Cruise decisions…

The beverage package that works for his cocktail of choice is $810 (just for him!) for the length of the cruise, allowing him to drink all he wants and includes tips.  For one second we considered this.  He feels he cannot justify the expense since he doesn’t want to feel like he is pressured into getting his money’s worth.

On the other hand, I don’t want him to feel he can’t have a cocktail when he wants one so we went to work and did the math.

If he has three cocktails a night (highly unlikely he’ll drink every night), the total would be $27.60 per night x 15 nights for a total of $414.  Considering that some nights he won’t drink any alcohol but instead may have a non-included soda, we feel comfortable that the drink bill won’t exceed $400. 

Then, there’s the question of dining in any of the non-included restaurants. It’s unlikely we’ll choose to dine in these extra-charge restaurants due to our limited low carb, grain, sugar, and starch free diet. The exception to this would be a social situation whereby fellow travelers we’ve befriended invite us to join them at one of these restaurants. We’ll decide at the time if it makes sense to bear the added expense. We aren’t “tightwads.”  We’re world travelers with a desire to continue traveling for as long as our health holds out and that we stay within the budget we’ve established for our travels. 

We’ve allowed ourselves an average of $75 per day for extras on cruises.  If our alcohol beverage budget is $27.60 per day, that leaves us $47.40 per day in other extras. 

The next expense we’ll most certainly incur is the cost of Internet access on the cruise. At a cost of $395 for the 15 days, we will each be allowed 60 minutes of Internet access per day. (There were other less costly packages available but, cost per minute increased with lower minute packages).

As a result, I will write the blog offline then go online for posting, editing, and adding photos. This amount uses up $26.33 per day leaving us $21.00 per day average for incidentals which is enough for us to go on two excursions if we so choose.

Our habits of researching our travels, mindless reading online will literally be metered while we’re on a cruise.  Odd?  Yes, but do-able. We’ll have plenty to do to keep us occupied leaving us ample time to read one of many pre-downloaded books. 

Oops, there’s another task we must complete before the month ends…download books to the Kindle app on our phones and laptops, all of which may be read offline. It’s easy for me to imagine sitting in a lounge chair on the deck of the ship reading, “NeanderThin: Eat to Achieve a Lean, Strong, Healthy Body” while Tom peruses, “The Family Tree Problem Solver: Tried-and-True Tactics for Tracing Elusive Ancestors.”    Ah, nice.