The Carnival Caribbean cruise cost about $1900 for the four of us. I think this is a bargain, and it’s only just over our $200 a day budget. If we had picked an inside cabin instead, we could have kept to our $200 a day. There is no discount for kids, so it would be the same price for any group of four sharing a cabin. It is far cheaper than any cruise I have seen in Australia which is why I keep coming back to the Caribbean to cruise.
It is also necessary to budget for gratuities. On this cruise, the recommended amount is $11.50 a day per person aged 3 and over. This obviously adds up and cost us $276. This is automatically added to your bill unless you go and explain why you want to change it. I am happy with this system as it makes it much easier for people like us who don’t understand tipping. We also tipped the people who would bring us room service a couple of dollars and there would be a tip added to any drinks bill.
On top of the cruise cost and gratuities, we budgeted $50 per island and $50 overall for the cruise for incidentals. This $50 went on our transport to the cruise ($28), a tip on arrival for someone to take care of our bags ($5) and our washing ($6) with a little bit to spare. We did our washing on board which was very easy as there are laundry facilities on most levels. We bought some cocktails using leftover money from our shore days.
This means that in total, our 8 nights cruising and all food and activities cost us about $2426 – so about $300 a day. We justified this extra cost when we booked it at home in Australia after we received a bigger tax return than expected. With an inside cabin and no extras, we could have got by on about $230 a day.