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We've been trying to plan out our next vacation, and a cruise sounds like an interesting option. We're two adults with no kids, and Seattle and Vancouver based cruises are in easy driving distance for us, especially Seattle. My partner is not a morning person, and likes to be up late and sleep in. For a lot of other trips this is a problem, with nothing to do outside the hotel room after one in the morning. It sounds like some cruises have 24 hour activities, so if she's looking for something fun to do at 3 AM there are probably some ship amenities still open? I know food tourism is big for other people, but we're both pretty picky with food, and on many of our international trips it becomes a big source of anxiety. It looks like a lot of the cruise ships have a good variety of food styles we like, especially breakfast foods. Also some appear to have some OK food options available 24/7, and some have relatively open eating schedules, too. We don't like being stuck eating on a schedule, we would rather eat when we are hungry. We haven't been to Alaska, so that would be interesting to visit. The main downside is my partner does not like extended cold on vacations. Over 70 F would be ideal during the day, but above 50s is still fine for the average day. An excursion or two in colder / freezing temperature is no problem and fun for both of us. Is there a good place to look up the average temperature ranges for Alaska cruises during the at-sea days? We both like to swim, are the pools fine to use for most of the trip, or is it too cold? We want a good variety of activities available, and she doesn't drink, so we want something that's fun for someone not drinking. It looks like quite a few cruise lines leave out of Seattle and Vancouver. Reading this and other threads it sounds like Disney is the king (and available from Vancouver), but we would prefer Seattle unless it's a huge difference. Out of Seattle, it looks like Carnival has the most focus on on-ship activities. Celebrity Cruises looks upscale, but doesn't seem to have a lot of on-ship activities. Norwegian Cruise Lines seem to have more on-ship activities than Celebrity. The cruise sites make it hard to understand what a total budget to expect to pay, on top of the cruise tickets themselves. Would budgeting about $200 per person per day cover food / excursions / on ship premium activities / daily alcohol pass for me + soda pass for her? We can be pretty flexible with our trip date, but a late May trip (in 2-3 weeks) sounds pretty good to me. It looks like that also puts us in a good timing window to get some last minute deals on the cruise tickets, or is this the kind of thing we should book way more in advance?
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May 5, 2019 19:45
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| # ¿ May 22, 2024 11:43 |
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It looks like Carnival cruises are generally either sold out in the near future, only have interior rooms available, or cost about 2-3x as much for balcony rooms as other cruises. I'm still doing research, but I'm pretty sure we would rather have a balcony on a less exciting cruise ship over a tiny interior room on a more fun ship, especially if the price swing is so big. I think she will want to go for the spa treatments. I tend to over budget my per day spend on trips. It's better to come up with extra money than to have money get tight on the vacation. July is the soonest a Carnival cruise is available with the balcony rooms, but the other cruise lines seem to have some available for the end of May. I'm leaning toward end of May right now because it fits my schedule better. It looks like we could get a suite on Norwegian for less than the price of an interior on Carnival right now.
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May 6, 2019 03:08
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Thanks for all the info. We've booked a cruise on the Norwegian Bliss.
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May 6, 2019 05:13
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We're back from our Alaska cruise on the Norwegian Bliss. It was a pretty great experience, maybe our favorite vacation. We'll definitely want to cruise again, not sure if we want it to be our vacation next year yet.
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Jun 2, 2019 23:17
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Doronin posted:My booking window for excursions on our Disney Wonder cruise to Alaska opens in about 4ish weeks, but I'm struggling to pick stuff out. I want to get in early because I want to make sure we get the top picks. We did Alaska on Norwegian in 2019 so our choices may have been different. Here's what we picked for our three: Juneau - Mendenhall Glacier & Gardens. We enjoyed both parts of this. Definitely worth it for us. Skagway - White Pass Railway & Yukon Expedition. The Yukon Expedition was great, I really liked the museum up there. The railway back was OK but we didn't know there was a good and bad side, so we sat on the bad side with the not so good views. Ketchikan - Bear Creek Zipline. Yeah ziplines are basically everywhere touristy, but they can be fun as long as they aren't dirt cheap. We had a good time with this one. I doubt this would work with a 3 year old.
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Apr 29, 2022 00:19
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