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There are 7 things that I have seen people I consider to be smart cruisers do every time they go on a cruise to ensure an unforgettable cruising vacation. I put these 7 smart cruise tips and tricks to the test on a cruise to see how they fare and stack up. Find out how I get on and what I recommend based on that.
Links mentioned in the video:
https://www.cruzely.com/cruise-line-drink-package-calculator/
https://www.cruisemummy.co.uk/cruise-drinks-package-calculator/
ABOUT TIPS FOR TRAVELLERS: If you want to get cruising right, Tips For Travellers makes it easy to plan and have the incredible cruise experiences you dream of every time. All my Tips For Travellers advice, tips and tricks tips draw on everything that I have learnt on the 77 cruises I have done to date.
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over the years i've observed that there
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are seven things
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that really smart cruisers do to
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maximize their chance of having a
0:07
phenomenal
0:08
cruise vacation so i'm gonna put those
0:10
to the test and show you what those
0:12
seven things are
0:13
and how i use those things that smart
0:15
cruisers do every single time they're
0:16
going to cruise
0:17
to make this cruise that i'm on right
0:19
now unforgettable
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and memorable so join me as i take you
0:23
through those seven things and how to
0:24
make them work
0:25
for you too if you're new here welcome
0:27
aboard my name is gary bembridge and my
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goal
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is to make it much more fun and even
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easier to discover
0:33
plan and enjoy unforgettable cruise
0:36
vacations
0:37
the first thing that smart cruisers do
0:39
once they've decided what itinerary they
0:40
want
0:41
and what ship they want is think about
0:44
the cabin and choosing the cabin
0:46
why is that really important a lot of
0:47
people say cabins are not important it's
0:49
just somewhere
0:50
to get changed and sleep however let me
0:52
tell you if you get
0:53
a cabin that doesn't suit you it will
0:56
ruin
0:56
your cruise i have thousands of people
0:58
contacting me around this issue so what
1:00
do
1:01
smart cruisers do what did i do for this
1:03
particular cruise well first of all
1:05
i never ever take a guaranteed fare
1:08
guaranteed fare is where you choose
1:10
which cabin grade you want a balcony
1:13
ocean view suite whatever it is
1:14
and you let the cruise line choose the
1:16
cabin for you i will always
1:19
take the choose your own cabin option
1:20
now it's not always
1:22
necessarily more expensive so that's the
1:24
first thing i do
1:25
get control of choosing a cabin secondly
1:28
i would always choose a cabin where i'm
1:29
surrounded on all sides
1:31
by other cabins so above me below me
1:34
either side of me and i did the opposite
1:36
me
1:36
i would make sure there's a cabin that
1:38
then kind of provides a buffer from
1:40
any noisy venues that may disrupt you it
1:43
can potentially protect you from
1:44
high traffic areas or whatever that is
1:47
really really important
1:49
the third thing i then do is make sure
1:51
that i'm having a cabin
1:53
with no interconnecting door to the next
1:55
room unless of course
1:56
i need one because i'm traveling with
1:57
someone that again is really important
1:59
because noise
2:00
and disruptions can seep through and
2:01
become pretty disruptive particularly
2:03
the people next to you
2:04
have a different schedule to you the
2:06
fourth thing i do
2:07
is i choose a cabin in the center of the
2:10
ship so
2:10
middle of the ship and that's really
2:12
important because first of all
2:14
it means that your kind of equidistance
2:15
from all of the key venues and
2:17
activities so
2:18
the restaurants might be at the back of
2:20
the ship or you might find the front of
2:22
the ship's the theater so you're kind of
2:24
middlewise also it's really important
2:26
because it's where you're going to have
2:27
the least amount of
2:28
movement so that's also good
2:30
particularly worried about being seasick
2:32
the next thing i do is i always choose a
2:34
cabin that sort of
2:36
in between the promenade deck sort of
2:38
where a lot of the
2:40
shops or the theater that kind of stuff
2:42
is and the lido deck which is where
2:44
you'll normally have things at the
2:45
buffet restaurant the pools
2:46
so try and get one that's sort of in the
2:48
middle of the ship that way as well
2:49
that means that you're then sort of
2:51
equidistant between where you like to
2:52
spend most of the time
2:54
on the cruise now i would always choose
2:56
a balcony so on this cruise i've also
2:57
chosen
2:58
a balcony cabin that's something that i
2:59
just like that's a personal preference
3:01
but i think smart cruisers if they can
3:03
push the budget would choose a balcony
3:04
it's great sitting out there in the
3:05
morning sitting at sunset watching
3:07
getting out of port relaxing and
3:09
whatever so once i've got my cabin
3:11
locked down and i've done that smart
3:13
move the next thing i do
3:15
is think about the money so the second
3:18
thing that smart cruises do is around
3:20
budgeting whether it's
3:21
pounds whether it's dollars whether it's
3:23
euros and it's really important
3:25
to understand this whole area because
3:28
look at the lowest fare is not the right
3:29
thing to do as any smart cruiser knows
3:31
the lowest fare may be hiding a
3:34
multitude of sins
3:35
it's estimated that cruise passengers
3:37
once you're on board you'll spend
3:38
between 50 percent and 100 or even more
3:41
of what you spend on the fair once you
3:43
get on board so really important to
3:44
understand what is and isn't included
3:46
as you look at the overall cost so for
3:48
example on the screws that i'm on right
3:50
now on piano
3:51
there's very few inclusions so the
3:53
actual overall fare
3:54
was pretty attractive however it did
3:57
include
3:58
gratuities however it didn't include
4:00
drinks
4:01
it didn't include excursions it didn't
4:03
include wi-fi
4:05
it didn't include specialty dining and
4:07
didn't include obviously things like the
4:09
casino
4:10
and bingo stuff like that however my
4:12
previous cruise
4:13
which i was on which is both viking and
4:15
saga they included everything and in
4:16
fact saga
4:17
even included the transfer from home to
4:19
the ship
4:20
so although this cruise looked
4:22
significantly cheaper than my other
4:24
cruises
4:24
once i bundled everything in and did a
4:26
comparison the differences were not as
4:28
great
4:28
as you expect so really really important
4:31
look what's included now my special
4:32
tip if you are looking for a smart thing
4:34
to do is to look for
4:36
promotions or wait to book when there's
4:38
promotions that bundle things in so as i
4:40
look at my cruises for next year
4:42
i think almost every single cruise that
4:43
i've booked has
4:45
a series of inclusions as part of the
4:47
overall affairs promotion so
4:49
often it's including wi-fi gratuities
4:52
drinks and then some of them even
4:54
include excursions
4:56
as well there's a myriad of those now so
4:58
holland america for example has the
5:00
hazard all
5:01
celebrity has a bundled fare oceania
5:03
cruises has its own life where you pick
5:05
and choose
5:05
some of those so really really important
5:07
is make sure you know what's included
5:09
and not included
5:10
and be kind of budget wise and budget
5:13
smart
5:14
now that's all well and good but if you
5:15
find for example that drinks
5:17
are not included and you have to look at
5:20
buying drinks and you're thinking about
5:21
a drinks package
5:22
there is a lot of smart watch outs that
5:24
you need to know about when it comes to
5:26
drinks
5:27
now i don't drink alcohol so things like
5:29
this free bottle of
5:30
fizzy that i got given when i came to
5:32
the cabin doesn't help me a lot
5:34
neither do drinks packages however i
5:36
know that i'm the exception
5:37
so one of the critical things when it
5:39
comes to drinks packages is bear in mind
5:41
that cruise lines all offer them
5:43
and they push them like crazy so that
5:44
for me is always a warning sign
5:46
if the cruise line is pushing something
5:47
it probably means they make lots of
5:49
money from it
5:50
however take a look very carefully
5:52
drinks packages now i always used to
5:53
wrestle with it
5:54
on what's the best way of assessing a
5:55
drinks package now i've actually found
5:57
two phenomenal calculators which you can
6:00
use to work out if a drinks package
6:02
makes
6:02
sense the first of these calculators is
6:04
on the site
6:05
cruiserly.com and on there you can go in
6:08
and input how many drinks you'll have by
6:10
type
6:10
per day it'll tell you how much you'd
6:11
like you to spend on that particular
6:13
cruise line
6:14
and then you can compare it with what it
6:16
will cost you for a drinks package
6:18
there's a similar calculator on the
6:20
cruise mummy dot co dot uk side an
6:22
advantage of that one is particularly if
6:23
you're in the uk
6:24
looking at some of the uk lines she
6:26
covers that there
6:27
the advantages on those calculators you
6:29
can then see how much you'll spend based
6:30
on what you normally drink
6:32
compare it to the price of a drinks
6:33
package also when you look at a drinks
6:35
package
6:36
bear in mind there are a lot of
6:37
restrictions and make sure you
6:39
understand what they are so every smart
6:40
cruiser will do this
6:41
so first of all for example many of them
6:43
will limit the number of drinks you can
6:45
have per day
6:46
and that could be 12 or 15 so it's still
6:47
quite a lot but that also includes
6:49
things like coffees
6:50
and speciality teas for example secondly
6:53
you might find that
6:54
every single adult in your cabin has to
6:57
buy the drinks package if one person
6:59
buys it now that's not true of all lines
7:00
but it is true of many
7:02
and thirdly a lot of them will restrict
7:05
the type of drinks you can have on the
7:06
drinks package so though you might
7:07
be able to have 12 or 15 it may say
7:10
limit all drinks up to say 12
7:12
per drink itself so some of those more
7:14
exotic cocktails or
7:16
cognacs or whatever are not included so
7:18
take a look very carefully those
7:19
exclusions
7:20
and be smart about those because you
7:22
might find it doesn't make sense so the
7:24
calculator
7:24
plus the restrictions is the smart thing
7:26
to do when it comes to drinks
7:28
if you don't drink alcohol like me still
7:30
look at the packages and particularly
7:31
the soda
7:32
and the specialty coffee ones because
7:34
some of them don't have a requirement
7:35
per day so for example on princess
7:37
you basically have a certain number of
7:39
specialty coffees
7:40
during the course of the cruise so it
7:42
could actually be quite beneficial
7:44
so once you've figured out if a drinks
7:46
package is for you there's one more
7:47
smart thing that you should do
7:49
both with the drinks packages and other
7:51
things that you might be planning to do
7:53
on board figuring out if you need a
7:55
drinks package before you go is really
7:56
important once you've decided that
7:58
and the other things that you might want
8:00
to do on board whether it's by wi-fi
8:02
with especially dining whether it's
8:04
excursions
8:05
go onto the cruise line website most of
8:08
them will have a cruise personalizer
8:10
and look at the offers and the packages
8:12
because you'll normally find that most
8:13
cruise lines
8:14
will give you a discount if you book
8:17
those in advance now the downside with
8:18
many
8:19
is you might have to actually pay for
8:20
those in advance and on some cruise
8:22
lines you can't
8:23
use any onboard credit against those and
8:25
again it differs by cruise line whether
8:26
you can
8:27
or can't but you'll normally find there
8:29
are deals to be had and what's important
8:31
to remember
8:32
is it's extremely unlikely that those
8:34
deals will be
8:36
better once you get on board because
8:37
they don't want lots of unhappy people
8:39
who've been organized
8:40
and then they come on board and see it's
8:42
cheaper so definitely
8:44
pre-book all of those things that you
8:46
think you're going to want to have
8:48
of course once you get on board do check
8:50
the the deals are available on any
8:52
embarkation deals but you'll generally
8:54
find by booking those things early focus
8:56
on excursions
8:57
focus on wi-fi focus on drinks packages
9:00
and focus on specialty
9:01
dining so once you've got those things
9:04
all sorted and is getting much closer to
9:06
the cruise
9:06
there is a couple of other really
9:08
special things you should do
9:10
if you want to be crew smart and the
9:11
first of those is around
9:14
the when you arrive for your cruise
9:16
which is
9:17
extremely important i always
9:20
always make sure that i arrive wherever
9:24
i'm going to
9:25
the day before the cruise now if i'm
9:27
actually just traveling locally so i'm
9:29
just driving an hour and a half
9:30
away i don't do that i don't head down
9:32
to the port in advance
9:33
but i always get there the day before so
9:35
if even if you're coming from quite far
9:37
away and involves a lot of travel get
9:39
there the day before
9:40
there's nothing more stressful than
9:43
starting to run late for a cruise and of
9:44
course there's nothing more
9:45
awful than missing the actual
9:48
embarkation and departure of your ship
9:52
so absolutely build into your costs
9:55
build into your budgeting
9:56
getting there a day early that extra
9:58
cost of a hotel overnight
10:01
is well worth the stress
10:04
removal and the risk of missing your
10:06
cruise smart cruisers
10:08
consistently will always say get there
10:10
the day before
10:12
it's just too unpredictable not to
10:14
talking about the area of reducing risk
10:16
and reducing stress i guess one of the
10:18
things that really came into focus
10:20
as we headed into the whole coveted
10:22
shutdown
10:23
and all the drama that that ensued from
10:25
that is we learned the importance of
10:27
actually minimizing risk and one of the
10:29
things
10:29
that smart cruisers do is focus on
10:32
reducing and minimizing risk now there's
10:34
a couple of things to do
10:35
some of which some people would
10:36
definitely disagree with but i'll give
10:38
you the three
10:38
that i absolutely focus on and at least
10:41
suggest that you consider these to
10:43
reduce the risk
10:44
smart cruisers will first of all decide
10:46
around the vaccine and vaccinated
10:48
cruises now i know there are different
10:49
opinions around the role of vaccines and
10:51
not vaccines
10:52
but currently where we're heading is
10:53
we're seeing a wide variety
10:55
of issues around where you can go what
10:58
you can do on ships and how that's
11:00
playing out
11:01
so whilst you can go in some countries
11:04
in some places
11:04
without a vaccination there are much
11:06
more limits on what you can do
11:08
so for example you might have to pay
11:09
extra for tests you might find in
11:11
certain ports you can't go and explore
11:12
yourself and
11:14
you might find it even part of the ship
11:16
or close off to you
11:17
so certainly consider whether it's worth
11:19
having a vaccine or focusing on vaccine
11:21
cruises
11:22
just because that's going to be the
11:23
thing that gives you more
11:25
to do less restrictions and you're going
11:28
to find it just much easier particularly
11:29
if you're looking at traveling
11:30
internationally now i know not everyone
11:31
agrees with that but that's certainly
11:33
something at least think about
11:34
the second thing that's absolutely
11:36
critical whether you agree with
11:37
vaccinations or not with vaccinations
11:39
is travel insurance and this is required
11:42
by many cruise lines so
11:43
even some vaccinated cruises that are
11:46
heading out of parts of europe they
11:47
require now
11:48
proof of travel insurance when you check
11:50
in in some places like in the u.s some
11:52
cruise lines only requiring it
11:54
for unvaccinated passengers however
11:56
travel insurance is really really
11:58
important
11:58
uh particularly in these ongoing times
12:01
where things chop and change
12:03
buy travel insurance when you book your
12:05
cruise so smart cruisers will book it
12:07
and buy it at the same time as they book
12:09
their cruise and what's important is
12:11
build into that
12:11
council for any reason so if you have to
12:13
cancel your cruise for whatever reason
12:15
it's covered because you can't always
12:16
get refundable deposit but really
12:18
important make sure that you have
12:19
medical cover
12:21
particularly related and that will
12:23
include covert
12:24
evacuation and repatriation so even if
12:27
you end up going on a cruise
12:28
break your leg or have some other
12:30
problem when you're abroad which i have
12:31
seen happen to people on cruises
12:33
they haven't had travel insurers and
12:34
it's cost them thousands and thousands
12:36
and thousands of pounds
12:38
so travel insurance is the second one
12:40
the third one which is
12:41
slightly less dramatic is bear in mind
12:44
that
12:45
cruise ships do not have a dentist and
12:47
they don't have
12:48
access to dental facilities so i always
12:50
take with me a dental repair kit
12:53
as part of my little first aid kit and i
12:54
always have a little first aid kit so
12:56
smart cruisers will always have their
12:57
own little first aid kit
12:58
so of the remedies that you like to have
13:01
and have that dental repair kit which
13:02
you can buy
13:03
from a drugstore i've it's helped me
13:05
it's helped loads of passengers i've
13:07
come across
13:07
and it's a really big issue it's
13:09
definitely something that smart cruisers
13:11
will do
13:11
one other really key thing that smart
13:14
cruisers do which might be a surprise
13:16
to you is this one and it's something
13:18
that i didn't used to do but i started
13:20
doing a couple of years ago and now i
13:22
absolutely swear by and i do have it as
13:24
one of my critical things that smart
13:26
cruisers do
13:27
and it's this one nowadays and from here
13:30
onwards
13:30
smart cruisers will always use a cruise
13:34
travel agent now i used to be perhaps
13:36
like many of you
13:37
i used to think i'm savvy i'm smart i'm
13:39
a
13:40
sophisticated experienced traveler and i
13:43
will do my own pick and mix i'll book my
13:44
own flights my hotel
13:46
my cruise direct and bundle and put
13:49
things together
13:50
i saw once we headed into the covert
13:53
situation
13:54
and actual fact a couple of cruises
13:56
before that when things went wrong
13:57
the value of having a travel agent you
14:00
have
14:00
one single person that deals with
14:03
everything it's one email it's one call
14:05
and they can handle everything it's
14:07
really important to understand that
14:09
cruise travel agents will at worst be
14:11
the same price
14:12
as booking direct so it's not like say
14:14
if you book a hotel or stuff like that
14:16
where they're often booking direct you
14:18
can get it cheaper travel agents will at
14:19
worst be the same price and often
14:21
will be better they'll put other and
14:23
bundle other things in but certainly
14:25
i all of my cruises i do through a
14:27
cruise travel agent of course i still
14:28
research it
14:29
i look at the cabins i look at the ships
14:31
of the itineraries i look at the prices
14:33
but i put it all through a travel agent
14:35
now depending on the country you're in
14:36
travel agents can also put together
14:38
packages where if one of the
14:40
elements of it goes bankrupt or
14:42
something happens they can get you
14:44
out of the rest of it without
14:47
big penalties without lots of cost so a
14:50
cruise travel agent i stress
14:51
a cruise travel agent specialist is
14:53
really important especially if you're
14:55
new to cruising
14:56
they will know the ships they will know
14:57
the lines they will also help you
15:00
you know navigate through many of these
15:02
tips that i've actually given you right
15:04
here now if you want to know
15:05
more smart tips about cruising and
15:08
things to do
15:09
take a look at this video where i put
15:11
together some of my
15:12
favorite and most important mistakes and
15:14
tips that people make and how to
15:16
overcome them so why don't you take a
15:18
look there
15:19
and you'll discover straight up the
15:21
biggest mistake that people make and how
15:23
to overcome it
15:24
so click on that and i'll see you over
15:25
there now
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