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Tips On Avoiding Blowing Your Cruise Budget. In this video learn about the five biggest hidden and unexpected costs you will incur on board your cruise ship that can mount up and significantly increase the cost of your vacation. Cruise industry experts say that the average cruise passenger will spend at least $500 per person on board the ship across a seven day cruise, and most much more In this video I talk about the five things you need to be prepared for, and how to minimise these - especially as it is hard to avoid spending anything on each of these.
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Every week Tips For Travellers shares videos to help you make the most of your precious travel time and money on both land and at sea. First-hand travel inspiration, advice and tips based on the over 20 years I have been travelling every month.
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in this video I'm going to tell you
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about the five items that could
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completely blow the cost of your crews
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apart and go beverage of tips of
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travelers on average people spend at
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least $500 per person on board the ship
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per seven days that's a thousand dollars
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per couple and that's probably on the
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low side so a couple of things that you
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absolutely need to watch out for well
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the first of those is gratuities so they
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can vary from a low end from $12 per
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person per day right up to almost $20
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per person per day and they keep going
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up gratuities are increasingly auto
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added on to your bill by the cruise
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lines if you're traveling with an ultra
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luxury cruise line gratuities are
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normally included in the fare and also
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if you're traveling in some regions of
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the world where tipping is not
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culturally the norm like Australia
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you'll also often find the patooties are
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included in the fare but for those
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regions of the world they are Auto added
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by the cruise line onto your bill now in
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some cases on some lines you can go in a
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quest they're either reduced increased
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or totally removed but increasingly
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cruise lines are moving away from that
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so at the time of recording for example
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on Norwegian Cruise Line if you want to
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change the auto gratuities you have to
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pay them and then apply for a refund or
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a change once you've left the cruise but
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they are in fact an integral part of the
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members of crew onboard salary and they
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really rely on those gratuities so in
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some ways in my view adding gratuities
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and also editing is a little bit as
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honest because all the cruise line is
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really doing is keeping the headline
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fare down but actually it's something
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that you've got to pay and the crew
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members salaries really depend on those
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Cotuit ease so gratuity is going to cost
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you around $100 per person per 7 days
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the second thing to watch out for are
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drinks now unless you just drinking
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water or you're perhaps on one of those
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high-end cruises where drinks are
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included but for most cruise lines and
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most cruises you're going to drink more
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than the tap water that's available even
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if you don't drink a lot you'll soon
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find even just soft drinks coffees teas
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can soon mount up cruise lines also add
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gratuities on to your drinks of around
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about 15% most cruise lines offer drinks
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packages
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these can cost around about 55 dollars
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and up for an all-inclusive package that
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includes soft drinks wines beers spirits
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that's fifty five dollars per person per
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day and also if you're traveling with
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someone everyone in the cabin has to buy
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the package so you're talking around
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about a hundred dollars per person per
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day there are of course cheaper packages
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like soft drinks only ones which could
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be $25 per person per day so you can
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easily be spending around about for a
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couple hundred dollars a day just on
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drinks the third thing to watch out for
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are excursions now of course if you're
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going on a cruise just to stay on the
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ship and you don't plan to get off any
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ports there's gonna be no costs at all
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however most people when they're gonna
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cruise get off in the port and many
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people will go on excursions either with
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the cruise line or with independent
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providers or they may even go traveling
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by themselves on things like hop on hop
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off buses or taxis if you're going on
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cruise on excursions you're going to
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mount up a pretty hefty bill excursions
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can cost anything on the low end from
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forty fifty dollars just for a very
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simple transfer perhaps to a beach up to
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a course many thousands of dollars on
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average I've found excursions were going
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to cost you around about $75 to $100 per
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excursions so again you could be
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spending that amount of money every
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single day of the cruise you can
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minimize those costs by going on
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independent excursions which may cost
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you slightly less of course you can self
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talk but still you're gonna have things
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like entrance fees hopping off buses
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taxis so again you need to make sure
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that you understand what excursions you
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want to go on and budget for them
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because you could find yourself spending
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$250 and upwards on excursions on your
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seven-day cruise the fourth big wall
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chart is the internet now the internet
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on board cruise ships is very expensive
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you can be spending anything from 25
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cents a minute up to 75 cents and above
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so even if you're just spending an hour
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online at the best package price
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available you could be spending $100 per
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person across the course of a seven days
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now the good news is cruise lines under
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standard internet and access is becoming
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more and more important to people and
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they are trying to drive down the cost
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of the Internet
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I have spent up to $250 in a seven-day
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cruise just to have decent Wi-Fi access
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to be able to do all the things that I
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want to do online whether it's checking
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emails a little bit of browsing social
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media so
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that could be a big cost that can
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completely flow away your budget now the
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fifth thing is discretionary spend
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things that you might want to do on
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board and you can probably control these
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more but there are things that you soon
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find you're racking up a lot of costs
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for one of the big ones is speciality
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dining of course your fare includes all
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your meals so in the main dining room or
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the you know buffet restaurant often
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it'll include room service but what the
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cruise lines have started to do is to
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put in more and more speciality
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restaurants whether it's a steak
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restaurant a sushi restaurant burgers
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restaurant because they want to get you
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to spend more money on board now the
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charge for speciality restaurants can be
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on the low end just ten dollars or so
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that it can go right up to $75 or more
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so if you decide you want to start
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eating at those special energy
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restaurants it's gonna cost you quite
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over money so even you know one night
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out for two of you could be cussing you
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you know one hundred and fifty dollars
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the other thing of course is spa
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treatment spa treatments onboard ships
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can be very expensive
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I found the cost of treatments to be
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quite high versus what I find them to be
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on land so you can be paying way over
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$100 just for a 60-minute massage the
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good news is the fitness center is free
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to use a table try and also sell you
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classes for example where you can be
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paying you know $25 per class another
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thing that people rack up a lot of cost
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is buying the onboard photographs there
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are photographers all around the ship at
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every event they take lots of pictures
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and you want to know why it's because it
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earns the cruise lines a lot of money
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pictures themselves are pretty expensive
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to buy again you can buy packages that's
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something that people really like to do
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they like to have a picture taken with
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the captain or senior officers which are
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often offered because again the cruise
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lines know that a lot of people want to
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buy those and of course then there's
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gambling and gaming like bingo and again
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that's come not compulsory is something
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you might want to do but again if that's
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the sort of thing that you like to do
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and it's very easy when you're on
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vacation to get swept up in that whole
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thing and find yourself spending quality
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at the casino because he knows I'll take
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up a lot of space on cruise ships and
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again if you've wondered why it's
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because it makes them a good sized
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amount of money so once you're on board
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those are the things to really watch out
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for some of them are quite hard to avoid
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simply to tease you know you've got to
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drink something
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more than just water even if you're a
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non drinker you've got excursions
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because you got
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to go out and see the port and you've
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got the internet and you gotta have
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discussion you spend as you look at the
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cruise don't just look at the fair
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you've got to think about those other
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costs which are pretty hard to avoid and
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could add a huge amount onto the cost of
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your cruise hope you found that helpful
6:53
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6:58
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