In writing my review of our recent 3-night cruise aboard the Disney Wish, I discussed a bit about the cost of the trip without going into detail of every single line item. In this post, I’m going to go through almost every single individual item associated with the trip, starting with the second we left our door and included everything from the cruise cost to airfare to onboard cold brew coffee to our “buffer” day at Disney World. Read on to learn how we spent our money on a short trip aboard the Disney Wish!
Summary of Budget
Here’s a summary of all the costs associated with this trip. I’ll give some high-level thoughts on the trip cost before going into more detail in each category.
Airfare - $1,043
Airport Meals / Snacks - $58
Transportation - $345
Cruise Cost - $4,218
Onboard Expenses - $1,104
Buffer Day at Disney World - $1,235
GRAND TOTAL - $8,003
Well…$8,003 for a four-night trip (3 nights on the cruise plus a buffer night) for two adults and toddler is…high. Perhaps most tellingly, when I started booking this trip I no doubt balked at the $4,218 I’d be paying for the cruise right off the bat. And that “cruise cost” wound up being barely half the total cost.
For what it’s worth, the cost of my “baseline” Disney World trip for a family of four comes out to $6,865 in 2024, and that’s the total cost for a five-night trip with a fourth person.
I’ll also add that if you subtract the “Disney World buffer day” cost, the trip cost comes down to $6,738. The problem is that it’s strongly recommended you don’t fly in the morning of your cruise. This means you’ll inevitably have some hotel and meal costs associated with the additional night. Even so, you can do that for far less than we spent. More on this later.
Disney Wish Cruise Budget Breakdown
Now I’ll go through each category in more detail…
Airfare ($1,043)
We were flying over Easter weekend, so it’s not shocking we got hit with high prices even on the pretty well-covered LGA-MCO route. We flew Delta Main Cabin. I checked several times, but couldn’t bring myself to upgrade to Comfort+ (Delta is the only major airline we don’t have preferred boarding on, and I like to get my overhead bin space).
Airport Meals / Snacks ($58)
We’re the sorts of people who travel about twice a month on average and still—STILL—fail to just buy our own snacks at the bodega down the street before we leave the house. This cost also includes some meals at the airport.
Transportation ($345)
These costs include:
$12 roundtrip bus fare to/from home airport
$243 private car from Art of Animation to Port Canaveral
$90 bus from Port Canaveral back to the airport
Transportation from the airport to Art of Animation is counted later as part of the Disney World buffer day costs.
An Uber from Art of Animation to Port Canaveral will probably cost you under $100. We use Uber quite a bit at Disney World, but—without going into it—this just isn’t the sort of journey I much like requesting an Uber for, and I’m definitely we had Lauren book us a car for this journey. It was seamless despite some, let’s say, “very big hiccups” that we caused.
As I wrote in my review of the cruise, our bus from the port to MCO on GoPort was actually too seamless for me to review. We walked right onto a bus after we got off the ship and were at the airport with a few hours to spare. Definitely good value at $90.
Cruise Cost ($4,218)
Inside Stateroom
2 Adults - $2,820
1 Child - $933
Taxes, Fees, and Port Expenses - $334
Prepaid Gratuities - $131
Total - $4,218
Except for the prepaid gratuities, this is the price you’d have seen if you’d run a search for this itinerary when we booked it. This is the cruise cost that includes everything included on a Disney Cruise. The next section (onboard expenses) covers the extra, optional stuff we spent money on while onboard.
Again, this was an Easter weekend cruise, so this was among the more expensive itineraries. Our choice to go with an Inside Stateroom put us in one of the least expensive rooms on this itinerary, though.
Our Expenses Onboard the Disney Wish ($1,104)
Let’s go through the onboard expenses section-by-section.
Activities / Excursions
Bike Rentals - $45
Oceaneer Club Band - $13
Olaf's Royal Picnic - $358
Total - $416
I’ve separately reviewed Olaf’s Royal Picnic, the greeting / show experience that comes with a hefty swag bag. I find bike rental to be a very good use of time and money on Castaway Cay, and the Oceaneer Club Band deposit is refundable, but we keep the band as a keepsake. It’s worth noting we also did the Royal Gathering character experience—that greeting requires a reservation but is free.
Non-Alcoholic Snacks / Coffee
Preludes - $16
Wishing Star Café - $7
Luna’s Libations - $3
Cove Café - $10
Enchanted Sword Café - $5
Wheezy’s Freezies - $42 (included novelty cup)
Wishing Star Café - $7
Luna’s Libations - $12
Summertime Freeze - $9
Total - $111
Food and beverage expenses that are no included with the cruise also come with a “tip” option. We usually include some tip with our purchases. These expenses tended to be for things like cold brew coffee, canned soda and popcorn, or specialty beverages.
Bars and Alcohol (* included food purchase)
Nightingale’s - $39
Hyperspace Lounge - $30
World of Marvel - $28
Keg & Compass* - $18
Castaway Air Bar - $21
Hyperspace Lounge - $22
The Bayou*- $26
Total - $184
You can look up the menus of the individual bars online to see how much drinks are. These were mostly either solo visits to the bars for a single drink, or couple visits with one drink each. I’ve noted two visits that came with food purchases, too. I’d add that dinner doesn’t come with alcohol, and we only got drinks at one meal.
Merchandise - Total - $25
I bought Zoe a pin ($15) and a plastic sword ($10). I’m not super into weaponry, but Zoe had been so sweet during Pirate Night and just wanted a sword to complete the outfit, so I caved.
I assume we’re well below average when it comes to merchandise purchases. Besides a huge amount of branded Disney Cruise Line gear (shirts, jackets, etc.) there’s expensive jewelry, watches, and all manner of toys available for purchase. (Keep in mind we came home with a bunch of stuff from Olaf’s Royal Picnic, too.)
Misc.
Shutters Photo Package - $230
Laundry - $8
Onboard Internet - $130
Total - $368
As always, the fun things are in the miscellanea. As I explained in my review of the cruise, Zoe loves meeting characters, and the package of professional photos from Shutters is going to be a must-buy for the foreseeable future.
The onboard internet probably could have been skipped, and perhaps in the future I’d go without it. I have professional reasons to sometimes post on social media (I didn’t much this trip, though), and internet is also helpful if I need to research something while I’m onboard.
It’s maybe worth noting that three items—Olaf’s Royal Picnic, the photo package, and onboard internet—totaled $718 of our $1,104 of onboard expenses. That means that, these three large, very-much-optional items aside, we spent only $386, or $42 per person ($64 per adult, where most of the expenses came from) per night.
Disney World Buffer Day Costs ($1,235)
I’m putting this section last because it’s the least directly related to the cruise itself. It’s also really messy to say exactly how much you should budget for here vs. what we spent…
Unless you fly in the morning of your cruise (not recommended), you’re going to have some hotel / meal costs before you get on the ship. Since we’re Disney World annual passholders, we at least “saved” on ticket costs for this day. But I only booked the pricey Art of Animation Finding Nemo Suite because I needed to review it (I also liked Art of Animation for quick Skyliner access on this short day). And we only bought Rise of the Resistance Lightning Lanes because Zoe was just tall enough to finally ride it. To fill the afternoon, though, you would always want to buy Lightning Lane Multi Pass and stack some afternoon Lightning Lanes.
A reasonable estimate of costs for this buffer day might be something like $250 for a hotel, $50 for transportation, and two meals at $20 per person.
Anyways, here are all our actual costs for this buffer day:
Art of Animation Finding Nemo Suite (1 Night) - $831
Mears Connect to Hotel - $50
Lunch at Art of Animation - $33
Lightning Lane Multi Pass - $125
Rise of the Resistance Lightning Lane - $80
Soda, Candy - $10
Popcorn at Kat Saka's Kettle - $13
Dinner at Docking Bay 7 - $38
Breakfast and Coffee at Art of Animation - $45
Arcade at Art of Animation - $10