So you’re finally going on that dream vacation to the Caribbean or Europe or some random river cruise in the middle of nowhere. It’s going to be amazing. Maybe you splurged on a high end, inclusive line – if you did, these tips probably won’t help you much – but if you’re a financially savvy traveler, here are a few insider tips (because I totally lived on a cruise ship for 5 years) to help you save a few extra dollars on your cruise.

Drinks – your ship will probably have roughly 457,257,238 bars onboard. None of those drinks (other than a glass of the lowest quality champagne in the world on the first formal night) will be free. The thing is though, some of them could be, and if you’re a little outgoing, you should have no trouble scoring plenty of free drinks.

Most of the staff who are allowed out to mingle with the guests are permitted to buy them drinks.  It doesn’t hurt to sit down with the cast at the disco and rave about their performances and chat with them for 20 minutes or so, it could pay off in some free cocktails.

As an added bonus, I know at least on Holland America cruises, the performer gets to claim their drink as a comp as well – a further incentive for them to take advantage of this.Why don’t they do it more? Well, with the very strong anti-fraternization rules for crew and passengers, they’re not necessarily going to sit down and chat you up. It looks a little weird.

On the flip side, they’re also supposed to be super social and give you the experience of a lifetime – it’s much easier for them to do that if you approach them.

Shore Excursions – on some lines crew can escort shore excursions for free. You may want to be sensitive when asking crew what their favorite excursions are because odds are good your housekeeper or the plumber don’t have much free time to actually do them. Again, your best bet here are the entertainment folks.

The Shore Excursions crew can also let you know anything about all of the tours available on the ship, but keep in mind, they want you to buy their tours. The majority of the crew have a much better idea of what tours are the best and how to do them cheapest (and often it’s not through the cruise line). They also have great recommendations about what is truly “not to miss” in each port.

Internet – crew can help you out two ways here. Every single crew member can tell you where to find free Wi-Fi in port. Seriously. If your cabin steward doesn’t even speak English, he will understand when you say “Juneau? Free Wi-Fi?” (FYI – you’re looking for The Viking or Silverbow Bakery).

In addition to that, I was never above picking up a crew Internet card for a guest with the right incentive. Is this entirely Kosher? No. But it all started when a guest asked me once how we tolerate the ridiculous Internet rates and I explained that our rates were just a tiny bit less ridiculous ($40 would buy you 400 minutes on a crew card). He jokingly told me he’d make it $60, if I picked one up for him. I literally took his money, bought him the card, and returned 5 minutes later – he got his cheaper Internet, I got $20. I never went around looking to do this, but anytime a passenger started asking me about the Internet and made a similar offer, I went for it. Either way, it never hurts to ask. Diplomatically… it’s very similar to the $20 trick.

Keep in mind, none of them ever walked up to me and just asked for the card, and if they had, I probably would’ve politely declined. The trick to all this is to genuinely spend a few minutes chatting with the crew! Great topics to start with are asking where they’re from or what they did before they were on a cruise ship – both were topics we all loved talking about, especially home.

If nothing else, you enrich your vacation by making a new friend!