Recently I received a somewhat pointed question from a friend who wanted to know how many sea days there are on this nine month world cruise. Coming from a traveler who has jetted to some great locations and enjoyed truly immersive experiences, the implication was straightforward. Aren’t we spending a lot of time at sea, time that might better be spent diving deeply into a region’s geography, history, culture and people? The question is a good one, and two converging factors make this a good time to offer my thoughts on the subject.
First, a week from today we will be fully a third of the way through our epic adventure. By then we’ll have been at sea for three full months and have visited four of the planet’s seven continents. That’s enough time and travel to give me a solid perspective on the advantages and disadvantages of a world cruise. Second, and particularly relevant to my friend’s question, we have just completed the longest string of sea days that are part of our itinerary.
The Pacific Ocean is really big. One of our Polynesian guides told us you could put all of the world’s land masses in it and still have room left over. We spent four days at sea sailing from Los Angeles to Hawaii, another four getting from there to French Polynesia, and five more to reach New Zealand. Over a period of nineteen days we spent thirteen of them at sea, something we won’t come close to repeating between now and the end of the cruise in September. Long story short, and as I said above, I think now is probably a good time to discuss my friend’s question, so let’s get into it.
First, some numbers. Over 274 days we’ll visit more than 150 ports in 60 countries. Those are estimates, as our itinerary has changed a few times, but they’re certainly close, so we’ll go with them. That doesn’t mean we have nearly 124 sea days, because several ports of call include multi day stays. Additionally, several sea days are really adventures in their own right, like sailing through the Drake Passage and Antarctica, the Straits of Magellan, Chilean and Norwegian fjords, etc. If we count sea days as days spent with open water on both sides of the ship, the number probably drops to a little over a hundred. Still a lot of ship time.
All right, enough background. Here’s my short, over-simplistic answer. A world cruise isn’t for everyone. If you think you’d be miserable stuck on a ship for that much time, you’re probably right. If, however, like me you love being out on the ocean, or at least would find it tolerable, read on, because a world cruise offers benefits that can’t be obtained any other way (unless you own your own Lear jet).
Here’s one way to look at it, and Michele and I talked about it in this context. A world cruise is like buying a Whitman Sampler, which contains a lot of different chocolate candies, but only a few of each variety. The advantage is that you get to try a lot of different chocolates by making a single purchase, and after the box is empty there will be a few that you wish there had been more of. So, you go to your local confectioner and load up on those, which in my case would probably be the coconut filled ones. And so with the cruise. After 150 ports I’ll have a pretty good idea of the places I’d like to go back to and spend more time. I’ll probably call New Zealand Exhibit A, because there’s no way two days there will be enough time in that beautiful country.
Another big factor for me is the journey itself. By rounding the southern tips of both South America and Africa, we’ll be making a true circumnavigation of the Earth, a Magellan-like voyage I’ve always wanted to do. Call it a bucket list item if you like, but I think it’s awesome, sea days and all.
Another thing about sea days. Unlike our crossing of the Pacific, most of our sea days have come, and will come, in ones and twos, and we’ll often look forward to them as an opportunity to catch our breath, get some rest, handle personal matters (life does go on during a nine month cruise), and prepare for the next ports of call. When we get to the Mediterranean we’ll go through a long stretch with almost no sea days at all, and I have no doubt that we’ll wish there were a couple interspersed in there somewhere.
Two final thoughts, because I need to wrap this up. First, I love being at sea, with the whales, dolphins, flying fish, petrels, albatrosses, boobies, and the ever changing ocean and sky. The rainbows, sunrises and sunsets are wonderful, and at night stargazing is a joy. Imagine my happiness at seeing the Southern Cross for the first time. Second, the opportunity to see more than sixty countries in nine months took my breath away when I first considered doing this, and three months in it still does. As amazing as these first three months have been, the next couple will bring us to New Zealand, Australia, the Far East, and southern Asia, all the way to India. Sea days are a small price to pay for an experience like that.
On a couple occasions my friend has mentioned things he got to do and see that I didn’t have time for in countries we’ve both visited. He’s right, of course, and his comments don’t annoy me in the least. My experience is going to be 25,000 miles wide, but only an inch deep, and my take is that he’s helping me develop my short list of places I need to revisit in more depth after our cruise is over. Besides, by blogging about our quick visits to more than sixty countries, maybe I’ll give my travel-experienced friend an idea for his next deep dive into someplace he hasn’t visited yet.
Tomorrow we’ll be in Auckland, so watch for my first post from New Zealand, a place I’ve wanted to visit for a very long time. So until then, kia ora, the all purpose hello, goodbye, thank you phrase in Māori.
Thought I’d throw in a sampling of photos from our sea days. I really enjoy them and fill them with exercise, enrichment lectures, reading, blogging, planning our next shore days, and the onboard entertainment.
Speaking of enrichment lectures, this is my new friend Welson, a Brazilian who is a music professor at the University of Florida. I had the good fortune to have dinner with him one evening, and we hit it off. His lectures on Brazilian music on our sea days leading up to our stops in Brazil were wonderful.
Can’t remember whether it was Michele or me, but one of us got this great photo of an albatross flying alongside the ship on one of our sea days. They really are magnificent birds.
I love New York Times Sunday crosswords, and I’m working my way through this collection of 200 of them.
The pace is a little slower on sea days. On our way to the main dining room for a nice dinner.
On sea days we often have time to sit back and watch the sun set. This is the first of three I thought I’d share.
Unedited. Can’t believe how purple it was.
This one was either the day before or the day after the one above. What a difference.
This was technically a sea day, as we never got off the ship after missing our stop in Punta Arenas due to high winds. Not a bad consolation prize, wouldn’t you say?
With nothing to break up the view, we see quite a few full rainbows on sea days.
Moonrises can be pretty good too.
And speaking of the moon, this is Tom Vassos, Professor of Astronomy at the University of Toronto. His lectures on our recent sea days were awesome.
There’s always lots of onboard entertainment on sea days as well. This frivolity was part of our recent equator crossing ceremony.
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