Planning

The week leading up to your cruise is filled with anticipation and excitement! It won’t be long before you’re stepping on board your cruise ship and ready to sail the sea. However, it's important to make sure you've planned for your vacation accordingly to ensure your cruise goes off without a hitch.

You're spending precious time and money for your vacation, so preparation will be key for a great cruise!

There’s a lot to do before you’re relaxing on the pool deck with a drink in hand, so here are 15 tasks to complete the week before you depart:

For first-time cruisers, choosing the perfect cruise line can be overwhelming. From modern lines to luxury ships, no cruise line is identical to one another. This can make it difficult to know which cruise line is the right for you and your travel group.

People often worry about what to pack for a cruise, but of course, some items aren't allowed onboard, such as firearms and illegal drugs.

But passengers may be shocked to learn that some everyday household necessities, such as fans and humidifiers, probably won’t make it past the ship’s scanners.

And then there are others, that make us wonder if someone actually tried to bring these on a cruise and why?

Once you’ve made the decision to go cruising for your next vacation, you will quickly find there are thousands of different itineraries available. It can be overwhelming to know where to start! From the Caribbean to Europe to Asia, every continent can be explored by cruise ship. With so many options to choose from, it can be difficult to narrow your selection and choose your first cruise.

I recently returned from my first cruise since the pandemic began, and I realized mid-trip that my cruise packing list needed to be updated. With mask mandates in place and anxious thoughts about getting sick, I had added several healthy cruise essentials to my suitcase. Once onboard, I realized there were useful items I had not thought to bring that would have enhanced my Covid-era cruise.

Here’s my new post-pandemic cruise packing list for all the healthy cruise essentials you’ll want to bring onboard.

Whenever you look up cruise fares, the prices are listed as “inside cabins from $399” or “balcony cabins from $649.” The word from indicates that the price you see is the base rate, but you’re going to pay more due to the type of cabin you pick and a multitude of hidden cruise fees.

Picture this: You’re having such a good time at Senor Frog’s with your new friends and that third margarita that you lose track of time. Or maybe your tour bus gets stuck in traffic on the way back to the ship, which is something totally out of your control!

You're probably wondering whether a cruise ship will wait for you or not. Missing your cruise ship and getting stranded in a foreign port is one of the top concerns of first-time cruisers, and while the chances of the ship leaving you behind are low, it does happen.

Sometimes, you are not in need of a large family vacation. The thought of trying to coordinate dinner plans or shore excursions might sound too stressful!

There's nothing wrong with wanting to get away by yourself for a little while with no schedule to follow and no mother-in-laws to please!

With that, though, you don't want to take a solo cruise that ends up being stressful, so you want to be prepared for your upcoming cruise by yourself. 

There's a lot to consider when you're trying to figure out which cruise line is the best. It's not a simple question to answer because it depends on the interests, personalities and budgets of you and the people with whom you'll be traveling.

When determining how to pick a cruise line, check out our superlatives below, which are designed to point you in the right direction. Simply find the things that matter most to you, and see which cruise line falls under most of them.