The Cruise Ship that Ate My Brain

At this time last week, I was on a two-day preview cruise for a new ship, the Celebrity Solstice. Now, I'm not a very experienced "cruiser, I'd only been on one ship before, and the mode of travel that a cruise ship offers --a floating mall that is a bubble of food and familiarity with carefully choreographed insertions onto foreign shores --has never held much appeal for me. (In fact I've been pretty critical of the industry in the past.)

But as a travel writer, you don't always take the trips you want to take. And there's no denying that a cruise can be a budget-friendly way of traveling 'round, so I thought I'd check it out.

Celebrity is Royal Caribbean's high-end ship, and the Solstice had a lot of very good design in it.  Its main dining room, for instance, was designed by Adam Tihany, who handled the design of no-slouch restaurants Per Se and Daniel. (His firm also designed the ship's restrooms and they were really among the most lovely I've ever been in.)

I wish I could tell you more about the design, but I had trouble forming a coherent thought aboard. Here are my notes from the evening of 11/15.

I think this cruise is making me stupid. I can't seem to focus on anything. Now sitting on porch. [I meant, the"veranda" off the stateroom.] There is a high-end looking gunmetal mesh pair of chairs and what looks like teak, planked, table, that I'm leaning on. The sound of water hushing up against the boat. The air is warm and the sky is deep satin black in the distance, I see two ships. One a golden multi-lit spectacle like this boat, the other, equally lit but smaller. Or is it further away?

That's quite enough of that. Believe me when I tell you that my notes are generally better, unless I'm severely jet-lagged, which I wasn't. (Or drinking heavily, which I wasn't doing either.)

 The dumbing down effect was not only limited to me --my travel companion, another writer, also felt mentally challenged. Our conversations --usually West Wing worthy banter--were punctuated by a lot of helpless handwaving as we grasped for words.

So did the boat bump off some brain cells? I think it did. And by design! It seems to me that a cruise ship is an environment that is purposefully resistant to serious thought. For example, we sat by the pool, on the top deck, and it was very pleasant --a great place to read, or write or think, if not for the incredibly loud music (live band or loudspeaker).  Dinners are taken ensemble, ensuring small talk. Staterooms are not inviting during the day.

The ocean is by its nature meditative, but there's no place aboard with a water view where you can sit and think and be unstimulated (by alcohol or otherwise) for a few minutes.  You are not meant to be reflective, alone, or unbusy on a cruise. I couldn't form a coherent thought aboard because I wasn't supposed to.

Follow Alison Stein Wellner on Twitter: www.twitter.com/AlisonSWellner

Comments

[cruisemates]

Now that you have seen a ship, you owe it to your readers to report on a what a cruise is really like, not what your brain did as a result of a day of air travel to spend one day on a ship.

Paul Motter
editor: www.cruisemates.com
Online cruise guide, ship reviews and cruise community

[cruisemates]

But I have to tell you, an experienced cruiser will tell it takes a few days before you really settle in on a ship, to where you aren't distracted by the pretty artwork and oceanviews. At that point, you are in control and you really start to enjoy the cruise. You make the aerobics classes and culture lectures. You deal with your email and peruse the menus more carefully to balance your diet. In other words, a 2-day press trip is never intended to be like a real cruise, it is an opportunity to take pictures and sample the cuisine and that is about all.

Don't sell cruises short, or imply they are meant to make you mindless. The most exciting vacations I have ever had in my life have been on cruise ships. Go to Alaska and watch humpback whales bubble-feeding and glaciers calving - go to the Mediaterranean and spend two days walking through Venice and visiting the islands of Delos and Santorini. See the Baltic palaces of the Romanovs. REAL cruising isn't about being on a ship and reading a book, it is about the most convenient way to travel to exotic destinations ever invented.

You sight-see by day, return to your "hotel" for dinner, sleep in idyllic comfort and awake to go sightseeing again. Imagine seeing Europe without consulting a single train schedule or haggling with a taxi driver who can't find your pensionne. That's cruising, not a mindless one-day voyage to nowhere.

[Alison Stein Wellner - Huffpost Blogger]

Interesting points, and it absolutely confirms my belief that one-size-t­ravel-does­-not-fit-a­ll. For instance, some of my most favorite moments traveling have included taxi drivers and trains.
Although I still don't see how being on a great big cruise ship with thousands of people is meant to be a contemplative... and I think that travelers like me (and I mean ones who aren't investigating these things professionally) are not drawn to big cruise ships for a reason.

[cruisemates]

Hello Allison...

As a fellow journalist who was also just on a 2-night cruise on Solstice I say welcome to the cruise world. I admit that it is somewhat hard to concentrate on a cruise ship, but it certainly isn't impossible. Those of us who are professional cruise journalists manage to work on ships regularly.

There is something of a soporific effect that comes with being at sea, but it isn't really a result of any intention of the cruise line. It comes from the gentle motion of the ship, the plentiful food and the lack of any responsibility for any kind of work: your meals are cooked and served to you, your bed is made almost immediately the first time you leave your cabin. When go out for dinner your bed is turned down and your towels replaced. You don't have to do anything.

[Alison Stein Wellner - Huffpost Blogger]

Thanks, cruisemates! I spend about a third of my time on the road in hotels, so I'm pretty used to having my meals prepared and my room tidied --so I'm not sure that was what did my neurons in!