Going on a cruise, need suggestions

In My Humble Opinion
1

Leaving Ft. lauderdale, FL stopping at Cozumel, Costa Rica and Panama.

I’ve never done a cruise before and I haven’t been outside the country since I was 16 so I’m at a bit of a loss as to how to prepare. I need tips for what to do on the boat (in addition to “avoid the buffet”) as well as what do I do for money on shore. I’m assuming I won’t have much time to get outside of the normal touristy areas and that US money would be widely accepted. I’ve been told my credit cards will also be useful, but I have some apprehension about swiping my card in an environment that must be irresistible to fraudsters who could record my card info and use it later to make unauthorized anthrax or bubblegum purchases.

Any advise at all would be welcome. And no, I don’t plan on buckling any swashes with the local pirates so I will not be bringing my sword.

2

I’ve been on several cruises. Dollars are universally accepted. In Cozumel, I did a snorkeling excursion and a horseback ride through the Mayan ruins. The horseback excursion was really nice. I haven’t been to Costa Rica or Panama, though.

Regarding the ship, I don’t think you will be bored. You can sit out on the deck, attend art shows, read, relax, gamble, drink, and people-watch. Personally, I like heading as far forward on the ship as I can and watch the flying fish leaping away from the bow. You can also look for dolphins.

When I am on cruises, I find that doing nothing is the hardest thing to do, but if you can, just look at the water and think deep thoughts. It might be the best thing you can do.

Normally, when we have cruised, we have gone with family, which means we have dinner together each night. On our cruise last year, it was just my wife and me. We enjoyed getting to know our table mates each night. Plus, there is something so very cool about having your waiter get to know you by name and your dining preferences. It is a very special touch to have him greet you by name (“Mr. Bob”) as he guides you to your seat. Makes you feel special.

I really enjoy talking to strangers and getting to know them, and I find that having breakfast and lunch with strangers is an awesome way to learn interesting things.

I speak a little Indonesian, so I enjoy talking to the Indonesian crew members in their own language. They get a real kick out of someone making the effort.

On our last cruise, I met a guy who was absolutely fascinating. He was a retired AP photographer who was now in the computer forensics field, and he had some awesome stories. I regret not getting his email address, because he was an absolute hoot!

Oh, and take a nap in the afternoon, if you can. Do it at least once. It will recharge your batteries like you wouldn’t believe!

3

I think Panama uses the US dollar and I recall that there were currency exchange booths right at the terminal in Cozumel. Can’t comment on Costa Rica, but I’d bet they’ll accept US dollars. You should also be able to get local cash to use from ATMs. I’d check out the message boards at the website www.cruisecritic.com. You can find a forum dedicated to your cruise stops and I guarantee that money issues will be discussed to death. You’ll also find some tips on what to do at each of those ports, where to shop, eat, etc.

I personally wouldn’t worry about using your credit cards. Warn your cc ahead of time that you’ll be using it outside the country and then just keep an eye on it and report any fraudulant activity immediately.

The buffet might actually be pretty good, depending on the cruise line!

4

Long time cruiser here with lots of experience.

My recommendations are as follows:

  1. Buy either the soda or alcoholic drink/wine card (depending on which you prefer) the first day as it is far cheaper than getting them individually. If you like wine, some cruise lines will still let you bring your own with a corkage charge, which will be infinitely cheaper. Check their website.

  2. Lots of the cruise lines will feature ‘upscale dining’ in a fancier restaurant on board for an additional charge. I have never understood the point of these as the food in the dining rooms is always top notch - ergo, avoid these.

  3. If you plan to buy anything expensive on-board (i.e. jewelry, watches, camera), wait until the end of the cruise when it at least be discounted. It’s a sure bet, however, that the prices on shore are cheaper.

  4. You may want to check out the individual ports on Tripadvisor.com before booking your shore excursions, as that will be your single biggest added expense in most cases. In some ports, the same trip is available for half the price on shore. The cruise line will try to scare you and tell you that if you don’t book with them, you may get stranded, because they only guarantee not to sail off without you if their shore excursion is late. Well, look on your itinerary and what the excursion is you want. 99 times out of 100, there is an independent operator just outside the port gates offering the same tour early in the morning and your ship is there all day anyway. Ergo, it is zero risk. Again, see what the people at tripadvisor.com have to say about it. Diving trips will ALWAYS be cheaper off the ship.

  5. Avoid the temptation to buy any art at the ParkWest auctions. You will ALWAYS find the same print/painting cheaper online.

  6. Think about gifts ahead of time if you feel the need to get them for people (or yourself). That is, leave some space in your luggage if you can, or if you go crazy like my wife does, pack a collapsible bag inside your luggage, so you can fill that with your gifts on the way back. Use your dirty clothes as packing materials for fragile things.

  7. Do get exercise on the ship, EXCEPT on the first sailing day. That day, the gym is horribly crowded. Everyone gives up after the first day.

  8. If you are booking a massage or anything in the spa, book early as the “at sea” days are the first to fill up and the most desirable time slots obviously go first.

5

Which cruise line are you taking?

In addition to the other good advice, I’d recommend not planning on a lot of shopping on-shore, unless you want to get away from the port area. I think the same company sells the same junk on 5 continents I’ve visited. The cruise line will also try to steer you to certain stores. They are getting a kickback from any place they mention.

If you don’t want to risk missing out on certain things (and I’ve often not seen independent operators in some of excursions I’ve taken) book early. Cruise critic, or a guide book, will tell you about transportation to any place you want to go.

Expect to get only a quick look at your destinations. Cruises are great for seeing a lot of places without having to hassle with luggage, but you’ll want to go back and really see anyplace that appeals to you.

Definitely do not buy any art. The Times had a long article a while back on this, and basically promises about the value of whatever painting you buy is worthless. In general I don’t buy stuff on cruise ships - or in hotel gift shops either.

Buffets are often fine for breakfast, if you don’t want to spend a lot of time, and sometimes lunch, but dinners in the standard dining rooms are usually very good, and it would be a shame to pass them up. My last cruise was on NCL, and the pay restaurants did not appeal to us at all. If there are seatings, I’d recommend going for a big table, because it is a good opportunity to meet lots of people. On our first cruise, on the QE2, we got to sit with the Chief Engineer. NCL didn’t have seatings - but we discovered that if we reserved early we would get seated at the big window, which was especially nice when leaving Malta.

In general, understand that the new business model for cruise lines is to hold cabin prices down and try to make it up by charging for all sorts of things on ship.

6

One thing I forgot - think about going to your port of debarkation the night before. When we took our Alaskan cruise we flew from SFO to Vancouver, and our flight was hours late. Luckily we had taken the pre-cruise package, and it was no problem. Other people in the waiting area were on a cruise that evening, and they were going crazy.

Think about trip insurance. We’ve never used it, but the volcano was exactly one year after our last cruise, and if we had been a year later it would have come in handy. Where you are going it might not be as important, though.

7

www.cruisecritic.com has good info

8

I can only echo the above, so:

I’ve been on cruises that stopped in Mexico, Aruba, Costa Rica, Panama and Jamaica, and have never once had to convert currency. I’ve never even seen foreign currency, except in Panama where a cashier gave me a Panamanian Quarter by mistake (same size as the US equivalent.) Everybody on the cruise line itinerary will take $US.

I would respectfully disagree with Yarster about the upscale restaurants. Yes, the free dinners are wonderful, but the upscale ones are even more so, and it’s only like $15 extra (my experience has been with Princess, fwiw) for a truly memorable dining experience.

Good advice about booking the spa. Everybody wants a massage on a sea day.

9

A word about dinners on the ship (from my experience on Carnival; I assume they’re all like this): they’ll bring you all you want, but it becomes problematic to order seconds after being served (major delays). The normal servings are modest. So if you have a hearty appetite, and/or want the steak AND the fish, order two or three entrees from the get-go. Likewise with soup, salad, and dessert.

If you don’t care for the excursions offered on a given day, or just want to do something different, get a map of the port city and do a self-guided walking tour. Mainly get out of the TOURISTS/TOURISTS/TOURISTS part of town and you can get a better feel for the place. We found a great uncrowded restaurant in Cozumel, with truly local fare. It worked really great in Alaska (inside passage), as each town had some interesting sights. Even just a couple blocks from the main TOURIST drag you’re likely to find shops that aren’t in bed with the cruise line, selling the same overpriced crap.

10

I have been on cruises, and like them. I have always wanted to take a Panama Canal cruise-are these worthwhile?

11

I certainly enjoyed mine! On my cruise we turned around in Gatun Lake, so it was part of a longer Caribbean cruise, and not a one-way Atlantic - Pacific cruise.

It was just cool, from an engineering standpoint, to watch your ship moving through the locks.

And I went on a shore excursion in the Panamanian jungle, and saw monkeys, sloths & toucans. Any opportunity to see wildlife is all good.

12

Been on a few… my .02 worth

Get a small plug bar with multiple outlets, many rooms will only have 1 plug.

We actually purchased sodas in port, a 6 pack of 20 oz plastic bottle sodas will carry easily and is easily aquired near any given port. Royal carribean and Carnival both had no problem with it at the time…dunno about current policy. We did this because we got alot of piss poor attitudes about the drink cards. Theoretically you flash them at a bar and they give you a soda, but unless you are waving a tip along with that they seem to take their own sweet time getting around to them.

As much as many people love to say “OMG what would you do stuck on a boat for 3-4 days” You will only get to do about 1/3 of the things you want to do.

For example, I attended an “Austin powers dance class” where a couple of the show dancers taught about 20 of us how to do some of the little dance sequences from the movie. By the end of the class there were like 200 people sitting in the audience cheering us on. We also attended a kind of adult game show where hundreds of guests were split into teams by clusters of tables in the main lounge. There were like 8-10 teams and prizes were given out for the first 3 teams to send someone up to the stage with drivers licences from 5 different states, or the first team to have a guy come up dressed in womens clothing, first team to come up to the stage with 5 pairs of mens underwear…you get the picture.

13

Just a quick cruise etiquette question—I understand that drinks (booze) aboard the ship are usually REALLY spendy and was wondering if people often try to cut down on expense by doing a bit of bootlegging.

Is it possible to buy a bottle of rum in a port city somewhere and get it (sneak it?) back aboard so you can make a couple of drinks in your cabin in the early evenings, that way you can just buy one or two per night from the boat bar itself, saving a big chunk of change?

I realise that this is not something that the Rockefellers would need to worry about, but what about the average couple from Deluth?

Does this happen a lot or is it something that is just. not. done.?

14

We always brought our own box of wine (don’t judge!) with us. Never a problem. And I don’t see why you’d need to buy it in port – couldn’t you just pack it in your luggage when you leave home?

15

In my experience aboard Princess, Celebrity, NCL, and Holland America, everything you bring back from shore is X-rayed, and any alcohol is held until the last day of the cruise when you can retrieve it at a specific location for your trip home. This may be for legal reasons in addition to having the added benefit of letting them sell you alcohol at inflated prices (e.g. to prevent underage drinking/ drunk passengers falling overboard). None of them will take your water bottles, however, so if your drink of choice should happen to be vodka, a clear tequila, or other clear liquor, and if it should happen to find it’s way inside a water bottle, then yes, you can drink on the cheap. I confess that I always assumed sodas were not allowed either, but I have never tried to bring them back. They do not care about food, though they would surely have an issue with any fresh fruits or vegetables.

@jsc1953 - fair enough on the upscale dining - it is IMHO. We tried it once on our recent NCL cruise in February. It was IIRC $20 per person more for an all you can eat sushi bar that was outstanding. But you multiply that times 4 people, and it quickly adds up. I guess I was more pissed off because they had SIX upscale restaurants taking up space on that ship. Admittedly, the Benihana knock-off restaurant was always full, but the rest were almost always empty (including the sushi bar). Meanwhile, the dining rooms were packed and clearly they could have just made those bigger, but by artificially creating a crowd, they get you to do the upscale restaurant because you don’t have to wait for “just a little more money”.

16

I don’t know if they do this in Mexico, but our last cruise required us to put our bags through an X-ray machine when returning from every port - so you are going to get caught. It depends on the policy. We don’t drink much, and I prefer free iced tea to soda anyhow, so it was no problem. I have ordered wine at dinner, and it wasn’t much more marked up than your average restaurant.

17

If you’re worried about the credit card thing, you might want to look in to getting one of those pre-paid cards. Think you can put any amount on them, like a gift card, and use them instead of risking access to your regular accounts. Worst case scenario would be losing whatever value remained on the card…

18

The prepaid cards are really nice for traveling. Get a few so if you lose one, you can just use the next one. Get 4 or 5 in smaller amounts as opposed to getting one or two in a larger amount.

Trust me, you’ll only be bored on the ship if you want to be bored. There’s so much to do. Plus, it’s a vacation. Take time to relax. Get a massage. Lay out on the deck with that good book you’ve never had time for. There will be a lot to do, but take some time to relax, too.

I loved going up to the sun deck at night and looking at the stars. You’re far enough away from the shore (and the lights) that you get a pretty amazing look at the stars.

19

My wife and I are taking that cruise (also our first) at the beginning of August.
When are you going?

20

I put 2 handles of rum and vodka into Poland springs bottles and packed them in my suitcase before leaving and had no problems. I’ve heard many people just put the liquor bottles in and don’t get caught but I figured it was easy enough to try to hide it a little.