4. Careful or You Might Miss the Boat
It’s written in the small print, but it bears emphasizing that you should take the embarkation time seriously. There is no clemency for passengers stuck in traffic, sidetracked by a flight delay or impacted by the weather. If you’re not punctual, the ship sails without you. It’s best to arrive a day before your cruise departs, so you don’t have to worry about close calls or missing the boat. Mid-voyage, there are often a few tardy passengers who lose track of time at the souvenir shops or port-of-call bars, or don’t leave sufficient time to get back from far-flung excursions. This dilly-dallying can have expensive consequences. Any travel to meet up with the ship at the next port is on your own dime (rightly so).
5. Cruise Ships Aren’t Immune to Crime
Don’t let your guard down or abandon your street smarts just because you’re on a vacation at sea. With thousands of passengers and crew on board a ship, it’s like a floating city, and with that comes a certain level of petty and not-so-petty crime. Theft, sexual assault, missing persons, murders, piracy, port robberies and the like can and do happen. Cruise lines don’t like to talk about it, naturally, and only a few voluntarily release crime statistics. A recent Senate Commerce Committee report showed that only a tiny portion of alleged cruise crimes are publicly disclosed. Out of 959 crimes reported to the FBI since 2011, only 31 were revealed on a U.S. Coast Guard web site. Without accountability, its hard for consumers to ascertain a cruise line’s safety record. This is not to fear-monger. Crime is more likely to occur on land than at sea. But having it occur on a ship presents some unique problems. If you are victimized on a cruise, you can’t just call 911 and get the police involved. You’ll be dealing with the ship’s security officers who are on the cruise line’s payroll and might not be so apt to rock the boat if crew are involved. On international waters, you’re not protected by the same protocols or laws you might expect on land or back home. You may have to deal with a series of authorities at various ports of call along your voyage, none that are incentivized to get involved in an international incident. The FBI may be called for serious crimes involving Americans, but they often seem more interested in protecting the cruise lines’ reputation than the investigation itself.
6. You Will Gain Weight
Despite your best efforts to eat sensibly and go easy on the edible indulgences, chances are you’ll gain a few pounds whenever you cruise. Between the fruity drinks, all-you-can-eat buffets, five course dining room meals, self-serve ice cream machines and late-night munchies, even the most self-disciplined among us are bound to go overboard with excessive treats. Hey, why not? You only live once, and you might as well squeeze every drop of value out of your cruise. Just know that you will be squeezing into your clothing at the end of the week and it’ll probably take you months to get back into your pre-cruise shape. The average person gains 5 to 10 pounds on a 7 day gluttonous cruise, despite all those walking tracks, yoga classes, gyms and salad bars.
