Cruise expense

[MotherofaPrincessLover]

Dave, we concur. DCL seems to be locked into a situation where they only depart from a Fla port for virtually every cruise. That makes it much more difficult for those of us that need to pay as much or more to get to Fla. However, we think it may be related to their desire to sell concurrent Land+Sea packages that include a WDW part. Kinda hard to do that if ship is departing from Bayonne, NYC, Baltimore, Galveston, Norleans, or non-Fla, or non-CA ports.

That's probably exactly true. After I had decided to go on a cruise out of Port Canaveral, I thought I might as well just go to Magic Kingdom for a day since I'll already be down there.

 

[Phonedave]

Move to Florida...

Sorry, the draw of cheaper cruising does not being to counter the problems with moving there.

 

[Kingdom Konsultant]

We give our clients on board credits to try to offset the expenses incurred on board. While the guarantee rooms are a good deal, the month of September has very good rates for the cruises out of Port Canaveral. You can place your deposit down when the pricing is released also since that is when they will be cheapest and if you know you cannot go, you can always cancel. I absolutely love DCL and for me to go on another cruise line I do find that I am constantly comparing them to DCL. I do the same if I stay at a non disney hotel no matter where it is, I am always comparing....

Pam

 

[flynnibus]

Anyone who tries to pick a date without any research will definitely be in for sticker shock. Just like anyone who thinks they can just pick christmas week at WDW at a deluxe and would be shocked by the rates.

Rates for the same cruise even can almost double depending on when you booked. Rates for different time periods are also radically different.

Cruises are not as adlib as showing up at a theme park - for the first timers, consulting with a Disney TA or reading something like the Passporters Guide should be a mandatory act before making any decisions. Because of life on board, what cruise, when to go, how to get there, what to expect, etc. It will make all the difference between frustration and delight.

 

[DisneyJoe]

Touringplans did 2 recent analysis:

This one does its best to compare the same cruise, same stateroom, with the only factor changing is the week and they plot the pricing over the year
http://blog.touringplans.com/2015/01/28/least-expensive-disney-cruise/

and this looks at stateroom category
http://blog.touringplans.com/2015/01/29/disney-cruise-stateroom-categories/

 

[flynnibus]

Touringplans did 2 recent analysis:

This one does its best to compare the same cruise, same stateroom, with the only factor changing is the week and they plot the pricing over the year
http://blog.touringplans.com/2015/01/28/least-expensive-disney-cruise/

and this looks at stateroom category
http://blog.touringplans.com/2015/01/29/disney-cruise-stateroom-categories/

Those are very nice and concise ways of visualizing it to people unfamiliar with the 'voodoo' of all the options