Travel Auctions: an Alternative Way to Find Cruise Deals

Cruise deals bidding sites are a relatively newfound niche. The idea, like the general travel auction, is simple; they aim to offer those willing to bid the opportunity to purchase cruise tickets for a low price. In theory a site user can win an auction that offers them a vacation at a fraction of the cost. Does that sound too good to be true? That’s what I thought until a friend convinced me to give such a travel auction a go. By some kind of fluke I actually won! Unearthing the travel auction That’s right. I signed up to a travel auction merely to see what it was all about and the next thing I know, I’ve won a three day cruise trip. Perhaps I’m going a little too fast, so let’s slow down a moment. Having decided to take my partner on a short cruise to celebrate our anniversary, I started searching the bowels of the internet. Ordinarily I tend to stick to the recognized vacation and travel websites but money is tight at the moment (as it is for many people) and a work colleague had suggested checking cruise deals bidding sites. It was with skepticism I started looking at such travel auction sites. The particular travel auction I partook in was of the penny bid variety. After looking at an array of sites I had decided that there was little to lose here, providing I maintained a level-head. I’d heard that penny bidding can become addictive due to the nature of the bidding process. Such auctions require you to pay to bid, but because they tend to rise in increments of one cent the item seems like a bargain. Win a travel auction, take a cruise Without going into too much detail, I found a cruise package that was currently selling for less than five dollars. I kept an eye on it with the intention of bidding towards the end of its listing (having learned that one from eBay). With less than 15 minutes to go I placed a bid (the travel auction listing was at just a shade over 15 dollars at this point). A counterbid was placed and so began a bit of a bidding war. Realizing that it was costing me (about 60 cents) for each bid I withheld. I held back until finally I placed a bid with 30 seconds remaining. Surprisingly, that bid wasn’t countered. The timer ran down and I was the winner of this particular travel auction listing. I had won a two person three day cruise for less than sixteen dollars. That’s a big drop from the near 1800USD retail price. Still skeptical – the back of my mind refused to accept the promises of a cruise deals bidding sites, particularly following some of the internet reports I had read – I paid the winning total and expected the worst. The worst never came. Cruising on the back of a travel auction Sure enough, all of the necessary details followed from the travel auction website, including instructions as to how to go about booking the cruise. That in itself was straightforward enough. I selected the dates that corresponded to our anniversary (well a few days out but close enough). I selected the cruise package provider, read the important details (luggage, passports, itinerary, and other similar topics) and waited patiently. Tickets arrived and on the stated day we both headed to the port in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Thanks to a travel auction website we spent the next three nights on a Caribbean cruise that took in the Bahamas, a truly beautiful location, and more importantly, beautiful sunshine and waters. I’m not sure how the travel auction site, or other cruise deals bidding sites for that matter, are able to offer such discounted cruise offers. I imagine it’s something to do with the tallying of payments made for bids. Regardless, trips like the anniversary one we enjoyed are rare. Imagine it; we got to see beautiful sites, enjoy fantastic food and drink and make the most of quality downtime, all for a discounted price. Even factoring in the cost of bids, the taxes and extras we paid for on the cruise ship, our journey was still incredibly inexpensive thanks to a travel auction site.