When is the cheapest cruise? Is it cost-effective?

Cruise travel is really becoming more and more popular these days. Did you consider whether a cruise would meet your standards when you went there? Here's a little information about cruising so you can decide if it's worth it.

Everyone will tell you that you can travel to Japan for five days and four nights for around 2,000 per person when taking a cruise. The round-trip air ticket usually costs more than 2,000 balabala, and you can also eat for free on the cruise.

When is the price around 2000?

Aft cabin off-season cabin

You have to find a way to take leave in the off-season, and generally the weather is already cold in the off-season, so everything on board Most of the outdoor entertainment activities will be closed, which takes away most of the fun.

The aft cabin means the boat is about to leave, but there are a few places to go. If there's a clearance sale, you'll travel.

What do you mean, inner cabin? There are no windows, a dozen square meters of room, and the cramped feeling is very cool.

Let me show you the summer cruise prices.

The amount shown in the picture is still the price of the inner cabin.

2. Do you think it’s over once you pay the shipping fee?

Dear, find a tip of US$10-15/day/person.

Dear, let me know the wifi fee of 10-15 US dollars/set/day.

Dear, there is an additional charge for land tours, about 300-500 RMB/person/day. There are even some ships that charge hundreds of dollars if you don't land, because you don't make any profit for them.

Dear, almost all the fun activities on the ship are charged, such as wind tunnel skydiving, Caribbean surfing, fun go-karts, and laser tag. The prices are more expensive than on land.

Oh, there are free meals on the ship, but the drinks are not free. Either drink more when eating the buffet, or drink the mineral water in the room.

Oh, don’t expect too much from free meals, it’s a buffet level of 98/seat on the street. I describe it as "the most wasteful method of cooking". The various seafood and steaks looked so enjoyable that I frowned while eating them. I can’t say enough about how delicious they are, just eat them. But be prepared to compete with Chinese aunties for plates. It is said that Joy was taken to Alaska by a Chinese aunt.

What? If you don't want to eat, you can pay. The board has it, as long as you have the money.

Play time

Do you think 5 days and 4 nights is 4 days in Japan?

Start boarding at noon on the first day and leave at night.

The next day, cruise on the sea.

On the third day, we disembarked at about nine o'clock and joined the tour group for sightseeing. Boarding the plane around 7pm.

Article 4: Swim fast in the sea.

Return to Hong Kong on the morning of the fifth day.

Yes, you took five days off, but you actually went to Japan for one day. And 99% of the attractions you go to are various parks and shrines that do not charge admission. Of course, most of the time you go to shopping malls.

By the way, the shopping spots are also carefully selected (many of them are duty-free shops acquired by domestic companies), and the prices are much more expensive than outside drugstores and electrical appliance stores. Otherwise, why don’t you take a cruise to Japan? There are no baggage restrictions on cruises.

Similarly, 6 days and 5 nights in Japan actually refers to 2 days, 3-4 days, 8 days and 7 nights.

Do you think that day in Japan is from 9 to 7 pm?

A ship with at least two to three thousand people was blocked by the quality of the Chinese people. If you are not a gold card or suite customer, you can wait in line slowly and not get off the ship for half an hour. The average disembarkation speed is almost an hour. Again, boarding takes half an hour, the average is an hour.

And there is no use waiting in line to get off the boat early. After all, everyone travels to land by car. You get on the bus, but your group mates must still be queuing up to get off the boat. etc.

In addition, although the two to three thousand people were divided after entering Japan, most of the cruise ships docked in small cities, so it would definitely be overcrowded if two to three thousand people were squeezed in at once. Apart from anything else, there was a long queue to buy something at the duty-free shop.

Accommodation

After checking into a room on a cruise ship, you will find that hotels in Japan and Hong Kong are particularly spacious.

Take the one with the largest number of balcony rooms as an example. Venice is 17 square meters, Happy is 20 square meters, Quantum and Princess are slightly larger at 23-24 square meters. Don’t forget that this area also includes the balcony. Basically, if you put 2 boxes, you can only walk sideways like a crab.

Prices in peak season are sky-high.

I once planned to take my wife and son to ride a quantum car during the summer vacation. I asked about the price and it was about 8,000/person (8 days and 7 nights trip). My son was only 2 and a half years old at the time, so I took it for granted that at least the price of having a child was?

Unexpectedly, at 2 and a half years old, the child is no longer considered a baby and has very little food. If they share a bed with an adult, they must pay the same as the adult. At first I thought Ctrip had made a mistake, so I called to the Caribbean and got the same answer: There are discounts for children in the off-season, and sometimes even the third person is free, but in the peak season the adult price is charged.

Two cups of W4 for three people? This does not include tips, wifi, land tours, paid meals, etc. Later, the three of us went to Singapore for 8 days. Excluding the total cost of shopping, we spent 2W2. We stayed at 5 Star Universal Studios and enjoyed all the fun.

The most embarrassing thing is the land tour.

If you have the heart of me eating and drinking on the boat, you can ignore this article.

But if you want to go to Japan, I advise you to give up the cruise. All the disadvantages of group travel are most vividly reflected in cruise shore excursions:

The first is the endless waiting. There are two to three thousand people, and the routes are different. People in the same car with you cannot get off at the same time after passing the security check.

Secondly, the scenic spots are full of potholes. As mentioned above, most are free parks and shrines, mostly in small cities in Kyushu and Shikoku. Tokyo, the largest city, has no stopover routes, blessing.

Finally, there is no doubt that it will take you to the shopping store for a long time. I won’t say anything else. You can wait in line for half an hour to check out.

Mainland China lacks suitable routes for cruise ships.

What is the most important thing about a cruise? Ah, sea view, but can you see the Bohai Sea and the Yellow Sea? It’s nice to see the sea without smog.

Every year from October to April of the following year, so many fun water sports on the ship are closed, and there is nothing you can do if it is too cold.

Refer to internationally renowned cruise lines, such as the picturesque Caribbean Sea: Sunny Beach, Mediterranean Connection Tour: World Famous Cities, Norway and Alaska Aurora, Fjords, and Glacier Tours.

In comparison, cruise ships departing from Shanghai and Tianjin are not cost-effective at all. This is like Americans going on a cruise to the Caribbean or Alaska. Few people choose to start in New York or Los Angeles.

Of course, cruises departing from Guangdong and Hong Kong are also good. The weather is warm and the water is clear. Even if you want to soak up the sun on the boat, you can go in the off-season. Even those destinations in Southeast Asia are not visa-free, which is a bit troublesome. You can also turn those X sand islands into various small islands in the Caribbean.

Policy restrictions

The first is the visa. Japan and South Korea couldn't help but sign China, and cruise ships are visa-free. But there is a prerequisite for this visa exemption. You want to travel in a group, which has been spoiled by domestic travel agencies.

Secondly, it seems that tickets cannot be sold directly on board. Usually, the tickets are sold to travel agencies. The travel agencies use the routine of shopping to recoup the costs by moving out the low-priced tours, desperately driving down the boat prices, and then go ashore and use shopping to recoup the costs. But the money I received for the boat ticket was too little, so I had to rely on various paid items on the boat to get the money back.

In general, the ship owners want to make quick money, the travel agencies want to make dirty money, and what is left for tourists is a waste of chicken feathers.