Why I’m officially done pretending land vacations are always better than cruises
Cruising is for people who have essentially given up on the idea of ‘discovery’ and just want to be fed like livestock until they fall asleep. I used to say that to anyone who would listen. I was that guy—the one who spent three months researching the exact right neighborhood in Berlin to ensure I wasn’t within two miles of a ‘tourist trap.’ I wanted the struggle. I wanted the authentic, gritty experience of trying to order coffee in a language I didn’t speak while a local looked at me with pure, unadulterated disgust.
But then I turned thirty-four and realized that planning a land vacation is basically taking on a second, unpaid job. I’m tired. I think we’re all tired, but we’re too embarrassed to admit that sometimes we just want to be trapped on a giant, humid Swiss Army knife of a ship where the hardest decision is whether to have the lobster tail or the prime rib (or both, because nobody is stopping you).
The ‘Authenticity’ lie and my failure in Rome
We need to talk about the fetishization of ‘authentic’ travel. There is this weird social pressure to avoid the beaten path, but let me tell you about July 2017. I was in Rome, staying in a ‘charming’ third-floor walk-up Airbnb that smelled faintly of old onions and damp towels. I had spent six months planning this ‘perfect’ land trip. I had a color-coded spreadsheet. I had offline maps. I was doing it right.
By day four, the temperature hit 98 degrees with 90% humidity. I spent forty-five minutes at the Roma Termini station crying—actual tears—because the ticket machine wouldn’t take my card and I couldn’t figure out which platform went to Florence. I ended up paying a taxi driver $40 to drive me four blocks because my spirit was broken and my shoes had rubbed a hole in my heel. I wasn’t ‘discovering’ Italy. I was suffering in a very expensive, very hot museum. I know people will disagree and say the struggle is part of the growth, but honestly? I just wanted a cold room and a burger.
The truth is that land vacations are often just a series of logistical fires you have to put out while wearing a backpack.
On a cruise, that failure doesn’t happen. If you can’t find the dining room, a nice man in a crisp uniform points the way. If your feet hurt, you go to the cabin. There is no ‘losing’ at cruising. It is a controlled environment designed to make sure you never have a bad moment, which is both its greatest strength and its most pathetic weakness.
The part where I talk about why I hate Carnival
I might be wrong about this—actually, I know I’m being unfair—but I refuse to sail on Carnival ever again. I don’t care how cheap the 4-day Bahamas run is. I went once in 2019 and the carpets in the hallway had this specific, lingering scent of fruit punch and industrial-grade carpet cleaner that I can still smell when I close my eyes. It felt like a frat house that had been bleached but not actually cleaned. I know they’ve updated their fleet. I know the Mardi Gras is supposed to be ‘luxury.’ I don’t care. I’m an irrational hater. I’ll stick to Royal Caribbean or Celebrity, even if I’m paying a 30% premium for the privilege of not smelling that carpet.
Royal Caribbean is my weird corporate security blanket. I’ve been on the Harmony of the Seas twice. I don’t even like the shows. I just like knowing exactly where the pizza place is. It’s pathetic. I’ve become the person I used to make fun of.
The actual math of the thing
I’m a nerd for data, so I actually tracked this. In 2021, I did a 7-day self-guided trip to Lisbon. In 2022, I did a 7-day Mediterranean cruise. I tracked my ‘stress’ levels (using my Garmin watch) and my actual spending. What I mean is—actually, let me put it differently: the cruise was ‘cheaper’ on paper but I ended up spending way more on the ‘extras’ that felt mandatory.
- Lisbon (Land): $1,450 total. This included a lot of cheap wine and $5 sardines.
- Cruise (Sea): $2,100 total. The base fare was $900, but then you add the $18-a-day gratuities, the $75-a-day drink package, and the $150 shore excursions.
- Step Count: 24,800/day in Lisbon vs. 11,400/day on the ship.
- Decision Fatigue: High on land, non-existent at sea.
Land vacations are for when you have the mental energy to be an architect of your own joy. Cruises are for when your brain is a puddle and you just want to be a passenger in your own life. Sometimes you want to be the architect. Most years, I just want to be the passenger.
The ‘Freedom’ delusion
People say land vacations give you freedom. Do they? Or do they just give you a different set of constraints? On a land trip, you’re a slave to check-in times, train schedules, and restaurant reservations. If you pick a bad hotel, you’re stuck there for three nights. If the neighborhood sucks, you’re walking through it every day.
A land vacation is like a choose-your-own-adventure book where half the pages are missing. You think you’re in control until the local bus strike happens. On a cruise, the ship is the destination. You aren’t ‘trapped’ on the ship; the ship is the only place you actually want to be. I realize how corporate that sounds. It’s gross. But after a year of Zoom calls and ‘leveraging synergies’ at my day job, I don’t want freedom. I want a schedule that tells me when the trivia starts.
Anyway, I digress. The point is that we should stop acting like one is ‘better’ than the other. They serve different masters. One serves your ego and your Instagram feed (land), and the other serves your nervous system (cruise).
The verdict
I still tell my friends to go to Japan and walk the Nakasendo trail. I tell them to get lost in the back alleys of Hanoi. But if they tell me they’ve had a hard year? I tell them to book a balcony cabin on a ship and stay there until they forget their own password.
Is cruising ‘real’ travel? Probably not. Does it matter? Not even a little bit.
I often wonder if I’ll ever go back to being that guy with the spreadsheet and the ‘authentic’ onion-smelling Airbnb. Maybe when I’m forty? Or maybe I’ll just keep getting older and lazier until I eventually just live on a ship full-time like those weird retirees who have 5,000 loyalty points and know all the bartenders by their first names. Is that a sad ending or the ultimate goal? I genuinely don’t know the answer.