Just looking for anything……

Hi Cruisers

Hope you have all had a nice couple of weeks, It seems a lot of you are really needing a cruise, because from most of my calls recently people are just looking to get away for a week or two anywhere. Yes anywhere, however that is actually harder to find than you might think, especially if you are looking to leave in the next week or so. Cruising is very different to a land based holiday, let’s face it most hotel rooms come with a window or balcony as standard, unfortunately on a cruise ship this is not the case, and with so many people now booking balconies on a cruise, they are much more difficult to find a week before the cruise departs. It always surprises me how disappointed people are when I tell them the only grade available at this late stage are inside cabins. I am then asked”well do you think any cancellations will become available” now to be honest we as agents are never really notified of cancellations and normally at such late notice, the cruise lines will normally move people around on board, what I mean is upgrade people already booked. The cruise lines will also need time to update their passenger manifest, this will normally happen a couple of days before the sailing, gone are the days when you could just show up at the port and get yourself booked on. Which I have actually done in the past, but with all the heightened security issues these days is never going to happen now. A lot of people think that if they leave the booking to the very last minute they will get a great deal, again this is not true and in my experience have found that actually even a week before a cruise the price can be more than you would expect. So if you are looking to get away I would check no later than about a month before departure, if you leave it any later, you will be very disappointed.

Now if you are looking for late fly cruise booking, remember not only will you need to find a cabin the chances of being able to find flights that fit the ships itinerary is going to be very unlikely and even if you were lucky to find flights expect to pay premium prices.

So if you are looking to get away, try not to leave it too late, otherwise you will find yourselves all very disappointed.