Drinking water...Free?

I have read so many negative things about not getting anything to drink in the dining room on the Costa ships....we are sailing on June 25th from Stockholm on the Luminosa....has anyone recently heard anything about this?

It depends on your nationality.

Americans get free tap water, everyone else has to pay for bottled water if they want it.

No, it does not depend on your nationality. If you book with Costa USA, you get waterusa regardless of citizenship (it should be on your e-ticket). That package is not included with European bookings.

It depends on your nationality.

 

Americans get free tap water, everyone else has to pay for bottled water if they want it.

Not free tap water. It's free bottled water by the glass.

Get the All Inclusive Drinks Package and get anything you want in the MDR.

No, it does not depend on your nationality. If you book with Costa USA, you get waterusa regardless of citizenship (it should be on your e-ticket). That package is not included with European bookings.

Yes but Americans usually book on the American website and non-Americans on a non-American website.

Thank you everybody for your comments.....

Admittedly not very experienced cruisers, but we always buy the all inclusive drinks, and after we have embarked and had our first cocktail one of us disembarks and buys 6 large bottles of water at the nearest supermarket or equivalent. We make sure we have a couple of small empy bottles to decant into. Otherwise, the ice provided in the cabin translates into water. The lack of freely available and drinkable water is a real indictment of most cruise lines

Admittedly not very experienced cruisers, but we always buy the all inclusive drinks, and after we have embarked and had our first cocktail one of us disembarks and buys 6 large bottles of water at the nearest supermarket or equivalent. We make sure we have a couple of small empy bottles to decant into. Otherwise, the ice provided in the cabin translates into water. The lack of freely available and drinkable water is a real indictment of most cruise lines

I am from the UK and always book via US travel sites. Last year we went with Costa and had to pay for water during the evening meal. It is true that American citizens have free water. But everyone else, if you do not have the beverage package, will have to pay

Yes we pay to get bottled water but do you know what .....

It's worth it to get a decent glass of water instead of the fluoridey tasted rubbish water that you would get if you ordered tap water

A Costa cruise is an italian experience . If you were in Italy you would pay for your water with your meal.

We went on a cruise on the deliziosa ship from the 1/7 Aug 16 and found our experience to be below our expectations. 10 euro per night service charge, no free water or cold lemon tea in the albatros restaurant (the food was tasteless and overcooked btw) and sleazy officers.

We did a Norwegian cruise (epic) three years ago where free water, free cold tea and free 24 hr dinning at the burger restaurant was available.

Everything about Costa tailed our ncl experience, from the professionalism of staff, entertainment shows, dinning options and the quality of food.

Next time we will pay a little more to begin with rather than getting screwed over by Costa.

Each to their own I supposed. We have only ever cruised with Costa and I have looked at other lines and read many reviews.

The AI package we book is a lot less expensive than any of the other lines I have looked at. We do not use the most expensive one because everything we want is on the one that costs about £26 pppd. I have no issue asking for a glass of bottled water which is included in this package.

I looked at photos of the food on other lines and whilst the specilaity restaurants look better than the ones on Costa, I don't think the food on Costa is that diabolical. It is a bit samey and sometimes not well coooked but we have always found at least one of the courses to be really nice.

I have a big issue about people moaning about the service charge on Costa and that the fact that is a compulsory charge. Most other lines have a higher day rate and are also compulsory.

The entertainment varies. I certainly don't want to sit through a whole show like Grease etc in the evening. The 45 minutes in the theatre is enough for me. If I want to see a show I'll go to London. There is usually at least one bar on the ship that has entertainment that suits our taste.

Costa is way cheaper than any of the other lines and the ships are lovely. We are looking at a cruise beginning of November and will stick with Costa.

We don't drink much alcohol but I wonder if Costa has a coffee/hot drink only package, like Some other cruise lines?

We don't drink much alcohol but I wonder if Costa has a coffee/hot drink only package, like Some other cruise lines?

The last information I have is that there are two coffee packages:

25 Espresso for €44.57

25 Cappuccino for €73.32

Just so you are aware, one Cappuccino on board is 2.80 euros plus 15 % all other coffees range from 2 Euros plus the 15 %.

So you can work it out whether it is worth it or not. There is also water packages.

See all on the Costa Site under on-board Desires in 'My Costa'

Even if you drink very little alcohol you soon reach the AI package price as that includes the dreaded 15% service on all drinks and water.

I drink perhaps one/two glass of wine with meals yet still find it better to have the package with as many coffees as I want.

We usually buy the package but won't be doing so for our next cruise on Saturday. The exchange rate for us £ to euro is pretty bad! The 10 euro service charge is even worse!

We will just buy our drinks as we go as we are hoping to be ashore a lot.

We will certainly buy the AI for our Transatlantic cruise in December though..

Well worth it!

I am being mean this time and packing a flask so I can enjoy drinks on my balcony :)

Caryl

Its swings and roundabouts really.. You have to take into account that the decent drinks package with costa is about half the price of other major cruise lines (when there not hiking the price of the cruise up and pretending its free) so even a light drinker will get good value from it. Just add on the drinks package - dont forget it includes good bottled water and excellent coffee.

Back from our cruise on Favolosa. We gave in and bought the package on day 2. Day 1 turned out to be quite expensive after a few coffees, a round of drinks before dinner and wine and water with dinner! It really is a no brainer not to buy their package. The weather wasnt very good so we stayed on the ship far more than we thought we would be which meant lots of coffees and water were ordered.

Caryl

Admittedly not very experienced cruisers, but we always buy the all inclusive drinks, and after we have embarked and had our first cocktail one of us disembarks and buys 6 large bottles of water at the nearest supermarket or equivalent. We make sure we have a couple of small empy bottles to decant into. Otherwise, the ice provided in the cabin translates into water. The lack of freely available and drinkable water is a real indictment of most cruise lines

Not sure what cruise lines you are referring to, but this is simply not true. No other cruise line that we have been on charge for water at meals or at other times even. After speaking with a guest services manager about this, he started with the "when in Italy" crap, then even he admitted that Costa will charge for whatever the customers will tolerate. Money-grubbing at it's lowest!

As for the AI drink packages, we ran into a real problem on our last, (and I do mean LAST), Costa cruise: The only wines by the glass they had available on our Intenditore drink package were the low-priced, rock-gut (5,00 euros/glass) wines. Any of the 6,00-9,00 euros/glass wines were "sold out." How convenient for Costa. We ended up having no wine at meal time due to this, instead having cocktails instead.

Oh, and in the MDR you can't get mixed drinks anyway since Costa has cut back on the waiters, (35 guests per waiter), and there's no staff to get them.

Costa's new motto: Experience authentic third-world service on a third-world cruise line, the cruise line for guests who don't know any better....

On our recent NeoRomantica, free water was always available either in the Buffet or Capri Grill.

There is always the tap in the bathroom sink, same water as in buffets.