Based on conversations with various friends and co-workers, vacation travel falls into a sort of continuum between two poles.
The left-hand pole is basically the group who wants to basically do nothing strenuous and be entertained, eat good food, go somewhere pleasant, and do it all in some degree of intoxication. The more extreme versions of this pole are the people who’ll go somewhere in Mexico to an all inclusive resort and basically vegetate and be more or less drunk in their lounge chairs the entire time, and will go to various touristy “outings” sometimes.
The right-hand pole is basically the self-sufficient explorer/adventurer group, where they go somewhere new, and do active exploring type things. It’s not really a restful vacation model.
I think the cruises fall somewhere about 1/3 of the way to the right- they get all that pampering and sloth on the cruise, but they get some degree of interesting sights and adventures on the port calls. If it was half time in port, half on the ship, I’d call it dead-center between the poles, but I gather that most cruises are more heavily weighted toward shipboard time.
:shrug: My wife and I enjoy both types of vacations. I’d say it’s split about 50/50. In fact, when we where in Costa Rica, we spent the first half doing adventure type stuff. White water rafting, zip lines, exploring on our own. The second half was drinks and books by the pool.
We did one cruise. It was… ok. Turned out to be spring break and the college kids got a little tiring (now I like my beer, but sheessss… The ship started running out of different types). The most disappointing part was the food. Mediocre at best. I had ONE good meal in the 7 day we where aboard.
My kids have been all over as well (particularly my daughter, my son isn’t much of a traveler and has elected to stay home with grandma). And one of the things when traveling with kids is that you WANT touristy. Its the rare parent who wants to expose middle or upper class pre-teen kids to “the real India” or visit an area of the world where Ebola outbreaks happen, risk being in the middle of an Arab Spring event or spend time in backwater China - any more than they want to go on vacation in the real neighborhoods of Chicago or Baltimore or stay on an impoverished Native reservation in North Dakota. Most kids aren’t cut out for "well, we don’t know where we are sleeping tonight and we don’t know if we will get sick from eating this food. There is enough excitement teaching an eight year old how to protect her bag from pickpockets in the touristy areas of Rome.
The backpack through Europe open each day to what the day brings to me experience I was lucky enough to have in college is not the one I would have wanted to take my kids on when they were younger. Its one that I hope traveling to touristy places will help prepare them for.
We also like both (although we aren’t really outdoorsy people - hiking and camping vacations aren’t our thing) and usually rotate between a “sit on our butt” (cruise or beach) vacation and a busy vacation. Busy for us can mean Disney, but has also meant the UK, Germany, Washington DC, New York City, San Francisco.
Some vacations are a good mix. Hawaii had lots of beach sitting. And some learning to surf, light hiking, snorkeling…
I went on a short cruise to the Bahamas in 1992. I think it was two nights on the boat. The food was excellent. I liked sleeping with the gentle rocking. I liked visiting the Bahamas. This was a short, inexpensive cruise (paid for by my parents, I had just graduated college) that hit the sweet spot for me.
BUT…
Cruises strike me as indulgent, vulgar, and white-bread. You know, it’s nice to go out for a nice meal or even a cheap, tasty meal now and then. Maybe even once a week. But to gorge oneself as people do on these cruises, and drink themselves under the table, and all that jazz. For weeks at a time. Ick.
I know there are relatively many American people who go on vacation to the same place every year. They even end up buying apartments or houses in that resort, which they will visit every year.
At least people who take cruise ship vacations get to visit different places.
Too expensive? mrAru and I had a balcony stateroom for 7 days going from NY to the Bahamas, all we could eat, all the booze we could drink and 2 hours internet a day for $1800US each plus tips. Add all the stuff to do like stage shows, classes on various stuff, movie theater, casino if you like gambling…
Honestly, unpack once and visit a bunch of tropical islands in luxury, what ISN’T there to like about it?
One could ask why people go camping over and over, or to Disney or skiing or to the beach over and over… We all like to do different things.
I have no desire to sleep in a tent or venture into the Magic Kingdom ever again. But in November, we’re driving to Fort Lauderdale for a 10-day cruise that includes going into and out of the Panama Canal, as well as stops in 5 ports. Including insurance and tips, I don’t think we’ll spend $3K total for the 2 of us, and we’re getting a balcony cabin.
Those of you who want to hike or drive your RV cross country or fly to another continent - have fun! We certainly will!
I did that one last year. It’s great. I could look down from my balcony at the donkeys as we moved through the canal. Lots of cool wildlife also in Costa Rica and Panama.
If you stop in Aruba, you can get an all day bus pass for $10. It stops at the beaches, and the northern route goes to the lighthouse. We also took it south through the places the people live and through the desert-like center of the island. The driver asked us if we really intended to take that route, but it was far more interesting than sitting on the beach.
We are stopping in Aruba and we’re taking the submarine excursion, just because. We’re not beach people either, but because of his several spinal surgeries, spousal unit can’t walk for very long. I’ll look at the bus pass - but I’m not sure how much time we’ll have after our sub ride. I’m still researching our other stops to see what we might want to do.
I’m looking forward to the locks - our cabin is forward on the starboard side, deck 4 - we should have a good view of the mechanics of moving thru!
Do they enjoy them that much?
Yes, we love them, only in part because where we are going, but mostly because of the on-board experience…
Do they really give you a rest?
Nah, not really…
Does the 5k to 10k missing in your bank account hurt?
We’ve been on 7 cruises, and the MOST we spent was $3K for a balcony room on a 10-day Caribbean cruise and that was because we went with other people and planned it a year in advance…since we are empty-nesters, we’re much more flexible on time…there are plenty of websites that offer huge discounts the closer to the sail date - our last cruise was a 6 day western Caribbean that we purchased a month before the sail date for about a 75% discount…it’s not hard to find balcony room for $600/person if your flexible on your travel dates…
Do you like the staff waiting on you?
I guess…the only one we really notice is the cabin steward, never had a bad one, they are great, and we tip well
Do you lose money in the casino?
Not a cent, don’t go there…it’s generally the one indoor place on the ship that allows smoking, we hate that and frankly, don’t care about gambling.
Do you really enjoy the modern huge cruise ship experience with it’s shopping malls and restaurants?
They are really cool, the cruise lines are trying to out do each other, so lots of choices and amenities…plus, there’s an excess of ships on the market now, it’s a buyer’s market, hence the discount websites…
Is sex better at sea? Come on you can tell me that much, right?
I’d much rather take a few cruises than travel in an RV. Have you seen the price of RVs lately? :eek: Even renting them gets expensive. And at the end of the week, you don’t have to spend another day taking the RV back to wherever it lives when you’re not using it since you can’t park it at home. Not to mention the cabins on a ship are much larger and more comfortable than anything short of a Class A diesel coach RV, and those start out at around $100,000.
Can you tell I have the misfortune of owning a 34-foot trailer? $5,000 a year to have the thing kill the grass in a friend’s back yard. RVs are like boats - the happiest day is when you buy one. The second happiest day is when you sell the damned thing.
I’ve also taken a couple cruises. The only thing I didn’t like about any of them was going back home when it was over.
Sounds like fun. My wife is claustrophobic, so the sub ride was right out. Even the old sub ride at Disney was not something she went near.
You may have read that Colon is not a place you want to walk around in. They are right. The people we ate dinner with didn’t know you had to book an excursion in Gatun Lake, so rode the ship back. When they tried to leave the cruise ship area they were stopped by the Panamanian police. Riding back through Colon, I understand why.
We went to the Maritime Museum in Curacao (it was Sunday so a lot of stuff was closed) and it was great, but that might be too much walking.
Maybe you can, but the only benefit I can sort of get at home without adding to my expenses is sleeping in the same room every night and not having to pack/unpack - but that’s only a benefit of a cruise over another type of multi-city vacation. But I can’t get the other benefits at home without spending a dime extra- if I want to go to a show every night, eat three meals a day in a restaurant, have a few drinks in a bar while playing a trivia game , etc it’s going to cost me something above my normal required expenses. And some things I simply can’t get without leaving home- I can achieve a different level of relaxation if I am away from home for 7 days than I can if I simply take 7 days off work and do a staycation with daytrips. At some point during that staycation, I am going to start to feel that I should be doing something productive , so in order to truly relax I have to go somewhere. Once I’ve paid to travel somewhere, paid for a hotel room, and paid for meals and activities most other vacations aren’t less expensive than a cruise. I just checked some prices and found a 14 day cruise from Rome to Miami for $529 a person. There are always taxes and fees, so let"s make it $1000 per person. That’s about $71/day per person - I don’t know anywhere where I can get even a hotel room and meals for $71 per person.
