fendersrule

I never had a chance to go on the last cruise cuz of Covid.

Going with Royal Carribean to Alaska soon and decided against the drink package, and again I'm a heavy drinker. The math simply just doesn't work out for the following reasons:

1) Only 2 sea days on the alaska trip, which is when the most consumption is. Like with the last cruise, I always plan to consume drinks (more than a couple) during port days.

2) You can buy 375ML bottles (with a 6 pack of soda) for $44. I purchased two.

3) Going with a group of 6. The other people either don't like wine, or have the drink package, so they're all bringing a bottle of wine to share. That means we will have a small stock pile of wine on board.

4) There is a glacier event one day where I have to be up by 5:00AM, so that pretty much limits my drinking during the night before.

There is no doubt in my mind I will come out ahead without drinking any less. For me and my wife, it would have been $850 to secure the drink package. 

Thanks. It sounds like Carnival needs to be more proactive on the next set of cruises past April 9th. It's causing lots of panic for our friends/family.

I'm with a group that is sailing on the Panarama on April 18. Me and 5 other cruisers.

We are pretty stressed and not sure what to do. We've heard the phones are completely tied up. And we have a "hunch" that Carnival will likely cancel the next batch, but we don't want to wait until the last second and lose our chance to get a refund, since we have a March 31st deadline to decide.

Not sure what we should do.

Direct is a non-stop flight....

I think you will find that people who are complaining about flying the same day have non-direct flights. I would never fly the same day if I had a connecting (non-direct) flight.

Connecting flights are 2x the risk. 

Direct or connecting flights. Please specify because it makes a diference.

13 minutes ago, cruizergal70 said:

My home airport offers many flights to the major cruise cities. 

 

Cruise departs at 5 pm. Need to be on ship by 4 pm. I book the 8 am flight with 90 minute flight time. Plane lands at 9:30 am. I'm good.

 

I would be good all the way through 1 pm. Even if my 8 am flight was delayed, there are other flights between 8 am and 1 pm. 

 

Same with all flights under 3 hours. I'd just adjust the flight time to a 6 am flight instead of 8 am. Still plenty of time.

 

What people seem to forget is that thousands of people drive and fly in the day of the cruise and it all works out most of the time.

 

It's an acceptable risk for me.

Word for word, this is exactly my case! Direct flight, 1.5 hours. Except, my plane lands at 9:00, with 3-4 other flights in-between 7:00 am to noon to take if it gets delayed!

Yep, totally an acceptable risk and really questions the "ALWAYS FLY IN X DAYS BEFORE" statements--although in general they are good statements. Sometimes, people are looking to book an "easy and cheap" cruise. Once you start making an "easy and cheap cruise" more expensive, then you could have gone on an different cruise all together. 

Especially watering down crown, which is close to bottom shelf. This is just false. 
 

if any drunkard could easy get slammed on a cruise, it would be me. They are not watering down booze. 
 

I’ve ordered Macallon and the other scotch that starts with the “G” (help me here) by the glass on rocks. Definitely the real deal. 
 

216, your opinion is simply wrong and libel.

27 minutes ago, Cruisingformetime said:

 

Even this can go wrong. though it's true that red-eye flights land early. The problem with that is, what happens if the toddler in the row behind you is wailing their poor little head off the whole flight and you don't get a lick of sleep on the plane? Now you're trying to navigate an unfamiliar city, on a time crunch and possibly in a foreign language, to start your vacation, on no sleep. Speaking from experience, guess how much fun that is?

 

It's worth the money to fly in the day before. If you've never seen the city, take two days.

Walking outside can go wrong, you can trip and break your wrists.

I mean, you're getting into that level of territory. For many of us, the "port city" is familiar. My SO is from LA, so she knows all about Long Beach, the traffic, and realistically how long exactly it gets to port in the worst possible case. She also takes that flight all the time (Boise to LA) and it's never, ever been delayed. Not to say that it won't "ever, ever" be delayed, but it's very low risk. Let's say it's delayed? You still have a half day to get there....there's flights from BIO to LA that are 30 minutes apart.

I think people make blanket statements to "ALWAYS" fly in the day before. In most cases, you should. Connecting flights are a good example. That's double the failure points, and connecting flights "usually" imply a flight time that's well over 4 hours, and it "usually" implies getting less sleep.

But a 3 hour direct flight (2 hour flight with time zone difference) and getting to an airport 7.5 hours before your sail off while being 2 hours away from port in an acquainted city, with plenty of sleep (getting up at 6 AM is not hard), in a month where the weather is quite nice, then I don't really see a lot of risk.

We land in LA at 9:00am. If we give ourselves 2 hours to get to port (realistically) from the moment we land, we'll arrive at 11:00am. 11:00am is our target, although it's a 3-4 hours earlier than when Carnival expects us to show. And we all know how this works--being early means you're still going to have to wait quite awhile to board.

Who wants to make a bet that I'll have time to check out Queen Mary before sail off?

Calculated risks can sometimes make sense. 

On 2/8/2020 at 11:48 PM, 216Cruiser said:

Like I mentioned, it got down to basic Crown Royal and Coke (Pepsi). Very weak and I watched the shot of Crown being measured. Nobody will convince me it isn't watered down. I drink the same thing at home. You pour a shot of crown in a rocks glass and fill the rest with your soda of choice, you're going to taste it. Barely could on the ship. 

Carnival does not water drinks down. Sweet drinks have a lot of sugars and such to them to where you're drinking lots of the "other stuff". When you're mixing drinks at home, you're probably not measuring 1.5 ounces, you're probably dumping in 3-4 ounces.

What I wanted to say though, and this is probably a true thing for others, but when you're outside, partying, super pumped, music blasting, under direct heat, hot, sweating, moving, that it seems that drinks affect you less.

I know this because it seemed true on my last cruise (drinking more than usual when I'm partying in direct heat to "feel" super buzzed) and I can attest to this when I'm fishing by sitting in a chair with heat beating on me at 95F chugging beers like it was nothing. Where if I was at home I'd be too tipsy under the same conditions.

Order a single shot of crown next time. It will taste exactly like a single shot of crown.

Also, I always had a bottle of water on me. I was always drinking water every 30-45 minutes. This plays into the "drunk" effect as well. 

Do you mean layover to mean connecting flight?

I would never fly the same day in a cruise in which I had a connecting flight (implies a long flight).

20 minutes ago, 216Cruiser said:

I'm thoroughly convinced that Carnival waters down their booze and nobody will convince me any differently. I'm actually a bit of a lightweight and could hardly get buzzed even when really trying. 

You are correct somehwat. But...the Alchemy Bar does NOT water down drinks, even the $8.95 drinks, and certainly not the $10.95 drinks. Plan to hit that area up A LOT. It's a good known secret. 🙂

With a cheers card, you are in complete control. The Lido deck place, just tell them you want it strong. Many bar tenders will make sure to make it right. They aint' going to double the ABV, but they will usually do a healthier pour. Without cheers, a $2 tip goes far and they'll do the same thing when you see them again...

Sadly, most places, even off the cruise ship, cannot make a healthy mixed drink. I rarely order a mixed drink anymore from a place I don't know because it's mostly a crapshoot. My local neighbor bar sure can do it right. That's why I personally stick to scotch/whiskey, strong beers, wine, or simple mixed well drinks if I just want something sweet with alcohol. You can't mess up beer, wine, or hard alcohol. 

I typically do mixed drinks while "coasting" throughout the day or to start a sea-day. 🙂 

If you watch Carnival make your mixed drinks, they do add the appropriate amount called for. It's hard to fake that. A tip or even just a request to make it stronger they typically will make it where you want it. Don't be afraid to speak up. 

Beer: $4.9-6.5 ($5.70 average)

Common mixed/frozen/wine/most of alchemy's menu/lido deck/nightclub/comedy club/yadda yadda: $8.80ish ($8.80 average)

Higher-end mixed drinks (available in some places): 10.95 ($10.95 average)

Hard alcohol: $5.75-11.95 ($8.85 average)

Average of all drinks: $8.5, because people that buy cheers are probably going to drink/try many different things.

Carnival Cheers: $51.95

$51.95 / $8.5 = 6.1 drinks.

This is another way to look at it that I simplified. See attached for drink menus at the most common locations. I didn't include beer and wine menus, but again carnival doesn't really carry "top shelf", and I'm very sure wine will fit into "common" drinks of 8.80ish on average which you just lumped as "foo-foo" drinks. 

6 drinks per day with Cheers, to break even, looking at Alcohol consumption alone. Telling people it's 5 drinks a day is false information IMO. Consider the averages of all drinks, and what most "drinkers' will be doing on a cruise. That is drinking everything.

1 hour ago, VentureMan_2000 said:

What didn't you understand regarding the math I presented ?  I provided the range of drink prices and how they affected the break even on the Cheers package. 

 

You somehow pulled out, "5 drinks per day means you are ordering the most expensive drinks that are only found in certain places (10.50ish)".   What does (10.50ish) mean ?    

You keep insisting on some form of fuzzy math that somehow makes sense to you.  Math is black and white... nothing fuzzy about it.

Your expectations are biased. First off,  you're conflating math with a variable that is constant (tips), so drop the constant. It's fluffy. You're also underestimating "foo-foo" drinks. See below. You then conflate it with buying water individually, which would be absolutely incorrect to do on a cruise. Everyone knows you buy a case of water if you don't have cheers pre-board for cheap.

There is no such thing as a 11.50 drink on carnival. At least It's one that I don't know about. Can you please explain which "pricier" drinks make the $11.50 mark and how relevant and common they are? The most expensive drinks are 10.95 at Alchemy (1/4 of the menu). The only hard alcohol drink that is "pricey" is Don Julio at $11.95, but I doubt most people will be sitting on Carnival taking Don Julio shots all day. I'll have a few, but not all day, for 7 days straight.

I'm not disagreeing with you much by the way, not sure where your hostility is coming from. Let me simplify it for you:

Beer: 8 to break even, agreed.

Blender/Frozen/Mixed/Common/Everywhere drinks (MOST DRINKS at MOST locations on the cruise ship): 6 to break even. This is what you call "Foo-foo" drinks, but I guarantee this is 90% of what people drink as they are available everywhere. 

Pricier drinks at 11.50? What does that mean? Look at my second paragraph above. But sure, if you are only drinking the two priciest drinks on the entire ship (which are not served in all places), then call it an even 5 to break even, if you are constantly hunting for "pricey" drinks.

What is the average of 8, 6, and 5?

6.3 drinks. Simplify it. Drop the .3. Who cares, It's 6 drinks.

I'm not aware of anyone that "hunts" for only the 2 priciest drinks at all times. When I'm on the lido deck, I'll get a drink from the lido deck that looks refreshing, probably a taquela sunrise, or something tropical. When I'm in the Redfrog pub, I'll probably grab a beer that looks refreshing. When I'm in Alchemy, I'll probably order something expensive because it's good stuff. When I'm in the dining room, maybe I'll order a glass of expensive wine?

The average is still 6 amongst all drinks at Carnival. It is not 5 drinks. Your post #71 is wrong. You state "5" drinks in that post as if no one drinks mixed drinks on a cruise.

I still ask you, what is the average of 8 (beer only), 6 (mixed/frozen/etc drink only), and 5 (rare top shelf stuff)?

I made the decision to fly the day of. Actually, a bunch of us made that decision last night.

Boise in April has very good weather, much like everywhere on the west coast. I can't see weather making any impact.

Usually when stuff is delayed, it's only delayed for a short period of time. Being that we've booked a flight that arrives at 9:02AM, we have lots of buffer room if we allow 2 hours to get to Long Beach port. So that serves as a semi-decent backup plan. Funny we talk about this, as my girlfriend's flight that she's on RIGHT NOW just got delayed.....for 30 minutes. That would be nothing based on the amount of buffer time we have for cruise day.

It's a calculated risk that has an extremely high probability to succeed. The whole point of this cruise was to "go for cheap". So that's what we're doing.

I managed to get 2 other groups, all first time cruisers, to go as well. Two of them are flying from Seattle, and Two of them are flying from PDX.

Super generic question. I've cruised before. The first cruise was a 7-8 hour flight, plus a 1 hour drive to port. The answer is easy - you should absolutely get a hotel.

Curious about my second cruise. My second cruise in April as a 1.5 hour flight time including time zone differences. I can get into LAX at 9:02am. Cruise won't leave until 4-5PM. Am I correct that in this case that flying in the night before is unnecessary?

Keep in mind though klfhngr is that port days really throw a wrench on calculations. For me, port days mean explore + fun + drink.

 It's easy to exceed cheers value on sea days, but those 6-8 beers you had in port, you now need 6 more when you get back on the ship for the 3 days you are in port. If you can't do that, it heavily weighs down the average of Cheers.....

personally, when I "drink", I don't want dairy products, nor do I crave "sweets', nor do I want "soda." If I want a "soda" then I will grab a lite beer...

One quick way of valuing cheers. Can you drink 6 drinks a day for 4 days straight, and THEN can you drink 12 drinks a day for 3 port days. If the answer is "no" (most people), you shouldn't be getting cheers, unless you are a cruiser that chooses to stay on the ship during port days...

My last word on this is that I'm barely a Cheers person. I would guess that most people will not come "up ahead" in the cheers package. Some people have been gracious to type in their "drink" itinerary for a day (thank you) but words of wisdom is that I want your actual 7-day itinerary of drinks on the ship including port days where you leave the ship and drank somewhere else. That's where things get really hazy...

45 minutes ago, VentureMan_2000 said:

 

fuzzy numbers...

Trust me on this as I did the research. You need closer to 6 drinks per day on average to break even. I spent time to google the menus. I took pictures when I was on the ship. 5 drinks per day means you are ordering the most expensive drinks that are only found in certain places (10.50ish). It assumes you are sitting at the alchemy bar all day and ONLY ordering the the best each time (which isn't most of the menu) or are doing Don Julio tequila shots only. People don't really do that on a cruise. Realistically, you'll order a range of things from 6-10.5 throughout the day depending on where you are at. The average is $8.25 per drink. I'm saying this to keep it simple. The average is closer to 6 drinks. It sounds stupid to argue over "5 or 6", but for 7 days, 6 drinks makes a difference when comparing the cost for Cheers vs non-Cheers.

Believe it or not, we are mostly in agreement, I think. You need to be a DRINKER in order to get the Cheers package. If you can manage a little more than a bottle of wine every day for 7 days straight, including your port days in which you drink off the ship,  you should probably get cheers. Many people I know should get cheers. Many other people who "think" they drink a lot (but really don't) should NOT get cheers. If you're falling over after drinking a bottle of wine you should NOT get cheers....it's geared towards people that are thirsty...

Sorry, it is not 5 drinks on average. It is 6 drinks. The average price of drink including beers, shots, and mixed drinks is $8-9ish. 

The bottle of water is a murky topic. Everyone knows (I hope) that pre-buying water in a case for your stateroom is just as cheap as the supermarket. I think it's like, $5 for 12-16 bottles or something. So let's leave water out of it, or just include $5 over the course of the trip, and just add a nice coffee per day. That won't effect your estimates very much though, just wanted to throw that out that if you are actually buying water individually on a cruise, you are doing it wrong!

I would also leave out the tip, because it's 18% percent regardless whether or not you have cheers or not. 🙂

It's still basically 6 drinks per day average to break even on. That would mean 42 drinks are necessary to break even, plus your bottle of wine that you brought onboard. All I'm saying is that this requires some heavy drinking.

For a 7 day cruise with my included 750ml bottle of wine on board:

This is my drink record for my last cruise, not including the $3.75 mocha that you may have each morning. Keep in mind that I personally like to start my day with some exercise before getting trashed and I don't start drinking until noon, so for me, all of this has to happen starting at 12:00PM on sea days:

Sail off: 2 drinks + 1x bottle of wine

Sea Day: 10 drinks

Port Day (beach day that included about 13 drinks: 0 drinks

Port Day (excursion + several drinks): 6 drinks

Port Day (excursion + several drinks): 5 drinks

Sea Day: 15 drinks

Sea Day: 7 drinks

= 45 drinks. The beach day I didn't want to even look at alcohol when I stumbled back on the cruise ship. The last sea day I had to slow down to just 7 drinks because it was just wearing on me at that point. But you can see that I broke into the positive, but not by a huge margin. That doesn't include the 7 coffees that I got either. So for me, Cheers worked, but again, it's was an uphill battle and a true test of endurance. There were times that I felt that I didn't "need" to drink (and probably shouldn't/wouldn't have), but because I had the card, why not? Did I mention I was 223 lbs and 6'4" that can hold alcohol very well?

For many people, this is not an easy feat. "It's a marathon, not a sprint".

Without cheers you'd still be spending around the same amount, if not less if you plan to do some cool port days. Without cheers, your game plan should be:

1) Bring a VERY healthy ABV Wine on port. A port wine, or something. Try to get near 20%.

2) Use the beer dispenser in the buffet if on a Vista class ship. It works out to a little less than $5 per 16Oz pour.

3) The most common "mixed drink" price on Carnival is $8.50, you should feel more than welcome to get as much as you'd like without thinking about your wallet. You're not going to get caught with a $15-20 drink on Carnival. The most expensive hard alcohol drink on Carnival is Don Julio, and it's $11.50. Everything else is around $6.50-8 if you like drinking hard alcohol straight. This point of this is to remind you that drinks are really not that expensive on Carnival to begin with.

4) Pre-buy a case of water. You shouldn't need to ever buy water individually.

5) Drink drip coffee most mornings. It's free. Coffee's job is to wake your ass up.

6) Splurge with drinks on port days. The nice thing about not having Cheers is because you are not paying for drinks that will be very difficult to do when you get back to the ship after being pretty loaded.

7) Add a bottle of Champagne pre-book. It's $24.95, which works out to $5 less than if you bought champagne individually.

I can easily see how you can still drink your ass off on Carnival, without the cheers card, and many cases spend less to around what Cheers would cost. Think about it. I haven't met much people that can out drink me.

Interesting guys, thanks.

It seems to me that the Nightclub got botched. 

You should get the cheers if you are not getting off the ship, that kinda makes it an easy. Remember though, EVERYONE 21+ in the stateroom gets cheers as well, whether they like it or not. If you're OK with that, then...

Cheers will work on any drink $20 or below. It has a maximum of 15 drinks per day. Cheers will not work for pitchers, "buckets", or any other "group" cocktail. It does not work for room service cocktails, nor will it work with a wine dispenser (like in the Library). 

You will be hard pressed on finding drinks that are over $12 on Carnival. I'm not sure if it's possible, maybe the Steakhouse or something?

As I've mentioned, drink prices without Cheers is very reasonable. 

ALL of drinks at Alchemy bar are either $8.50-11. Same for Havana bar. Same for probably every bar.

That's the reason I created this thread is to get people thinking. Because all beers are basically $4.50-6.50, and because all mixed drinks are basically $8.5-11. 🙂

A single serving of hard alcohol ranges from $5.25 - 11.95 depending on quality.

It probably means I need to work extra hard. 🙂

I thought about pulling up my sign and sail receipt from 2018...and hers to. 

That's a good post. Fully agree!

The last point you made is a serious flaw in the program that I'm hoping they resolve somehow because otherwise it's a good program. Making everyone in the stateroom do cheers is a band-aid for a different issue. It's obvious that some people will "break" the rules, but there are many other people that seriously cannot drink for a medical issue, religious issue, or they just drink very light, or don't want to drink at all while cruising. That's a lot of "real" people. Carnival is very strict on this--they won't accept a doctor's note, either. 

What's also good about the Cheers program is that it allows you access to specialty liquors that you would normally never buy to begin with...think of really aged scotch. 🙂

I'm probably going to do cheers again this time only because I was able to talk my girlfriend into it last night. That's $450 additional that we were not budgeting for the cruise. I will "probably" get my money's worth (and I will have to try like you mentioned because there is pressure when you have port days), but she will not get her money's worth. We figured that the path of least resistance is to just get cheers for us both rather than no one get cheers. Again, working very heavily in Carnival's favor!

Was just curious--I found this out after I booked my sail on the Panorama.

It appears that there is no separate "nightclub" anymore, which I always thought was a neat place, albeit on the smaller side, but still neat.

Now Carnival takes the limelight lounge and "makeshifts" it for the nightclub? There's really not a single picture online on what this looks like, but how is this working for people? Does it still feel like a nightclub? Makes me think of dancing in an empty auditorium. Is the bar makeshift now too?

I also noticed that the Indian food on the lido deck is gone, and is now replaced with a seafood joint (that is additional $). I am a little bummed about this, because the Indian food was easily one of the best things to eat on Carnival. The good news is that there's still plenty of good food on the ship, but I'm a little bummed that this is gone.

The alchemy bar is still there, which I've considered is one of the best bars on the ship for the best drinks that aren't sugared down. But I see that there's the "Havana" bar now. How does this compare--worth stopping in?

Guys, drink prices are not really that bad on the ship for the most part. Beers are $6.50 for a 16Oz pint (craft). Mixed drinks are around $8.50. Compared to many airports, stadiums, this is actually considered "cheap". That's only "a little more" than my neighborhood bar, although my neighborhood bar makes stronger mixed drinks that the Lido deck place. 🙂

Some people on this thread buy Cheers and don't even calculate if they are coming out or not. They just buy it for the convenience. I get it, but it doesn't aid or help the discussion. You really should figure out if you're coming out ahead or not. Coffees are $3, so don't over-value those. Two coffees = 1 "cheaper" drink like a Beer.

8 Beers on Carnival is $52. If you are a beer drinker, you will have to average 8 beers per day over 7 days including port days, to break even. This may sound easy to most, but keep in mind if you are getting shitfaced at an all inclusive beach and manage to get back into the ship, you'll need to drink 8 beers on that day, OR you will need to + 2 beers for the other days. That's what happened to me in Cozumel at Mr. Sanchos. 🙂

6 Beers on Carnival is $51. If you are a mixed drink person, you will have to average 6 mixed drinks over 7 days, including port days, to break even. Same as above, it's a marathon, not a sprint, so if you have a zero day, or got heavily loaded in port, you will have to make up on the other days.

Get Cheers if:

1) You are mentally and physically booze-cruising, not just "having a couple drinks a day."

2) You are a "luxurious" drinker that demands only the best quality liquors. Cheers is great for that.

3) You plan to drink "semi heavily", like to try new things, and love specialty coffee. 

4) You don't do port days.