Who does cruises?

I've gambled very sparingly on cruises. I usually only do it one night just for the fun of it. One client of mine who was with our group, actually hit a small jackpot that paid several thousand dollars. Cruise ship slot machines are rumored to be tight as hell. The one criticism of Regent (and there aren't many) is that many of their guests (but not all) are fairly elderly and their casinos and bars usually close about 11pm.

I didn't gamble at all on the Princess cruise. Took a look at the paytables for VP and they were awful. But I can't say I felt I missed anything by not gambling. Also, both my wife and I really enjoyed the days at sea. Plenty to do (and eat, of course).

Good recommendations. As a newbie to cruises we didn't know the buffet would be open upon check in day so we made extra time before getting to the ship to eat lunch near the ship at a land based restaurant. When we got on the ship we discovered the buffet was in full operation but we had already eaten. My recommendation to any newbie is to eat lunch on the ship on check in day. Don't make the same mistake we made.

Also the $12 per day soda package isn't worth it IMHO, unless you're a Diet Coke junkie. I couldn't drink my money's worth of soda. However I can't speak for the alcohol package for I didn't try that package. I think the alcohol package was $35 per day or something like that.

Hmm, would I spend $12 per day for unlimited soda? Depends.

I don't drink liquor, but a flask could come in handy with unlimited soda.

The prices that I used were from 2008. Today's prices might be double. Actually it is double according to Royal Carribean's website which I just checked; the soda package is $25, the alcohol package is $55. Sorry for false hopes.

Never been,but as I understand,they really FEED YOU!
Gain 12 pounds in 12 days,no sweat.

Yeah,do the searching on their site to see what you want.
There are a pile of extras available.
I'll guess that the attraction to the cruises is the trip,not the destination.

Gambling? Probably not advised,because you will be in International waters IF a problem happens:bad. The odds are terrible,anyway.

Shows and entertainment and things to do on board are the attractions. Boredom is not an option!

Imagine a small town with 12,000 people or more and 4,000 employees.
Maybe some day,I will do a 'cruise.'I'll need to gain 20 more pounds,sooner or later.

My buddy ,"Crazy Ron", did 3 years on one of the Princess Lines. He liked to see ports outside of the U.S. and he picked up a few extra languages to speak. Most employees are required to speak more than one language!

Do they have roaming 'hookers' in a small city like that?
Ron could do that,as a stud.He was a fitness trainer,but not much business,so he bailed. He has a lot of stories!

Disposable income I have ,but I'll spend it in a foreign country,like Las Vegas,Nevada.

I've only been on one cruise, last June, from San Juan PR to Aruba. First of all, I thoroughly enjoyed the cruise, most especially visiting the various island ports. The food was very good, accomodations wonderful and most comfortable. Service was friendly, prompt and professional. Aside from coffee, tea and juices, all other drinks are expensive. I had no criticism of the cruise or cruiseline (RC). By personal preference, I did not enjoy the 'holiday camp' atmosphere during the cruise days, but I recognize that most of the cruise patrons had an excellent time joining in on the ship's activity list. The casino only operated out of port, and the games were limited and tight. Jackpot options typically involved perks on future cruises. Most evening activities had payouts, also typically a future cruise perk. If I had a suggestion for the cruise lines, it would be to spend more time at each port, so that onshore visits weren't so rushed. Even so, I had an overall great time on the adventure.

Living in Florida makes it easy to cruise. Over the past 20 years I have gambled way too many hours on cruise ships. Other than continuous shufflers I haven't found the blackjack to be any worse than the Las Vegas strip. I spend a lot of time on cruise critic and I have never heard of anyone having a hard time getting paid their winnings. I have seen people win in excess of 50K and they never had a hard time getting paid, of course the check might have bounced. One advantage, at least for me, is after a little play the casino starts giving you free drinks and over the past couple of years Carnival has given me more free cruises than I could take. Usually I either win 3k or lose 3k over a 7 night cruise. My wife and I always play side by side so that 3k is for two people.

Carnival has cruises geared towards gamblers called "Premier Cruises". They are fantastic. On one cruise they gave us $1200.00 cash just for showing up. We booked a grand suite for $700.00 for a 7 night cruise. We had comped meals in the high end restaurants. We had free drinks in the casino from the get go. The welcome aboard cocktail party was a blast. Every night we had some sort of a special gift in our suite, champagne, cookies, chocolate covered strawberries etc. We wound up $2100.00 ahead on that cruise and my wife received a voucher for a 7 night cruise for 2 people and I did too. We took another cruise at no cost and took her sister and husband with us.

On NCL they have shoe games at 25 dollars and up. At 50 dollars the dealers stand on any 17.

On every cruise I have been on (over 20 cruises) the slots are horrible and the VP is basically unplayable.

As stated in other posts Regent is in its own league. Carnival and NCL are good for us because being retired we are just looking for a fun getaway that doesn't break the bank.

I check out cruisecritic.com pretty much every day and I have never heard of anyone having a hard time getting paid on any of the major cruise lines.

The other side of the coin is I have read more than one article about land based casinos, including LV not paying jackpots.