July Last Minute Cruises

My wife and I are planning on going on a cruise for our 5 year anniversary this July on either the 17th or 18th but we are sort of confused with some things. I've noticed that the closer the dates get to the sailing date, the prices tend to go down. Is this true also in July when I hear is busy season? I assume since most people will be traveling during this time prices won't be as low. Has anyone booked for a low price in July? Any help would be great. Thanks.

Where are we talking about cruising?

Whether or not prices go down depends on sales for the individual cruise. It would be impossible to say all cruises go down prior to sailing. Rather, a few that you might have seen have decreased, but many you don't see aren't going down.

What does that mean? If you wait too long, you may find yourself without a cruise, as the cruises on the day(s) you want are sold out.

Annnddd...there is a great thread around here where a last minute low fare cruise fare savings was eaten up by the high cost of last minute airfares.

Edit: Found the thread:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2016801

Just depends on demand. If the ship sells out, but a cabin or two becomes available, the price isn't necessarily going to go down. If it's a popular cruise, and you manage to book a cabin, most likely it will sell out. If it's a cruise that's a bit iffy (maybe the cruise line was trying out an additional ship too many for one area, for example; or a repo cruise to get a ship from one area to another), and there's still some cabins left, the cruise line will drop prices.

A couple of cruises ago, we booked a cruise within two months of the sailing date -- a very popular cruise at holiday time. I had also waitlisted us for a lower category cabin to help us save money. When I got a call about a cabin opening up, it was for a higher fare than the cabin would have gone for a couple of months before.

Thanks for the information. Our plan is to buy tickets to Orlando soon so that we can prevent buying last minute flights. And if we can find a last minute cruise from Port Canaveral then then we'll do that. If not, we can find something to do at a nearby beach for a few days.

I having been seeing how cruises leaving two weeks from today are going down to $199; so I was wondering if that price drop trend continues in July as well.

I having been seeing how cruises leaving two weeks from today are going down to $199; so I was wondering if that price drop trend continues in July as well.

Again there is no way to tell. It all depends on how the cruise is selling.

Welcome to Cruise Critic.

There are only a couple of cruises offered on July 17th -- Carnival and Disney -- 3 day cruises and on July 18th there is only a 3 day RCI cruise offered.

With so few ships going out of Port Canaveral at that time, I wouldn't expect any big bargains.

Thanks, I never thought about that. Leaving out of Miami is out second option but the hard part is finding airline tickets for a decent price. Hopefully with there being more options out of Miami, there will be more chance for price drops.

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