rum runner and shampbooze success!

Went on a 4 night Bahama cruise last week out of port of Miami. I had two rum runners in each of our 3 checked bags and a set of shampbooze in one of the checked bags. I also had a 8oz rum runner in my carry on along with 4 20oz coke zero bottles. They checked the coke zero bottles and ignored the rum runner in the carry on. I had it in a ziplock with aloe, sunscreen, and a couple other water/gel items. The lady even picked up the ziplock bag with the rum runner clearly visible and put it right back. The girl friend also carried on a rum runner with her vodka in it successfully.

Some of the smuggled stuff.

I did buy a few drinks. I think 3-4 of them. And I probably spent $100 drinking in keywest.

We are traveling on the cruise spirit in May,After reading about the rum runner etc.just wondering exactly how expensive are the drinks on board? I drink wine and Hubby beer.occasionally spirits.Are there bar fridges in the cabins?

Beer isn't very reasonably priced I don't think ($5-6). Spirits are priced as much resorts/hotels ($5-6) and wine is maybe slightly more expensive (cheapest glass around $6). Martinis I think are often the best deal for what you get.

Many lines and cabins have fridges, but not all. You can always request one if you do not have one in your room for medical purposes and they can provide.

Another way to "sneak" it on is buy when on port... when you get back on the ship don't try to hide it, they tell you to get in line to check your booze, and if you're coming back at the end of the day the line is long, hundreds of people are milling about and no one will notice you slip into the elevator instead of waiting in line... I've only done this with alcohol gifts for others unfortunately... and I got out of line just because I didn't want to wait there for 15 minutes.

As previous poster commented beers are in the $5-6 price range. But, each cocktail I purchased was $8-10. But, your mileage may vary.. I've never done the sneaking alcohol on board. I am usually not a drinker, but on a cruise I will have 3-5 drinks per day.. My last cruise with my husband our drink tab was $800 for a 7 day cruise. A few drinks I did get special cups but that is it.. It adds up fast.

My girlfriend and I are definitely going to try Shampbooze in our checked bags. But i think we've found a genius way to get liquor aboard.

We're going to take a couple of empty wine bottles and fill them with liquor and recork them. They sell heat shrink foil for the tops of the bottles for super cheap. We're going to give it a shot.

Has anyone tried this?

If the cruise lines charged reasonable prices for their drinks, more people would buy more drinks, and NOBODY would try and smuggle on booze.I dont mind paying UK prices for it ,but I do begrudge the extra %15 service charge, even if you go to the bar to order.A BOTTLE of decent beer $7.75

.....criminal

My girlfriend and I are definitely going to try Shampbooze in our checked bags. But i think we've found a genius way to get liquor aboard.

 

We're going to take a couple of empty wine bottles and fill them with liquor and recork them. They sell heat shrink foil for the tops of the bottles for super cheap. We're going to give it a shot.

 

Has anyone tried this?

I've done several cruises recently; took on the (allowed) bottles of wine in my carry-on luggage, and the security folks always looked carefully at the foil seals. It seemed very deliberate; they didn't really look at the label at all, but they did scrutinize the foil seal. I make wine and have used those heat-shrink foil seals, and trust me, they don't look the same as the original wine bottle foil. They will not seal as tightly and they tend to "crinkle" rather than shrinking smoothly. I can only guess that is why they seemed to focus on the seals during inspection.

My advice, don't waste your money on the heat shrink foil tops.

My girlfriend and I are definitely going to try Shampbooze in our checked bags. But i think we've found a genius way to get liquor aboard.

 

We're going to take a couple of empty wine bottles and fill them with liquor and recork them. They sell heat shrink foil for the tops of the bottles for super cheap. We're going to give it a shot.

 

Has anyone tried this?

We actually do a cheap wine bottle that has a screw-on top and fill it with liquor. We are always in a hotel the night before, so we enjoy the wine at the hotel the night before, fill it with liquor of our choice, and superglue the screw lid back on. Has worked like a charm every time.

Happy2bsailing

I plan to buy the sodapackage and more that includes mocktales and order bottles of rum vodka and gin for my cabin. We will bring our mock drinks down add a little alcohol and enjoy a nightcap on our balcony. It is a cheaper option and I done think it breaks any rules since I buy both the mocktails and the alcohol from the cruise ship.

I've used rum runners several times and never had a problem. Also used the leather canteen bag things without problem other than some leakage. And I've done the whole skip the booze check-in line thing. All has worked just fine for me. Once I put liquor in a water bottle and it got caught and I've seen the skip-the-line thing not work for some people. It's all a gamble but in my younger days I thought it made it interesting to try. Plus I was a college student with limited funds wanting to maximize fun.

I always take my wine allowance. Generally I still buy a few drinks on the ship and I've almost always had booze left to bring home. (I must plan to drink more than I actually do).

The last two times I cruised it was very port intensive so I just took the wine allowance and that was enough for me. I would buy drinks a couple of times during happy hour and I think my onboard spending was only around $50 total for 10 day cruise.

Upcoming cruise is on Azamara so I really have no need to bring anything onboard to drink. I kind of look forward to that as now I'm getting older and don't find smuggling on booze near as exciting.

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I would like to smuggle a small travel iron. Any input whether I may be able to get by with it?

While I've never been caught with RRs, there was a time that I had to ditch them before we even got to port. Had them in a bag that was meant to be checked. Almost missed the flight so we couldn't check the bag. Good thing it was small enough to be carried on, but had to throw away two large RRs, two bottles of wine. So the loss of the cost of the booze plus the RRs themselves negated the other times that I was successful in smuggling. It all evens out, so I don't really bother anymore.

Even if you were able to get enough smuggled onboard to last you your whole cruise, you'd still have to get ice and mixers (meaning leaving your cabin). I think smuggled booze is only good for drinking on your balcony or perhaps in the middle of the night when I would assume the bars are closed.

Last cruise we ordered 350ml bottles from room service. It turned out cheaper than individual drinks, but mixers were kinda a pain. We had to bring back oj from the buffet at breakfast.

While I've never been caught with RRs, there was a time that I had to ditch them before we even got to port. Had them in a bag that was meant to be checked. Almost missed the flight so we couldn't check the bag. Good thing it was small enough to be carried on, but had to throw away two large RRs, two bottles of wine. So the loss of the cost of the booze plus the RRs themselves negated the other times that I was successful in smuggling. It all evens out, so I don't really bother anymore.

 

Even if you were able to get enough smuggled onboard to last you your whole cruise, you'd still have to get ice and mixers (meaning leaving your cabin). I think smuggled booze is only good for drinking on your balcony or perhaps in the middle of the night when I would assume the bars are closed.

 

Last cruise we ordered 350ml bottles from room service. It turned out cheaper than individual drinks, but mixers were kinda a pain. We had to bring back oj from the buffet at breakfast.

I had several little 2 oz bottles I carried so I could just add it to the OJ or whatever --

I would like to smuggle a small travel iron. Any input whether I may be able to get by with it?

We saw several fans and irons along with little pocket knives on our way off the ship for reclaiming, so I really doubt you'd be able to smuggle something like that onboard. That REALLY shows up on an xray.

My girlfriend and I are definitely going to try Shampbooze in our checked bags. But i think we've found a genius way to get liquor aboard.

 

We're going to take a couple of empty wine bottles and fill them with liquor and recork them. They sell heat shrink foil for the tops of the bottles for super cheap. We're going to give it a shot.

 

Has anyone tried this?

My brother in law makes wine. He made us wine bottles of Captain, labels and the top was waxed shut. Worked just fine for us, it looked like some fancy expensive wine!

Our issue this year is putting it in our checked luggage and risking it getting broken. (We drove to FLL last year from Pittsburgh, flying this year)

My parents tried an iron once and it didn't make it. I've always brought my steamer with no issue. Hopefully it makes it on my next cruise.

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My brother in law makes wine. He made us wine bottles of Captain, labels and the top was waxed shut. Worked just fine for us, it looked like some fancy expensive wine!

 

Our issue this year is putting it in our checked luggage and risking it getting broken. (We drove to FLL last year from Pittsburgh, flying this year)

Put it in the middle of the suitcase, and double-bag it with zip locks. We do this all the time bringing back bottles of perfectly legal booze to Canada from the Caribbean. Never had one break yet.

I seriously doubt the scrutineers are going to look sideways at a corked, shrink-wrapped-top labelled bottle of what looks like wine. They are looking for fifths of booze, not disguised in any way. They'll be happy if they catch those.

My brother in law makes wine. He made us wine bottles of Captain, labels and the top was waxed shut. Worked just fine for us, it looked like some fancy expensive wine!

 

Our issue this year is putting it in our checked luggage and risking it getting broken. (We drove to FLL last year from Pittsburgh, flying this year)

I would be more concerned about TSA stealing them. And yes, they steal bottles of wine. It's happened to me. And they were wrapped in bubble wrap stuffed into boots. If you are leaving out of Florida and spending the night before the cruise starts, I'd UPS them to the hotel and have them hold them until you get there.

Have done all of the above... here is my analysis:

Mouthwash - terrible idea... I don't like mint in my vodka sorry.

RR's - expect this to work 60-75% of the time

Re-corked wine or any other bottle - worked well in past but inspectors are getting picky

Packing it visible right in luggage - believe it or not this has worked 80% of the time for us

Buying in embarkation port after security (San Juan and Barcelona) -100% successful

Buying on a port day - works 50% with liquor, 90% time with wine. We've been stopped once with wine (Carnival) and gave up the liquor (half of it :D ) once.

Or what we now do - Just order the $60 bottle from room service and pack mixers.... much less stressful, cost effective and 100% foolproof. Of course this is to be enjoyed in your stateroom... but pack a couple of sports style water bottles fill with ice/mixer and they work just fine at the pool for awhile.

On our 12 day Med cruise we bought two 1 liter bottles of vodka after security, and mixers. Each had a bottle of wine in luggage which we bought in Barcelona the day before. Throughout the cruise maybe had 6-8 buckets of beer by the pool. All in all spent maybe $300 for the two weeks? All inclusive would have been just over $1300.... So in my book, we won without being too sneaky or going way outside our comfort zone to work the system.

Hubby and I are not big drinkers. We can think of better ways to spend our cruise than drunk or hung over. Our last cruise we were determined to take advantage of the "750 ml of wine per person per cabin". So, the morning of the cruise, we made it a point to stop at a liquor store and buy what we wanted. Carried on board, not a problem. Ironically, we ended up having a "last cruise night cocktail party" to get rid of all of the booze/wine that our group had brought/smuggled on board!

In summation, we prefer to buy our drinks on board. After all, what is the point of cruising if you can't/don't/won't enjoy bellying up to the bar and ordering a perfect cocktail, or nabbing the "drink of the day" guy? For us, a huge part of cruising is the treat of doing things we don't normally do at home.