I was talking this morning with a long-time friend with whom I did a lot of traveling back in our mispent youth. She expressed some surprise that I do so much cruise travel now, since most of the things I enjoyed most about travel back then are missing from the cruise experience. She's right, but there also are many things to recommend cruising. To me, the ideal is to do a bit of both.

Sooooo, this started me on list-making. Below is my list of the pros and cons of cruise travel (specifically, luxury cruise travel).

Join in, and add your own lists!

Pros first, in no particular order:

1. Exploring a variety of places in a relatively short time without having to pack or unpack, wait for a plane or train, drive yourself somewhere, or lose good vacation time to the tedium of moving from one place to another.

2. Having your bed made and room cleaned every day, and you didn't have to do it.

3. Good, interesting food that you didn't have to cook.

4. Long, leisurely dinners with a variety of fun and interesting people.

5. That never-empty glass of wine at dinner and glass of scotch at the bar.

6. Not having to worry about finding a designated driver or navigating one's way back to the hotel while under the influence of that wine or scotch.

7. The list you form of places you've sampled and now you know you must go back and spend more time there.

8. The list of places you've always wanted to go, but upon visiting you discover they aren't that great. You got to see them, but you didn't blow a whole vacation on them.

9. The places it never occured to you to visit, but because the ship stopped there so did you. And now you're in love with it (think Visby).

10. Being rocked to sleep every night by the ship's motion.

11. Do the activities, don't do the activities. You're still doing something special with your holiday, even if all you're doing is napping on a lounge chair.

12. Being surrounded by people with positive attitudes, who WILL have a good time and good experience. And who will happily join you in forming no-whining zones.

13. An opportunity to get to know the staff, at least a little: largely comprised of lovely young people from all over the world, who work hard, play hard, suffer from homesickness but are thrilled to be seeing the world, and are often supporting multiple generations of their family on their wages.

14. The enduring friendships that you form. (Hey, I'm going to share a cabin next year for 71 nights with someone I met on the Song of Flower ten years ago.)

15. If you're visiting an uninteresting place, don't worry about getting bored. You won't be there long.

The cons:

1. If you're visiting an interesting place, you never get to see all you want to see.

2. $$$$$

3. You don't get much chance to get to know the people, hang at the local spots, or have those adventures that can only come with a stay in the place.

4. You don't get as wide a sampling of local cuisine.

Crystal, I think you pretty well covered the pro's & con's and I agree w/ all. All inclusive, dining and unpacking once does it for me.

Crystal, you did such a good job that I have nothing to add!

I can't add one thing, Crystal, you nailed it!!! And aren't we all so lucky?? Sorry we were late discovering cruising - as my granddaughters would say "it is so totally awesome"

Crystal, I would have to agree. We used to do land-based vacations in tropical locations and thought that was the be-all and end-all. We always said we'd never go on a cruise (all we'd ever heard about were the mass market HUGE ship lines).

Now I just can't picture us planting in one location for any longer than a day or two. Just too much to see and do, and a cruise is perfect to satisfy that desire.

Crystal this is a great pros & cons list. I agree with all of it. :)

Tom and I do still enjoy taking land based trips (that is how we met Kristin & Greg :app: ), but we do lean more towards luxury cruising when it comes down to making a choice.

Also, since land based "warm climate" trips is what my job is I need to try and keep up on all the nice resorts (such a hard job you know...checking them out and making sure my clients will enjoy staying there)! ;)

Way to go Crystal!! Your mind works a lot better than mine....can't think of anything else to add!

I can't think of anything to add either!

Masaki

Crystal, the only "pro" I can think of to add is "security". The fact that you feel safe in a foreign place where you don't know the language because there are others with you.
Great list.
Lynn

Nice list, Crystal. I whole-heartily agree with those enduring friendships.

I agree with the security aspect, along with being almost guaranteed to have so much fun even if traveling alone.

As far as the limited time in port...most of the time I'd agree; but on many trips the ship overnights (or even two overnights) which I love. You have the safe option of returning to the ship or the adventuresome option of immersing yourself in the local culture and cuisine. I hope they continue to do this and even add more overnight ports.

I could have never done my amazing trip to Asia without a fantastic cruise like RSSC.

Sue,
Anytime you need someone to help you check out the resorts, I'd be willing to go, even on short notice. I'll send back a detailed report too. ;)

Lauri, you're right about the traveling alone. I travel alone about half the time, and doing it on a cruise is considerably easier than doing it on a land trip (though that's fine too if you take some basic safety precautions and keep your pleasant switch turned on).

That's pretty much how I wound up being an RSSC junkie. Once I decided, despite my previous cruise experience being awful, to see the Greek islands by cruise, it turned out that, with the comparatively low single supplement, RSSC was about the same price as most of the premium cruise lines (and my smart TA knew from what I hadn't liked about my earlier experience to keep me off the mass market lines). That was 1997 and the Song of Flower. And I was hooked, though it took some urging to get me to try other ships after SoF sailed into the RSSC sunset.

Great list Crystal!

I never thought I'd set foot on a cruise ship. We've always loved the water, and sailed for many years on Lake Ontario, and a few other places.

Several years ago, while treking in Nepal, I was very uncomfortable eating the food (lost 15 pounds, I should go 2 or 3 times a year).

That's when we decided our next trip would be a cruise around S. America, where we could depend on a good variety of food prepared under hygienic conditions.

True, cruising may be seen as a "lazy" way to travel, but it works for us now. I can not conceive of going to a resort for a week or two anymore.

I love being in and on the water - toss in interesting ports and relaxing sea days and it's heaven!

Hey Arlene...at times I even take friends with me when Tom is busy at his job. I am not one to travel alone...I am a big fraidy cat! ;)