WTH??? Atlantis Aquaventure price..how the heck?

[Disney1fan2002]

DO families afford it? $160/pp for anyone over the age of 10. That's my entire family of 5. Sooo for a mere $800 we can spend 6 hours at a cool waterpark in the Bahamas.

Sorry, I'll have to pass. No way can we afford to pay $800 for an excursion.

 

[Handbag Lady]

DO families afford it? $160/pp for anyone over the age of 10. That's my entire family of 5. Sooo for a mere $800 we can spend 6 hours at a cool waterpark in the Bahamas.

Sorry, I'll have to pass. No way can we afford to pay $800 for an excursion.

I agree. We are doing the $6 whatever per person cab ride to Atlantis instead. Granted, no water park, but I think we'll live.

The other option is to rent a room at that hotel near Atlantis for $250 or so, is that Days Inn? Anyway, it is a better option if you must do the water park.

 

[tinkmom2]

If you book Comfort Inn suites I believe you get free access to Atlantis. This might be a cheaper option for you. http://www.comfortsuites.com/hotel-paradise_island-bahamas-BS003 You can also use Cabbage beach for free. Just take a taxi there.

 

[truck1]

Just a suggestion, but some have rented a room next door at the Comfort Inn I think, and used that to get into Atlantis.They have a waterpark share deal.
Thats not the only excursion that is high priced.I looked into the scuba tour with Stuart Cove, and thats 145 dollars for a 2 tank trip.For that price, I can go to the Keys or anyplace in FL and get a 6 tank trip.Plus, since SC offers specials all the time, DCL wont honor them.Cant book directly thru SC because of the contract the lines have with them.

 

[Disney1fan2002]

I think it's just sticker shock I am experiencing. We have cruised DCL 5 times. (4 with the kids) We have never gotten off the ship in Nassua. This cruise coming up in April, I decided to check out what Nassua has to offer.

Holy Schmokes. Anyway...after the intial sticker shock, I think I will be able to sock away $200pp between now and April so that we can choose a really cool excursion. We are eyeballing the Blue Lagoon Dolphin adventure. The scary thing about that is paying for the kids who may "chicken out" at the last minute.

 

[truck1]

Theres a couple of things that are fairly cool to do and are fairly cheap.
Weve done the pirate museum, which was about 20 dollars a pp,and is within walking distance of the ship,and also the harbor tour,which is the first half of the semi sub tour, which is also fairly reasonable.Either one, the sub tour (which includes the harbor tour) or the harbor tour by itself, is nice,as well as just taking a cab to Atlantis, and walking around thru the aquarium.

 

[Terapin]

I agree about the high price of excursions, especially for families. If DCL is listening, please offer some family-oriented value excursions!

I am not paying *hundreds* of dollars to visit a beach for 3 hrs, as nice as it may be. I am happy to spend money on truly unique and unforgettable experiences, but a pretty sand beach I will see many times in my life.

In the high price of DCL cruising the scale of money often gets diminished. On a cruise where we are 6k in, why should another 300 bucks matter? But it does, $300 is a ton of money IRL.

I am doing very few DCL excursions on our upcoming TA because of the price for us as a family of 5. I understand that cruise lines inflate the costs of excursions over and above what the local place charges, but sometimes it is more than double (albeit with travel included).

In Gibraltar for example DCL is offering a Wild Dolphin watching excursion for 59 I think US. THe local place is charging less than 25 US. Exact same company, same boat, same experience, and we booked at the same time as the DCL excursion! Seeing as Gibraltar is very small and there is great local transportation for a buck or two, if walking is an issue, I really can't see the value in the $34 bucks per person for simple travel. And that $170 is really a lot of money, even in DCL land For the bigger excursions the price difference is even greater.

I understand the concern around missing the boat on non DCL activities, but I take this in stride and book things with a huge window for unexpected events. And in Gibraltar, for instance, the dolphin thing is only about 3 kms from the ship by foot!

In any case, we chose our excursions very carefully and really weighed whether the convenience was worth the grossly inflated price. I'm not one to tell people how to spend their money (see my sig line for staying concierge at the parks - lots of money but worth it to us for how it makes the vacation 'feel') - but this was our line in the DCL sand!

 

[tjbaggott]

I had booked marked these two threads that give a LOT of info about Cabbage Beach and a little on Cable Beach. Definately check them out! This might be a nicer option to the high priced Atlantis.

http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2279215

http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2312796

 

[rockydek]

got a great rate at The Comfort inn Suites...free Aqua adventure and Dig access. Well worth it.

 

[kristieuk]

If you wanted to do Atlantis, I would second a look at Comfort Suites - there are so many 'adults' that it is likely to be a much cheaper option (I think you can book 1 room for 5, but I could be wrong). It was a cheaper option even for us (2 adults one child) than the extortionate cost of the DCL trip. I agree with you that it is a ludicrous amount of money for a few hours, and Atlantis itself is expensive in terms of food and beverages.

I hope you enjoy your day in Nassau whatever you decide to do

 

[Anal Annie]

The Comfort Suites is 4 per room so a family of 5 would need to book 2 rooms in order to get 5 wristbands...STILL much cheaper tho than booking the excursion thru DCL.

 

[Figment_Fan]

After looking at, and paying for, some of the excursions on the cruise, it makes me laugh at those that complain about ticket prices for a whole day at WDW.

 

[scootch]

You can hit great deals at CS. We only paid $176 a room last fall.

 

[mclewes]

We are a family of 5 ,my boys were 7,8 and 10 when we went, and we booked Atlantis through Comfort Suites. You do only get 4 wristbands but I asked on our precruise thread if anyone doing the same had less than 4 ppl and would therefore have an extra wristband.
Someone did and it was very easy to arrange to share a cab to the hotel and check in together, get the extra wristband and go our separate ways!
Overall we spent between $350 and $400 with food for the whole day....still big bucks but my kids were at the perfect age to enjoy it....
It's still one of their favorite parts of the trip....that being said on our next cruise in 6/2011 we are planning less excursions and more ship time!!

 

[ShellyLynn3630]

The Comfort Suites is 4 per room so a family of 5 would need to book 2 rooms in order to get 5 wristbands...STILL much cheaper tho than booking the excursion thru DCL.

For our family of four, CS was only like 80 bucks cheaperthan Disney after the taxi and food. I am not sure how these other people get such great rates for this hotel. Plus, with Disney we will have a little bit of "insurance" in the deal. I still don't know as to whether or not we will do it though.

 

[Donna3271]

We did the Comfort Inn for $157. I see the price went up in the course of a year. Honestly, I would just take a cab over, walk around a bit and see Atlantis, then head back to the boat pool. The water park is cool, but not $800 worth of cool

 

[travelfanatic]

We just recently booked a room at Comfort Suites for September & it was $237 for 4 of us. I thought that was a deal considering DCL is charging well over $600 for 4. I can't imagine paying that kind of money for 6-7 hours of fun!!

 

[tiggerlover2]

The Comfort Suites is 4 per room so a family of 5 would need to book 2 rooms in order to get 5 wristbands...STILL much cheaper tho than booking the excursion thru DCL.

You can take a chance on getting a daypass once you get there from the kiosk in the casino. I know when we were there it was $110 pp for adults... I know it's not a big discount but it does cut down the hassle of booking a hotel.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

DO families afford it? $160/pp for anyone over the age of 10. That's my entire family of 5. Sooo for a mere $800 we can spend 6 hours at a cool waterpark in the Bahamas.

Sorry, I'll have to pass. No way can we afford to pay $800 for an excursion.

ITA!! We are a family of 4, all 'adults' and even looking into CS, what starts out as a $250/nt hotel room, by the time they add in a bunch of ridiculous fees (knowing darn well you're not even stepping foot in the room) such as energy fee, housekeeping fee, etc. There are so many, you can tell it's even a stretch for them to come up with names for them.
Why not just call it the "bend over and grab your ankles fee"? Sure, we could scrape it up but just not smart use of my $$ imho. The whole thing just completely turned me off even trying to get there.
The Wonder cruises are so short anyway, we were just as happy to stay on the ship and enjoy it.

 

[bbn1122]

We are going on a 3 night Dream. I have already decided to enjoy the new ship and skip the Atlantis. We have always thought of going, but not for $800 for a family of 5.

You should see how much the Med Cruise excursion are, unbelievable. I was contemplating that in two years, but between the airfare and excursions. It looking like over 16K for a family of 5.