Sounds like everything is included in the price of the cruise except dinner at one restaurant. Anyone have more details?

Thanks!

Not included:
Shore Excursions
Alcoholic drinks
Soda from the bars (I believe) since you can get free self-serve soda. (Free with meals at the sit-down restaurants and at self-serve stations at Castaway Cay.
Specialty drinks from bars/lounges.
Bottled water.
Some activities such as bingo and wine tasting. (Charges are listed in the daily Personal Navigator.)
Tips/gratuities.
Spa Treatments
Meals at Palo

Kinda hard to give you an "exact" list but that gives you an idea for starters. You really can go on the trip without spending extra cash.

Not included:
Meals at Palo


Well, not exactly. I know what you're trying to say - there is an "extra" charge for Palo (apparently in order to provide gratuities for that waitstaff since they are not included in the general tipping pool). But guests do not have to pay for their ENTIRE meal at Palo (which would obviously be very expensive) just the gratuity (used to be $5 per person - I think it is $10 or $20 per person now).

The surcharge is now $ 10 pp at Palo.

But guests do not have to pay for their ENTIRE meal at Palo ...
In essence we are saying the same thing two different ways. You still have to pay something to experience Palo. $10/pp is a steal for the experience from what I hear.

But the great thing about a cruise is that pretty much everything is included. You can pretty much walk on to the ship with $5 in your pocket and pretty much leave with that same $5 in your pocket. But I will say that adding on Tips was pretty much the largest "expected" expense outside of your cruise fare. (I say expected because I would hate to think that someone would not actually tip those that serve them throughout their stay.)

Then dont forget to consider the costs of any airport/resort transfers that might be needed and trip insurance. They may not be automatically included in your cruise costs. (And I do consider trip insurance a must have as it did pay out for me once and was well worth it.) I know that if you go through DCL directly, they do a good job of itemizing these costs for you but not sure if all TA's do that. (Im sure the good ones do.)

Not included:
Shore Excursions
Alcoholic drinks
Soda from the bars (I believe) since you can get free self-serve soda. (Free with meals at the sit-down restaurants and at self-serve stations at Castaway Cay.
Specialty drinks from bars/lounges.
Bottled water.
Some activities such as bingo and wine tasting. (Charges are listed in the daily Personal Navigator.)
Tips/gratuities.
Spa Treatments
Meals at Palo

Kinda hard to give you an "exact" list but that gives you an idea for starters. You really can go on the trip without spending extra cash.


DCL photos (the ones taken by their photogs) were one of our biggest onboard expenses.

DCL photos (the ones taken by their photogs) were one of our biggest onboard expenses.
Good add to the list. Too bad they dont use PhotoPass or something similar. It just seems like a huge waste to see many of those pre-printed pictures go to waste.

The surcharge is now $ 10 pp at Palo.

But SO worth it!!! The food is awesome and the service is amazing. We ended up tipping 30 dollars on top of the 10 each because our server was amazing. Totally went out of her way to make accommodations for my shellfish allergy (a tricky one on a cruise ship, as there's lots of seafood).

Good add to the list. Too bad they dont use PhotoPass or something similar. It just seems like a huge waste to see many of those pre-printed pictures go to waste.

Yeah, I agree, and it was sort of a hassle to go find them every day or so and pile them up together. There must be a ton of wasted paper from unpurchased photos.

I thought that it was VERY sneaky that the larger size photos from formal night were not included in the package that was offered.

I think the Photopass idea is excellent.

Yeah, I agree, and it was sort of a hassle to go find them every day or so and pile them up together. There must be a ton of wasted paper from unpurchased photos.

I thought that it was VERY sneaky that the larger size photos from formal night were not included in the package that was offered.

I think the Photopass idea is excellent.

We were just having a very long discussion about this very topic last weekend with several cruise friends. I have a theory about why they haven't implemented photopass - there a several reasons:

1) How do they handle families? All too often, you are split up. Adults in the spa, Kids in the nursery or club/lab, etc. Does every family member have their own pass? Since they do so many candid photos in the kids program, do you really trust your 3 year old (or teenage for that matter) to hold onto and present their photopass on the spot? Not to mention that it also kills the 'candid' nature of it quite a bit if you have to dig the card out and let them scan it first.

2) Have you ever been in the photo studio the night before disembarcation? Talk about nuts. Now imagine that they had to work with all those families standing over computer screens trying to decide which photos to buy, and then having to order them and get them produced. Not a task I would want to try. They won't even develop traditional or digital film on the final night - they are too busy just trying to ring up purchases. (You *might* be able to talk them into reprints, but don't hold your breath)

3) The Impulse Factor. You have all your photos already printed and you sort through them. By the end, you will probably have several in your purchse that you would not have ordered seeing on the screen. It is Retail 101 - and we see it everyday in our business. Customers at the store impulse buy. Customers ordering electronically don't. I think the principal holds here.

I agree that there is an incredible amount of waste. You should have seen the dozens of bins of photos after the first Panama Canal cruise that we're not purchsed. But, they do recycle all of that photo paper, so it is not totally wasted.

I would also bet that they have a number of studies that show that having the walls of photos increases sales by some percentage.

As usual, Tony, you are absolutely right. :)

I guess part of the incentive would be to NOT have the Photo area so crowded. People could go home and choose their photos from home!

Actually, I would probably buy more photos if I could do so from home. I hate trying to bring pictures back in my luggage, etc.

1) How do they handle families? All too often, you are split up. Adults in the spa, Kids in the nursery or club/lab, etc. Does every family member have their own pass? Not to mention that it also kills the 'candid' nature of it quite a bit if you have to dig the card out and let them scan it first.

The kids almost all wear their cabin key around their neck. They could do the same thing with the photopass. Or they could have a wristband on each kid that the photographer could scan. Photopasses are scanned after a photo is taken, so the candid pictures can still happen. :|

2) Have you ever been in the photo studio the night before disembarcation? Talk about nuts. Now imagine that they had to work with all those families standing over computer screens trying to decide which photos to buy.

Place order; order is hanging on your stateroom door as you leave and/or available for pickup in the terminal after disembarkation.

3) The Impulse Factor. You have all your photos already printed and you sort through them. It is Retail 101 - and we see it everyday in our business. Customers at the store impulse buy.

I'm not going to fight this one... it is probably the number one reason they do it.


As for photopass, they could say no photopass access on the ship. Example. You get home and grandma wants a copy of the photo of the kids and Mickey. Reorder online. Simple. Also this would give you the choice of print sizes. They could continue doing their regular routine for the kids photos and for anyone that wants to purchase on the ship.

Place order; order is hanging on your stateroom door as you leave and/or available for pickup in the terminal after disembarkation.
To build on that idea... set up several kiosks around the ship so that people can access their Photopass info when it is convenient for them. The completed prints could then be delivered to the stateroom, or mailed home as appropriate. (maybe get a $1 off for buying them while on the ship or some other incentive to make it more of an impulse buy.)

The kids almost all wear their cabin key around their neck. They could do the same thing with the photopass. Or they could have a wristband on each kid that the photographer could scan. Photopasses are scanned after a photo is taken, so the candid pictures can still happen. :|

It strikes me that there is an even easier way. The cabin key is a small plastic card with a magnetic strip and/or a barcode. Photopass is a small plastic card with a magnetic strip and/or a barcode. It seems that these could be the same card...

What I would think would make sense would be to either have the cabin key work as a cruise-specific Photopass or associate the key with a WDW Photopass at the time of check-in. The photographers would then give the guests the option of scanning the key to add the picture to the Photopass account for later viewing. If Disney still feels that the old-fashioned photo viewing is best, there is no reason why they couldn't still print out all the pictures as well.

As for candids, I think I recall that the WDW/DL systems are set up to scan the Photopass before the photo is taken, but I don't see why the system couldn't be programmed the other way around. They could easily set it up to have the Photopass scan associate the card with the last photo taken instead of the next one.

I wouldn't be the slightest bit surprised if a system like this is in place before too long. It took about a year between the introduction of Photopass at WDW before it arrived at Disneyland and it wouldn't surprise me one bit if DCL is next.

-Jeff