Help on planning a cruise?

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Isabel

1: know what your budget is.
2: pick a location.
You need to take into consideration what the ports of departure are for that location and are you willing to fly. For example, when I went on my cruise to the Bahamas I had to fly from Arizona to Florida just to get on the boat so I had to consider that flight into my cruise travel budget.
3: compare prices on different sites.
http://www.cruisesonly.com & http://www.cruisevacationcenter.net show you multiple cruise carriers & let you compare based on price and ammenities.
www.Cruise.com & http://disneycruise.disney.go.com have Disney Bahama cruises which are good for kids but always WAY more expensive than non-Disney cruises.
4. You can view weather information on the net at these web sites: http://www.bahamas.com/bahamas/weatherdetail.aspx?island=long
http://weather.org/caribbean.htm
and you can also call the member assist/customer service number for the agency who you are booking your cruise through & they can give you information.

My first cruise was from Miami to Nassau (Bahama's) & I loved it. It was a 4 day/3 night cruise Carnival Cruise. It was super relaxing, there where people of all ages & LOTS of kids (they provided a kids day camp at no cost so the parents could take a break) although it had been promoted as a "party" cruise :) . It wasn't an issue for me. The land excursions provided where cheap and lots of fun. My total flight, round trip was $150.00 and my cruise was $300.00 (that includes all the food, drinks & my land excursions!).

Some sites will not only show you what cruises are available, but also provide advise to help you pick the best type of cruise for you: http://www.vacationstogo.com
Remember that just because you take their advice, doesn't mean you can't book the cruise on a different web site if you find it at a lower price :)

I hope you have fun!!

Eh to Zed

When me and my Family were looking at cruises to go we started by going to main cruiseline websites.. Carnival, Royal Caribbean, Princess, Holland America etc. Search on those. When I went on my first cruise it was from Florida and around the Western Caribbean. Mexico, Grand Cayman, and Jamaica. It was for a week and it was pretty good, the eastern Caribbean is alot more split up, chances are that if you were to take a cruise through there you would take alot of excursions to other destinations. You also want to depart from an easily accessable area. We departed from Miami, but we flew in from Ft. Lauderdale. A good time to go would be around December, its quite busy at you could expect, but Domestic travel shouldnt be that hard to travel with. If you can be more flexable with your dates, id suggest more into January and February. as they are still a "getaway" type cruise and are cheaper than the December cruises. When we traveled from the end of December to the Next few days of January, it was pretty expensive, each room (we rented 2) was about $3000 for the entire cruise, and thats a basic interior, no frills room. We had our entire vacation planned by an agent from Carnival, she planned flights (which were VERY rare from Vancouver), planned hotels to stay at before the cruise, planned shuttles, and planned our assigned dinner times. The prices can get VERY overwhelming, a pop would be $3, and a Dakari would be about $7 each. And every visitor must give $60 gratituity for employees at the end of the trip. Overall if your planning a cruise yourself id start with a cruiseline website, such as Carnival.com and search for available cruises, or go to a travel agency, we ordered many books on the different destinations before we even came close to decideing on the cruise line. Do not buy anything off of Expedia (etc) as I find their alot more cheaper than the airline's websites themselfs =)

whoa mamma!!!

If you go to www.tripadvisor.com you get user reviews to anyplace in the world you can think of from vacations to eateries or entertainment. Check it out. There is no better advertisement than word of mouth!

cruise junkie

go see a travel agent tell them how much you can spend and when you ca get away and go from there

lindalbnj

Well u can get a cruise package that takes you to mexico, Bahamas, and the caribbean...like St. Barts, or St. Martin. They are all beautiful. Also, hurricane season for those places start in about June and last up until late September. For most of the year they have beautiful climates. Either way a cruise is alot of fun, check for ones that have all-inclusive where u can eat when u want, and not when u are told to. Alot of them have dancing rooms, pools, and alot of other things to keep u busy. Even day cares. Hope this helped!

FILE

Start by choosing a budget. How much can you spend. Then you can go to any travel website like Expedia, or Trarelocity and check out the cruises at the price you can afford. Pick a one destination and a short cruise for the first one. If you like it book a longer one next time. Each cruise line has a website and you can book thru them too. Each cruise line has their own theme too. Like the Disney Cruise is a good one to start with. Etc. Good Luck.. Check the weather on the internet after you pick a destination.

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