Transatlantic Cruise

[Georgia Girl]

My husband and I are considering the NCL Getaway Transatlantic sailing on 10/22/23. We've never done a Transatlantic before and I'm a little nervous about the consecutive sea days. What advice and experiences have you had?

 

[FIYes]

We have taken a couple of transatlantic cruises and enjoyed them both. My recommendations are as follows.

I wouldn’t recommend transatlantic for a first cruise because you don’t know if you enjoy cruising. There are quite a few sea days. Do you enjoy sea days or get bored? We enjoy sea days and take advantage of the on board activities…shows, lectures, trivia games, etc.

For our first transatlantic cruise, we booked a tiny interior cabin. It was okay, but for the next one we booked an ocean view. For that many sea days the natural light was worth the extra cost. Even with an ocean view the cruise was a great value and something we hope to do again.

 

[Sunset]

We had a balcony 14 day from Bacelona to NY in May a few years ago.
The balcony was an upgrade and while it was nice, it was cooler/colder than we expected out on the ocean.

I found on the 5th day at sea, that I was ready to dock somewhere, but the first 4 days were totally fine with me.

I would do another in a heartbeat as it beats flying for comfort and lack of jet lag.

You can download some books before you go from various places including your library if reading is of interest to you.

The ocean for us, was normal, and a day or two it was so calm that I thought it would be great to kayak/canoe on if the ship would stop, but it doesn't stop. Overall the ocean was not rough like I thought it would be, but bring seasickness pills just in case it does get rough for you.

 

[user5027]

Our second cruise was the Titanic Memorial Cruise from Southampton to New York in 2012. There were two lectures each day, most by ancestors of people that built, crewed on or were passengers on the Titanic.

Maybe find a cruise with a theme you'd enjoy learning more about.

I consider transatlantic cruises the civilized way to go. The clock adjusts no more than an hour each day. No jet lag!

 

[Rustic23]

We did Spain to Texas. Don't remember total days cruise, but three stops before transit, and then 5 days at sea. I would do it again no questions ask! The seas were calm, and the boat about 80% booked.

 

[Koolau]

I would do another in a heartbeat as it beats flying for comfort and lack of jet lag.

Don't know about jet lag, but for the money spent on a cruise, you could easily spring for the "berth" style flights and be quite comfortable. Little chance of sea sickness (motion sickness) as part of the bargain. The time we got bumped to first class, the food was better than anything we got on our one cruise.

We enjoyed our Caribbean cruise but would not cruise again. Been there, done that, got the T-shirt. Just not our thing so the thought of that much time in a cabin (or trying to find new things to do on a ship) is not that appealing. I guess "cruisers" would probably love it so YMMV.

 

[Teacher Terry]

Long cruises are very different than Caribbean ones where you are in port most days. There’s so many activities on sea days that it’s definitely not boring plus I enjoy swimming and reading while sitting outside if warm. We had 8 sea days out of 13 days and it was really fun.

 

[Sunset]

Don't know about jet lag, but for the money spent on a cruise, you could easily spring for the "berth" style flights and be quite comfortable. Little chance of sea sickness (motion sickness) as part of the bargain. The time we got bumped to first class, the food was better than anything we got on our one cruise.

We enjoyed our Caribbean cruise but would not cruise again. Been there, done that, got the T-shirt. Just not our thing so the thought of that much time in a cabin (or trying to find new things to do on a ship) is not that appealing. I guess "cruisers" would probably love it so YMMV.

You can get a berth style flight for $1K or less and sleep fully stretched out ?

 

[Alan]

Long cruises are very different than Caribbean ones where you are in port most days. There’s so many activities on sea days that it’s definitely not boring plus I enjoy swimming and reading while sitting outside if warm. We had 8 sea days out of 13 days and it was really fun.

Exactly our experience. We have done a number of long cruises including 4 transatlantic cruises and the entertainment, activities and lectures during the sea days has been excellent every time.

 

[DrRoy]

Take a look at the at sea activities. Make sure you have enough things that you want to do.

 

[sengsational]

As in life, it's all about the people around you. Not the staff, but other passengers, for authentic interaction.

Also, you can make a connection with the guest lecture or other guest activity people. These are not the "activity staff". Those people can be jovial but paid to be doing it, and jostled around by their likely demanding employer. The guest lecture person does it infrequently, so might sit down and have a cuppa with you. The "guest lecture" I liked the most was a watercolor class. The leader was paid, but her husband and brother came along just for fun.

This is not to discount spending time with your spouse, but that's no different than home (except no shopping, cooking, cleaning). If you could rig up a deal where some friends went on the same cruise, that would be the best.

One more source for interaction is common interests with other cruisers. Here, you go on cruisecritic forum, find your roll-call, and sign up for stuff. They do "dumb stuff" like slot machine pulls, but have regular card games, dominos, stuff like that. It's way more fun to make a date for the climbing wall or hot tub than it is to just go by yourself.

And I'd go for a 6 or 8 person dinner table. If they all turn out not to your liking, you can always do anytime dinner, specialty, or buffet. But we're still in contact with probably 3 or 4 couples that we met at our table, and have done additional travel activities with some of them.

 

[brett]

We had a balcony cabin on a Celebrity ship. November timeframe a number of years ago. Rome to FLL.

The ship was excellent. Food, entertainment were all very good. Weather was perfect. Sea was like glass. We had a south facing cabin. I like to read on the balcony in the afternoon. More than once I had to come in because it was too warm.

It was all good. Would we do it again? No. Six sea days was too much for us. We were ready to jump ship by day 4.

The longest cruise we have done is 21 days. We prefer 14 days. After that we get very tired of the food and the environment.

We have some friends who love TA's. They like days at sea and find them relaxing.