1 million- including children under 18.

The experts at Travelers Advantage offer these tips and trips for the ultimate family cruise:

Family Cruise Tips:

• Be sure the kids’ programs are operating on the dates of your trip.

• Check the size and location of the cabin, and the guardrails on the bunks.

• Some ships have cabins that can sleep five; some have adjoining cabins; some give special rates for a second cabin for teens.

• Check required documentation for your children (ID, etc.).

• You never know when illness might hit your household and change your plans, so check cancellation fees and fees for changing dates. Trip-cancellation insurance may be worth the price.

Family Cruise Trips:

• Royal Caribbean International

There are a number of fun and educational complimentary programs including Adventure Ocean, a program for ages 3 to 12 and teens from 13 to 17 with special meals and play areas. The program has supervised activities for day and night. It includes educational entertainment programs and special menus.

• Carnival Cruise Lines

Carnival will host 525,000 kids this year on its “Fun Ships.” These vessels offer parties, special performances by entertainers, ship tours for kids and teen shore excursions, face painting, scavenger hunts, talent shows, photography workshops, art classes and waterslides.

• Disney Cruise Line

As you’d expect, families will find special facilities and activities with Disney Cruise Line, all beautifully executed. There’s an entire deck for kids, with a large staff, age-specific programs, and hands-on activities.

Other family-friendly cruise lines include Celebrity Cruises, Holland America Line and Norwegian Cruise Line.

Find your dream cruise at TopCruiseFinder.com.

Cruising Tips

Tips for Finding Cheap Cruises

Leave a comment

Cruise Ship
Image by Brooks Jones

Tips for Finding Cheap Cruises

So, you’ve finally decided you want to take a cruise for the upcoming vacations. Trouble is you can’t afford to spend too much on your vacations, so you need to find cheap cruises. Luckily for you, nowadays is easy to find cheap cruises, and not only that, by keeping some tips in mind, you can save a lot of money on your travel.

Here are some tips and information that will give you an advantage when saving for your cruise vacations:

– Do a Web Search. Yes, this may sound obvious to some of you, but it is very important. The internet provides a vast selection of packages and offers not only for cruise vacations, but for everything! Do not stick with same search term, add variations to your search. Advertisers will use different target search terms for their packages.

– Look for Off Season Cruises. It depends on what your destination is. Be sure to check out what are the low season months for a given cruise spot. Prices during those times drop considerably to attract more people.

– Inaugural Cruises. When cruise lines launch a new cruise ship, they make offers and incentives to get people to try the ship.

– Repositioning Cruises. These are cruises that are sent to another destination to cover demand (for example a Alaska cruises that are sent to the Caribbean). Cruise lines will try to cover their expenses of doing that journey by charging low prices.

– Check large vacations suppliers. Large suppliers have low prices. Be sure to check with Travelocity or online cruise suppliers like CruiseDirect.com since they can make customized packages.

– If you belong to the military, try going through the Tickets & Tours office on the base/post. They let people make interest-free payments, and that helps when you’re on a tight budget!

– Follow the too early or too late rule. That is book early or late. Prices drop on these very extreme booking conditions.

Finally, always remember to choose the right cruise line and ship. Be sure you are going to be satisfied by it, and don’t get caught in beautiful brochures and pictures. Sometimes a cheap cruise vacation can turn out to be a quite expensive one at the end, due to unexpected expenses. There are plenty of sites online that can help you review cruises. And always remember to have fun in your vacations!

Find your dream cruise at TopCruiseFinder.com.

Cruising Tips

Cruise Holiday Tips for Smooth Sailing

Leave a comment

Cruise Ship
Image by kansasphoto

Cruise Holiday Tips for Smooth Sailing

Is anything more luxurious than taking a cruise holiday? Traveling to exotic locations on a luxury ship, catching sunrays, and breathing the salty breezes can renew and replenish anyone, no matter how shopworn from the cares of work. However, a cruise holiday requires planning in order to be the best it can be. Check out these tips to have a cruise experience you will remember.

So where do you start when planning a cruise holiday? First, what is your budget like? Do you need to hold down expenses? Then here are a few tips for economizing on your cruise holiday.

When scheduling your cruise holiday, you should be aware that there are off season and on season dates, and that you want to schedule your trip in the off season to get the best deal. What you may not know, however, is that cruise lines actually change prices a number of times throughout the year. Ask and find out when their absolute lowest season prices are. In addition, keep your plans somewhat flexible so that you can change ships at the last minute. Sometimes a ship is not filled to capacity, so the cruise line will sell the last few tickets at a real bargain. It is always to their advantage to sail filled to capacity because people on holiday spend money on souvenirs, drinks, etc. Use this knowledge to get a really great deal.

Where you cruise to on your holiday can make a big difference in your cost as well. If you pick a popular spot, you can travel cheaper than if you choose a less popular spot. Another consideration is whether you really care about those ports of call. If you just want to stay on the ocean liner and enjoy the luxuries, book a cruise that doesn’t stop anywhere. These “cruises to nowhere” are just as luxurious as the others but cost less.

To be safe on a cruise holiday, don’t take a lot of expensive equipment or jewelry with you. Make sure your passport, health insurance, and other papers are up to date. Be sure to ask about laws you may inadvertently be breaking when you get off the shore you are accustomed to. Laws in ports and even in the water can vary, and you sure don’t want a big hassle with a foreign law enforcement agency.

To travel lighter, find out about equipment that will be available on the ship. For instance, if the cruise line provides irons or hair dryers, you won’t need to pack yours. Also pack your own sample size shampoo, toothpaste, and other toiletries because these items will cost more in the gift shop. You should have access to laundry facilities on your cruise holiday, so you don’t have to take a huge amount of clothing. Pick a wrinkle proof lightweight outfit for every two or three days and pick separates in colors that coordinate so you can get different looks. Be sure to pack a formal and or semi-formal outfit if you will be taking part in these sort of activities on your cruise holiday.

Book your next cruise at TopCruiseFinder.com.

Cruising Tips

Last Minute Cruises: Finding the Best Deal

Leave a comment

Cruise Ship
Image by King Brian

Last Minute Cruises: Finding the Best Deal

They say that an early reservation on cruise ships provides big discounts. Most of the cruise lines want to fill up the ships with reliable vacationers beforehand so they would know if they have sufficient passengers. On the other hand, if you do your reservation in a last minute time, you can still do it well.

Honestly, last minute cruising can also offer a bunch of discounts. However, last minute reservation can involve a great risk. One of the risk is the ship could fill up by the early bird cruisers and leave no space for those getting last minute tickets. Aside from that, if you live far away from the airport and seaport, the airline fare could be very costly.

Both if the plane and shipping companies go with the flow of booking as early as possible. Booking early means cheap fees. As a result of this, having a last minute cruise can give you a much expensive fees.

Waiting until the last moment if not done wisely can cause problems. You must be prudent in a last minute cruise. You must find the best deals with each cruising companies. There are several companies that offer better departure time deals. These deals are intended for most of the last minute cruisers who have no other choice but to book at the last minute. For example, the company can increase the discounts for them in order to reach the designated passenger count for each cruise.

If you are a last minute cruiser, the very important thing that you should do is to sail off before sunset to book the cruises. You can also get a middle man. Middleman can do the entire booking job for you. Another thing is you can also save a lot of cash by using the online cruise booking system. Using online booking system can give you a trouble free access. Aside from that, online booking can also save time and effort all at the comfort of your own home or office.

Another thing to be considered is the flexibility of cruising plans. You must know what you have to do. You must know also where you want to go.

Finding a right last minute cruise deal needs a lot of solid leg work. Destiny helps the person who helps themselves. But if you find the best deal, grab the opportunity right away. Sometimes the shining stars are hidden inside the dark clouds and its up to you to find them.

Now here are some basic tips and strategy how to get into a last minute cruise easily.

• Collect all the important cruise brochures and flyers from the traveling office. Always make sure about the cruise features. Check out also the ships and deck methods online. By doing this, you will be able to find the best idea about the fees, destinations, atmosphere, amenities, recreational option, and types of accommodations.

• Outline places where you want to go. As much as possible talk to the travel agencies. The travel agencies can give you some knowledge regarding the cruise and its details. If not, you can also ask your friends for some advice and recommendations. There are a lot of places to go to and things to see in Alaska.

• Decide how many days you will stay in the cruise. Asking the traveling agencies will give you some idea. You can also ask them about their cruising programs. Normally most known cruises last from 5 to 18 days. On the other hand, there are also some companies that offer longer cruising schedules with more things to see and do.

• Plan how much money you are willing to spend. Your budget will determine what type of cruise you will have. Most probably you can level your budget with cheap, moderate, extra-deluxe, and deluxe type cruises. It is recommended that comparing these types will be a great step to know what to expect. By comparing the basic type of cruises you will know which one can make you most comfortable and enjoyable within your budget.

• Last minute cruise needs a short span of time reservation. To do this properly, talk to a travel agent by phone. Do not hesitate to tell the agent about your budget and your needs. Aside from that, you can also refer to some catalogs to select what cruises are right for you.

• With the assistance of the traveling agent, select the most convenient place of departure. After that, book your own departure points to the transportation office. Not only that, you must also get some additional cost for transportation.

Do not overlook last minute cruising values. You can have a better discount from ship reviews and other vital information. It is better to be prepared before leaving for cruise.

Book your next cruise at TopCruiseFinder.com.