Tag Archives: disney wonder

the cost of delayed reality (aka “a week on the Disney Wonder”)

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Yesterday I posted about our week on the Disney Wonder (it was great!).  But now is the time for the hard-crunching numbers…how much did a week of fantasy life really cost?  Here’s the breakdown:

Before the Cruise  
Voyage Fare (2 adults, children sailed free on this cruise): $2,226.00
Vacation Protection Plan: $207.08
Government Taxes & Fees: $100.74
Ground Transfers: DECLINED
   
Total Initial Cruise Costs: $2,533.82
   
On the Ship  
Port Adventure – Puerto Vallarta Tequila Making (2 people) $100.00
Port Adventure – Cabo San Lucas Canopy Zip Line (1 person) $99.00
Spa (couples massage, anniversary tradition) $268.00
Dining – brunch $50.00
Dining – anniversary dinner $60.00
Merchandise – Nemo bucket $5.95
Merchandise – lip balm $1.95
Merchandise – funny light-up cup $5.46
Merchandise -  birthday gift for friend’s son $14.95
Merchandise – pirate hat for daddy/son $24.95
Beverages – mocha $5.54
Room Service $3.00
Babysitting $12.00
Babysitting $12.00
Babysitting $15.00
Gratuities  
Head server, maitre d $15.00
Server $90.00
Assistant Server $63.00
Housekeeper $84.00
   
Total on Cruise Costs $929.80
   
Travel Costs  
American Airlines check bag fee (used miles for the airfare) $25.00
American Airlines check bag fee $25.00
Prime Time Shuttle to and from airport $137.45
   
Travel Costs $187.45
   
Total Trip Costs $3,651.07
   
Additional expenses (tips for drivers, Starbucks, food at airport, cash used in Mexico, spare diapers, Cabo boats and bikes…things like that – an average.) $148.93
   
Total Total Trip Costs $3,800.00

holy…?

We used miles to pay for the airfare because it was $600 per person to get from Hawaii to LA.  If we had paid out of pocket, our total anniversary trip would have been $5k.  As it was, $3800 is a lot more than the initial $2500 that the cruise actually cost.  Incidentals cost a ton.  When our boys are bigger and we go on a cruise, they (and I) will want to do the fun adventures like the zip-line canopy/rock-climbing thing that my husband did.  Obviously our costs will go up a ton, even if we were to find the kids-cruise-free deal like we did this time.  I’d anticipate another $2-3K.

how will we pay for it all?!?

Needless to say, this is a lot of money.  We put aside $100 every month for our anniversary trip (every 4 years, go go Leap Day anniversaries!), and I saved all the money we got from Christmas to use for incidentals.  My husband saved a portion of his bonus for it too, and his parents gave us $100 to celebrate our first real anniversary.  We could’ve shaved off $100 if we hadn’t gone to dinner at the fancy restaurant, but it was our anniversary and we really wanted to.

tip me!  tip me!

The unexpected large expense was, of course, the gratuities for all the crew members.  That was $252 I wasn’t expecting.  We also had to tip the fine dining server ($30) and the massage therapists ($40), plus the room service guy ($3, wasn’t expecting that because on the Norweigan Cruise Line we didn’t have to), so that all being said and done was an additional $325 we weren’t adding into the budget.  Everyone was trying to sell us something – the spa girls had a list of things they used on us and wanted us to buy, when we bought the flashing lit cup for our son an automatic gratuity was added onto it (he refused to drink milk, so we tried every possible beverage vessel we could find).  Plus, oh man, the tips that are expected everywhere in Mexico.  The guy who held out his hand to help me off the boat wanted a tip, the kid who told me where to find the bathroom wanted a tip, the bathroom cost money to use; everyone wanted money.

paying for it all

The cost was doled out slowly over the course of a few months which made it very manageable.  The deposit for the cruise was paid for 6 months ago, the remainder was paid for in December.  This credit card bill will have the rest of it, but really, parceled out into three payments does make paying for a large vacation expense much, much easier.

how we could have saved money, by Captain Hindsight

Captain Hindsight tells me that we would have forgone the balcony and shaved off $200-400 of the trip (we thought we would be spending a lot of time out there while our son napped…I napped instead.).  He also says that we wouldn’t have spent $20 on groceries for the boat since we lost on the shuttle when the driver drove off with them (organic milk, bottles, snacks to keep kid occupied).  Captain Hindsight also thought that the vacation insurance could’ve been avoided ($200) but seriously I’m pregnant and we have a toddler.  There was a chance I was put on bed rest or something, and the entire amount would’ve been gone.  But I guess we could’ve done without those expenses, saving us $600.

but really, Captain Hindsight is a South Park character and not to be taken seriously

Anyway, that is the breakdown for the trip itself.  I may have forgotten a small cash something here or there  (my husband spent $20 on carne asada tacos for our lunch on his way back from the zip-line tour, but it was confiscated on the ship.  Did you know you can’t bring food from Mexico onto the cruise ship?  Weird.) but that’s really about what we spent in total.

What do you think?  Too much?  Too little?  Just right?

obviously i’ve been reading too much goldilocks…

…and we’re back

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reality, for a week.

We are back on dry land and woozy as all heck.  We haven’t lost our sea legs yet (plane legs for the last 6 hours), and as I brushed my teeth I felt my legs shifting like I was still on the boat.  I’m not.  I wish I was, but I’m not.  It’s back to reality for us.

For the past week my family has been living in a blissfull reality where phones and internet were nonexistant, and soft serve was available 24/7.  In this reality, Mickey and Minnie were the celebrities and desserts were served with every meal and with snacks in between.  Steak was for dinner each night and there was an entire ship for my son to play in.  For a bit it was, shall I say, the happiest place on earth?

boy. boat. and beyond.

I know a lot of people are a little wary of cruises, and I certainly don’t blame them.  There was a point that I got tired of being on the Disney Wonder but luckily it was the last day.  The ship was cruising back from Mexico to LA and the boat was a bit more rocky than it had been.  Add pregnancy and I was a bit miserable.

But in all it was a fabulous vacation.  We loved (almost) every second of it, and we loved our brief, fantastic reality.  For a week I wasn’t unemployed, we weren’t broke, my parents weren’t crazy, and we had nothing to do but enjoy ourselves.  We got to wake up each morning and snuggle with our son in bed while watching whatever five Disney movies happened to be on at that time.  We got to stand on the top deck and watch fireworks go off above our heads.  We got to have “fine” dining for every meal.  And we got to do it without any contact from the outside world.

oh hi caviar.

There were pros and cons of course.  Our son hated the Flounder’s Reef Nursery, and we didn’t trust the people that worked there to have his best interests in mind.  We had serious misgivings about how he was treated there as well as if he was fed the way they said they would.  When I found out that they had locked him in a baby swing twice (he’s 26 pounds and almost 2 years old), we figured that was enough and we cancelled all our future reservations.

scooby doo rock @ cabo san lucas

Another con was the Port Adventure we went on – a tequila tour.  We thought it would be great – it was touted as a mile walk to a tequila maker who would show us the mashing and distillation process of my favorite spirit – and in reality it was a 6 hour bus tour of the poorer areas with a half hour stop at a tequila place.  The tour guide made a point the entire time to tell us how rich America was and how poor Mexico was.  One of our favorite things she said was “Do you see the public school there?  There are 50 students to one teacher.  They have no AC, only one room.  They have no playground, and only have curtains to block themselves from the blazing hot Mexican sun.  It is my duty to tell you amgios this.”  For almost 6 hours she said things like this: “There is a golf course, but it is not for us Mexicans my friends.  It is for Americans.  It costs one hundred American dollars to golf on the course, so it is not something that us Mexicans can afford.  It is for tourists only.”  It was, to be honest, not a terribly enjoyable time at Puerta Vallarta.  It’s not that I didn’t find the dialogue fascinating, but rather that I found it to be out of place.  I wanted a tequila tour.  I got a lecture on poverty.  Wasn’t quite the same.

tequila~

Those were the few cons though of the trip.  Some slightly yucky food, some grumpy people working on the ship.  But all in all it was a fantastic time, a true break from reality.  Usually on vacations you can’t help but live in reality – your email dings, your facebook pops up, you get a phone call from a client or family member.  This stuff didn’t – couldn’t – happen on this cruise.  No one but my siblings, my in-laws and our house sitter had the satellite phone number that they could call to reach the ship.  There was no internet.  It was magical.

this molten lava cake was pretty magical.

Tomorrow I’ll post the breakdown of the cost of the trip.  It’s something not to be taken lightly, for sure.  I almost squawked at the final bill.  Until then…I’ll be working on making my brain stop trying to convince my body that its on a boat.  Because damn if I don’t feel woozy and I haven’t drank a bit!