The Caribbean may be a wonderful vacation spot, but it sure is expensive. Some of the high cost comes from an eager market of tourists willing to pay top dollar for souvenirs and a water-locked, trapped market base that cannot go elsewhere for things like hotels, meals, and entertainment.
But there are ways to take your dream vacation without mortgaging your house to pay for food and a place to sleep. Here are some places you can cut costs without cutting fun. You just need to make choices. Think about what is most important to you about your vacation. Do you really need an ocean view if you expect to be sitting on the beach all day anyway? Do you really need a full breakfast or will a continental breakfast be enough? Do you need a large hotel with an exercise room, indoor pool, and lush garden, or would you rather swim in the ocean and admire natural island flora?
No one can decide what's important to your vacation but you. But here are some places to think about cutting costs.
Hotel:
Do you need the services of a luxury high-rise, five-star hotel, or will a smaller inn do just as well? Think about whether you would use the features of the hotel. Think about whether you want to be surrounded by crowds on the beach. Think about when peak vacation season is - hotel rooms are more expensive then. Maybe you don't need to go to the Caribbean in January. Maybe June would be just as fun, and the rooms will be cheaper and the beaches less crowded.
Food:
To really cut costs on meals, think about bringing breakfast bars or protein bars with you. Or stay in a room that has a kitchen, so you can buy groceries and make your own breakfast and lunch, only eating out for dinner (this only makes sense if your vacation is long enough to warrant buying, say, a whole loaf of bread. It isn't cheaper if you only end up throwing away most of your groceries at the end of your trip!). Room service is significantly more expensive than eating in the hotel restaurant, and eating at the hotel is more expensive than eating at a stand-alone restaurant.
Souvenirs:
Let's face it - we all need to bring home souvenirs of the trip. But do you really need the T-shirts, the bottles of sand, the tacky picture frame, the stuffed turtle, and the picture books? Will you really wear the shirt? Will you really want to display the tacky picture frame, or will a photograph taken in the Caribbean, framed in a home-bought frame, do just as well? And what are you going to do with a bottle of sand, anyway? Limit impulse purchases by refusing to buy during your first shopping excursion. If you want it the second time you go shopping, then seriously consider buying it. Just remember, that multi-colored T-shirt won't look as laid-back when you're home than when you're in the Caribbean. And that picture frame will look different surrounded by your home knick-knacks that surrounded by other tourist merchandise.
Think twice before you reserve that hotel room, order room service, or buy your trinkets. You can still have a wonderful vacation, even if you think hard about every purchase. Just remember to bring your camera (and film - buying film in the Caribbean is extremely expensive!), and you will be able to remember your trip long after you forget about the trinkets you didn't buy.
Have a great trip!
