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Taking a cruise after a timeshare stay?

DaveNV

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I'm exploring options for a trip next year, and would like to know if you have experience with this kind of thing. I'm looking for tips, comments about your experience, pro and con, and whether you think you'd do it again.

Traveling far from home for just a week or so in a timeshare is never long enough, and I always like to take a second week somewhere nearby, to extend the vacation, and maybe even get more out of my airfare dollars. For example, next month I'm doing a trip to Hawaii for two weeks, with a timeshare week on two islands. With a multi-city airfare, it's a good use of the time and money.

In this case, I'm looking at New Orleans. For the time just after the timeshare visit, I didn't find other timeshares around there that caught my attention, but the idea of a cruise came to mind. I find there are Caribbean cruises that leave from New Orleans, and return there, that may tie in with the dates I'll be there.

One such cruise is down to the Yucatan, stopping in Cozumel and Progreso (Merida), then returning to New Orleans. I've been to Cancun before, but not out to Cozumel, and I've always wanted to see Merida. This looks like a nice way to do that, without spending a lot of money. I could then fly home from New Orleans, and everything could be tied into a neat bundle.

For those who have done this kind of thing (cruising before/after a timeshare stay), or who have done that specific cruise, what can you tell me about it? The cruises I'm seeing are on Carnival. I'm not much for partying, so a lot of the events on such a ship will likely not be used. But a nice ocean trip on a nice ship seems like it'd be fun. And seeing a bucket-list place like Merida, even for just a few hours, would be nice. We could then decide if we'd like to return another time for a destination visit.

What can you share with me?

Dave
 

VacationForever

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We enjoy cruises but we just cannot do Carnival. It is on the low end of all cruise lines, and as such, generally the demographics that go with it and not people that we want to be around.
 
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vacationhopeful

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How about a riverboat cruise up or down the Mississippi River added to NOLA stay?

Baton Rouge is up river from NOLA, also. And Panama City, FL is a 'drive' along the the Gulf.

I spent too much time in that area of the country 20+ years ago ... that era BF worked Nuclear Power plants in NOLA and Baton Rouge. NOLA had WAY better food; Baton Rouge was cheaper but fewer flights IN/OUT. His BFF nuclear friend rented a place from me in NJ while working the nuke plants at Artifcial Island (Salem) ... he eventaully MOVE here and rented a different place from me. He now is retired in lives fulltime in Thailand ... I am NOT visiting him nor his landholder where he owns the house and she owns the land it sits on.

And to the other Nuke pros on TUG ... how I acquired ALL my nuclear power plant knowledge.
 

dioxide45

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I'm exploring options for a trip next year, and would like to know if you have experience with this kind of thing. I'm looking for tips, comments about your experience, pro and con, and whether you think you'd do it again.

Traveling far from home for just a week or so in a timeshare is never long enough, and I always like to take a second week somewhere nearby, to extend the vacation, and maybe even get more out of my airfare dollars. For example, next month I'm doing a trip to Hawaii for two weeks, with a timeshare week on two islands. With a multi-city airfare, it's a good use of the time and money.

In this case, I'm looking at New Orleans. For the time just after the timeshare visit, I didn't find other timeshares around there that caught my attention, but the idea of a cruise came to mind. I find there are Caribbean cruises that leave from New Orleans, and return there, that may tie in with the dates I'll be there.

One such cruise is down to the Yucatan, stopping in Cozumel and Progreso (Merida), then returning to New Orleans. I've been to Cancun before, but not out to Cozumel, and I've always wanted to see Merida. This looks like a nice way to do that, without spending a lot of money. I could then fly home from New Orleans, and everything could be tied into a neat bundle.

For those who have done this kind of thing (cruising before/after a timeshare stay), or who have done that specific cruise, what can you tell me about it? The cruises I'm seeing are on Carnival. I'm not much for partying, so a lot of the events on such a ship will likely not be used. But a nice ocean trip on a nice ship seems like it'd be fun. And seeing a bucket-list place like Merida, even for just a few hours, would be nice. We could then decide if we'd like to return another time for a destination visit.

What can you share with me?

Dave
We have tied cruises to our timeshare stays many times. The cruises out of New Orleans are fine, they have limited itineraries because of where the port is situated. We have actually done that very same itinerary on Carnival and Merida is a neat city to see, though it is about an hour away from Progresso. So either rent a car or take an excursion there. It is an old colonial city with wonderful charm. We enjoyed our visit to Merida which happened to be just before the Day of the Dead that is HUGE in Mexico. They were putting up their decorations and shrines (not really sure what they call them) in the town square.

ETA: I would like to add, we usually like to have the cruise after our timeshare stay. This way there is no worries about missing the ship with a delayed flight. It also means we don't have to fly in a day early like we usually do for cruises and pay for a hotel.
 
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We did a week in Oahu followed by a 15 night celebrity cruise. Another time we did three nights in Victoria three nights in Vancouver then a week Alaska cruise and then three more nights in Seattle at timeshares. This fall we are doing a week in Vancouver timeshare, followed by one week cruise. And two short cruises out of Fort Lauderdale, with stays before and between. Very doable. All Celebrity cruises, all Worldmark or Wyndham.
 

DaveNV

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We did a week in Oahu followed by a 15 night celebrity cruise. Another time we did three nights in Victoria three nights in Vancouver then a week Alaska cruise and then three more nights in Seattle at timeshares. This fall we are doing a week in Vancouver timeshare, followed by one week cruise. And two short cruises out of Fort Lauderdale, with stays before and between. Very doable. All Celebrity cruises, all Worldmark or Wyndham.

So it sounds like you've done this a fair bit. If it was a cruise line you weren't enamored with, (based purely on presumed reputation), but it was the only game in town for the cruise you wanted to take, would you still do it?

Dave
 

SmithOp

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We did several weeks on the southeast coast last year with a cruise from Miami in the middle, worked out great. We are considering a Panama Canal cruise on the bucket list, there are some from Nola to LA, gets you most of the way home... I was just going to do a 3 night hotel stay before the cruise.


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I just took a Carnival cruise out of Cape Canaveral over Spring Break with my granddaughter and daughter. I chose it based on itinerary, embarkation port and specific dates. It was my only choice without repeating a previous itinenary. Did we have a good time? Yes. Did I like Carnival any more than I had on prior voyages? No. Worse, in fact. Did my daughter and 16 yr old granddaughter like Carnival? Surprisingly they did not. Was it a wild and drunken Spring Break cruise? Not like I expected it to be. If it was my only choice, I'd go again even though we had a number of bad experiences along the way. We were together. We had never been to the ports before and loved them. It was only a week out of our lives that wasn't top-notch.
 
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TravelTime

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We have enjoyed many Windstar Cruises all over the world. If we were to do cruises in the future, we would consider Viking Ocean Cruises, Oceania or Seabourne. We will also consider a Disney cruise, but that will be a one timer just for the kids. Viking started the ocean cruises not that long ago and they are getting superb reviews.
 

dioxide45

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We have enjoyed many Windstar Cruises all over the world. If we were to do cruises in the future, we would consider Viking Ocean Cruises, Oceania or Seabourne. We will also consider a Disney cruise, but that will be a one timer just for the kids. Viking started the ocean cruises not that long ago and they are getting superb reviews.
Unfortunately, not all of us have the budgets for these types of cruises. Other than Disney, you are talking $3000-$4000 per person for the lowest category cabin in off season. These are luxury lines, far from the mainline cruise lines.
 

TravelTime

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Unfortunately, not all of us have the budgets for these types of cruises. Other than Disney, you are talking $3000-$4000 per person for the lowest category cabin in off season. These are luxury lines, far from the mainline cruise lines.

Actually, we have never paid more than $2000-$3000 per person for a 7-8 night Windstar Cruise regardless of category or season or location and we have done 7 of them by now. Sometimes, they have really great deals for less.
 

dioxide45

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Actually, we have never paid more than $2000-$3000 per person for a 7-8 night Windstar Cruise regardless of category or season or location and we have done 7 of them by now. Sometimes, they have really great deals for less.
Still a big difference from a Carnival Cruise like the OP is considering that is $750 for a balcony for five nights. Also, Carnival is the only game in town out of New Orleans for the OP.
 

VacationForever

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My travel agent, who is Ken's travel agent, showed us a couple of great prices for Windstar but we passed as we had other cruises booked. I did look at other Windstar cruises recently and they were quite a bit higher than mass market lines.

We have done 2 Celebrity cruises and will have another 2 this year. It is considered the best cruise line for the mass market.

We had originally booked an Oceania and a Cunard for next year but my travel agent got us to go with him on a Royal Caribbean cruise, which I really had no interest to cruise with, but since it is a transatlantic cruise, there will be few kids. Plus it will in a large suite (owners suite). The cost per night of that is very close to the Oceania cruise, also an eastbound TA which we cancelled, after equalizing the perks offered by Oceania.

There are deals to be had especially when booking early or last minute.
 
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DaveNV

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Still a big difference from a Carnival Cruise like the OP is considering that is $750 for a balcony for five nights. Also, Carnival is the only game in town out of New Orleans for the OP.

And therein lies the problem. I'd like to see the northwest corner of the Yucatan, and this seems like a fairly inexpensive way to do it. Minimal extra expense, since my airfare home would be the return leg of a roundtrip fare, and the cruise leaves from the city where I'll already be. Leave the timeshare, board the ship, spend five nights without much extra cost, return to New Orleans, and fly home. Easy breezy.

The only thing giving me serious pause is that it's on Carnival. I've heard conflicting stories about them, including that they use their worst ships for that part of the world. And frankly, the idea of dealing with a bunch of napkin-twirling waiters doing a conga line around the dining room just does not appeal to me. With a balcony stateroom, I could sit out in the sun and enjoy the relative peace and quiet. And there's always room service. ;)

For those of you who can't stand Carnival, can you be specific? What exactly about them do you not like?

Dave
 
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dioxide45

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We have sailed Carnival, Royal Caribbean and Celebrity. All have their pluses and minuses and we weren't actually impressed as much as we expected to be with Celebrity. On Carnival we have sailed their small ships as well as their largest. Their ships may not be as nice as the other lines and they may be decorated in a more gaudy "Las Vegas" look to them. From a cruise and food standpoint, you ultimately get what you pay for. I would have no problems doing another Carnival cruise out of New Orleans. If you want to cruise to Merida, you really don't have a lot of options. For a five night cruise, if you don't end up liking it, you won't be on it all that long...
 

VacationForever

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And therein lies the problem. I'd like to see the northwest corner of the Yucatan, and this seems like a fairly inexpensive way to do it. Minimal extra expense, since my airfare home would be the return leg of a roundtrip fare, and the cruise leaves from the city where I'll already be. Leave the timeshare, board the ship, spend five nights without much extra cost, return to New Orleans, and fly home. Easy breezy.

The only thing giving me serious pause is that it's on Carnival. I've heard conflicting stories about them, including that they use their worst ships for that part of the world. And frankly, the idea of dealing with a bunch of napkin-twirling waiters doing a conga line around the dining room just does not appeal to me. With a balcony stateroom, I could sit out in the sun and enjoy the relative peace and quiet. And there's always rooms service. ;)

For those of you who can't stand Carnival, can you be specific? What exactly about them do you not like?

Dave

You might have seen this story... bad handling by the captain. But you would not find this sort of problem in higher end cruise lines.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/18/asia/cruise-ship-brawl/index.html

You may want to read Carnival reviews. Because of inexpensive cruise price, it also attracts many people who just want to drink and party. People complained about hearing folks shouting and banging on cabin doors going down the corridor in the early hours, presumably drunks. I am an old fart and I really do not want to hear or see young or older adults behaving like brats.

One thing to note about cruising and norovirus can hit any ship, I generally stay away from the buffet restaurant.
 

dioxide45

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You might have seen this story... bad handling by the captain. But you would not find this sort of problem in higher end cruise lines.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/18/asia/cruise-ship-brawl/index.html

You may want to read Carnival reviews. Because of inexpensive cruise price, it also attracts many people who just want to drink and party. People complained about hearing folks shouting and banging on cabin doors going down the corridor in the early hours, presumably drunks. I am an old fart and I really do not want to hear or see young or older adults behaving like brats.

One thing to note about cruising and norovirus can hit any ship, I generally stay away from the buffet restaurant.
There are certainly the party boats. With short cruises, one usually should try to avoid the weekend cruises and go for the ones that sail through the week. Those short three night, Fri, Sat, Sun cruises tend to attract the party boat crowd. We have been on them and we really haven't had any issues with drunks. We tend not to flow with the party crowd. We don't stay up real late and hit the clubs. If you don't run with that crowd, you tend not to see or be impacted by them all that much.

We always carry our own hand sanitize with us whenever we cruise. It really isn't a sure fire way to not get sick and avoiding the buffet won't necessarily save you. You have just as good of a chance of catching it from a door knob or railing.
 

VacationForever

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There are certainly the party boats. With short cruises, one usually should try to avoid the weekend cruises and go for the ones that sail through the week. Those short three night, Fri, Sat, Sun cruises tend to attract the party boat crowd. We have been on them and we really haven't had any issues with drunks. We tend not to flow with the party crowd. We don't stay up real late and hit the clubs. If you don't run with that crowd, you tend not to see or be impacted by them all that much.

We always carry our own hand sanitize with us whenever we cruise. It really isn't a sure fire way to not get sick and avoiding the buffet won't necessarily save you. You have just as good of a chance of catching it from a door knob or railing.
I agree... short cruises, regardless of cruise lines tend to attract the party boat crowd.

We started taking probiotic before travel, during travel and a couple off days after. The other thing that we have instituted is not touch our food, which means no bread, unless our hands are just washed and hands have not handled anything else like door knobs, doors and menus. I have horrible contact dermatitis, and unfortunately most hand sanitizers have chemicals that I am allergic to.
 

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I think it's great to combine a land-trips with cruises.
For a cruise we took from Copenhagen, we went to Iceland first.
For our next cruise from Barcelona, we're touring France+Spain first.
.
 
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We have done timeshares both before and after cruises many times. Usually after because I like to relax after a cruise. We even did a Panama Canal Cruise then spent a week in Florida at one of our timeshares after.
Check the site Vacations To Go on the Internet. You can find many discounted cruises and probably where you are talking about going. I'm another one that doesn't waste my time on Carnival.
We have been real happy lately with Celebrity. Princess used to be our favorite until Carnival bought them and we saw the quality of their cruises go down.
 

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We have done 3 timeshare stays along with a cruise vacation. The first time we did a week at Vacation Village at Weston followed by a Norwegian cruise out of Fort Lauderdale or Miami (can't remember which). We found the drive home (to north of Toronto) very tiring after getting off the ship and getting in the car for the long drive home. The next 2 times we did Carnival (1 out of Tampa, 1 out of Ft Lauderdale) then a week stay in a timeshare to relax. We did not find either of the Carnival cruises to be "party" cruises but we did not go at any school break or holiday time. When we cruise we are so active we prefer to take the week afterward to relax instead of the week before. We booked all our cruises through Vacations To Go and had no complaints at all. We would rather go on 2 or 3 cheap cruises (we get interior cabins) than 1 very expensive one.

Our DS & DiL have cruised out of New Orleans twice and loved it. They were surprised at how long it takes to go down the Mississippi and get out to the Gulf. The cruise stop at Progresso is interesting. They have the longest pier we have ever seen there, it is 4 miles long! The cruise line had buses to take people to shore. From there it is about a 45 minute car or colectivo (mini-bus or van) ride to the old colonial city of Merida.

~Diane
 

dioxide45

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Princess used to be our favorite until Carnival bought them and we saw the quality of their cruises go down.
I think overall cruise quality has gone down among the mainline and even premium cruise companies. Carnival owns a lot of brands, from mainline (Carnival, Costa) to premium (Holland America, Princess) to luxury (Seabourn). Each line tends to operate pretty independently.

I am still not seeing many posts from people saying they don't like Carnival that have actually sailed on Carnival. You can post a link to a negative story about a cruise, but what is that, .01% of all cruises that something happens where it becomes newsworthy?
 

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We did Carnival only once and it was many years ago and took our kids at that time. Just seemed to us that way too many people seemed drunk on that cruise. Everything was based around drinking for games,etc. It was not Spring break or holiday time but about 2 weeks after Spring break. Our kids schedule always seemed different then most places. Our kids were six and eleven at that time.
 

presley

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I have never cruised on Carnival, but I have a friend who lives just outside of NOLA and she cruises one or two times per year on Carnival out of there. She obviously loves it. She cruises with her whole family as well as just with her husband or just friends. She does not drink. I don't know what specifically she enjoys about it, but I suspect being taken care of and not having to do cooking/cleaning, etc has a lot to do with it. I'm sure some people take that cruise to party - that doesn't seem to put a damper on her cruise at all.

Take the cruise. You aren't a complainer. I'm sure you'll find lots of stuff to be very happy about on your cruise. I've been on cruises where people have complained about the most ridiculous things. If you are a complainer, you'll have lots to complain and whine about. You aren't that type of person. You'll have fun.
 

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For those of you who can't stand Carnival, can you be specific? What exactly about them do you not like?

My disappointment with Carnival was the food. I'm normally not a picky eater, but the selection seemed poor and the quality was bland. Naturally, this is a subjective issue. ;-)

And I stepped out of the dining room when they had their way-too-loud dancing waiter event.

I'm not saying I would NEVER cruise on Carnival again, but it would have to be the ONLY choice going somewhere that I really wanted to go.
 
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