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How to cruise with another couple?


SeagoingMom

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I checked on the Family Cruising board to see if there were any threads on this topic, but that board seems mostly oriented to families with children.

 

I would like to hear from folks who have cruised with one or two other couples (no children.) My husband and I are considering a cruise with my sister and her husband. We all like each other and get along well, but DH and I have never before cruise with anyone, and we wonder about the logistics. DH and I have cruised so far to have romantic get-aways, but have also felt that it might be fun to have some company, as this cruise would provide.

 

For those of you who have cruised with one or maybe two other couples (relatives or friends), how did you work out things like meeting up, how much time to spend together, cabin choices (proximity or no? adjoining or no?), planning excursions, fixed or anytime dining, communicating with each other, etc.?

 

I am not even sure what questions to ask, so I will let ya'll fire away with any insight you may think would help us.

 

The only thing I know at this point is that it sounds like my sister and her husband would not be going on the same sorts of excursions, generally, as DH and I would be -- they seem to have different interests than ours in most ports.

 

I want to figure out how to spend enough time together without spending too much time together! Needless to say, I want all of our relationships to be as good or better after the cruise than before!

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I checked on the Family Cruising board to see if there were any threads on this topic, but that board seems mostly oriented to families with children.

 

I would like to hear from folks who have cruised with one or two other couples (no children.) My husband and I are considering a cruise with my sister and her husband. We all like each other and get along well, but DH and I have never before cruise with anyone, and we wonder about the logistics. DH and I have cruised so far to have romantic get-aways, but have also felt that it might be fun to have some company, as this cruise would provide.

 

For those of you who have cruised with one or maybe two other couples (relatives or friends), how did you work out things like meeting up, how much time to spend together, cabin choices (proximity or no? adjoining or no?), planning excursions, fixed or anytime dining, communicating with each other, etc.?

 

I am not even sure what questions to ask, so I will let ya'll fire away with any insight you may think would help us.

 

The only thing I know at this point is that it sounds like my sister and her husband would not be going on the same sorts of excursions, generally, as DH and I would be -- they seem to have different interests than ours in most ports.

 

I want to figure out how to spend enough time together without spending too much time together! Needless to say, I want all of our relationships to be as good or better after the cruise than before!

 

Hi - we went on a cruise with my mother, brother and SIL (and their daughter) two years ago. And are planning to cruise in August with 4 other couples.

 

Our 'rule' is that we meet up at dinner, so we have fixed dining. Otherwise, we are all on our own. We choose shore excursions and have some we all want, some only a few do. We know we'll probably run into each other, and make plans during the day, but it's up to each of us.

 

My best advice is to talk it out ahead of time.

 

We don't have any adjoining cabins, and we all did guarantees since we didn't care how close we were to each other.

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I have not specifically been on a cruise with others, but have done family and vacations with groups.

 

Generally, I suggest that you set up one time per day that you know you will want to be together, such as dinner, lunch, cocktail hour, swim time, show time, or whatever you all agree upon. Trying to spend all your time together can be a bit suffocating, and you don't want that on a cruise. If you want to change that around and be flexible from one day to the next, sure go ahead.

 

I wouldn't necessarily want to be in adjoining cabins, but that depends upon how close you are to each other.

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We have cruised with other couples on more than one occasion. The only hard and fast time we had together was dinner. We didn't all do the same excursions although some were together. For sea days we did some planning at dinner the night before. The girls decided on a spa day, the guys got together in the sports bar for beer. It was all very informal. Some days the only time we saw the others was at dinner and afterwards for a dance or a drink. For us the less structured approach worked well. If you have seen the episode of Duck Dynesty where the family all went to Hawaii together you get a good example of how too much structure doesn't necessarily work out well. Actually just watched a re run of it last night and still laughed.

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Our first cruise was with a couple and the DW was a coworker of my DW. It was a very nice cruise but we tried to do too much together. As couples, we have different likes and dislikes and it made for situations where someone felt put upon or was joining in when no desire was there. We have since vacationed with this couple and as we spend more together we have realized we can do everything we want without being attached to the hip. We are then able to report in and hear about each other's day with interest. :)

 

Every port has something different so I would recommend being flexible enought to be able to split up when you have different desires in activities, and even meals.

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We cruise & do other vacations with groups of friends all the time. The secret is to set expectations in advance. Do you expect that everyone will do everything together all the time? Then make that known.

Our preference is that we expect to travel to & from the port together. We also expect that every night everyone will meet at a designated bar for happy hour. Sometimes from there we all go to dinner together, but sometimes we don't. If we're celebrating something special on board we pick the date in advance for the speciality restaurant.

We discuss in advance what excursions people want to do at various ports. Sometimes we do stuff together, but more often than not, we don't.

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Hi - we went on a cruise with my mother, brother and SIL (and their daughter) two years ago. And are planning to cruise in August with 4 other couples.

 

Our 'rule' is that we meet up at dinner, so we have fixed dining. Otherwise, we are all on our own. We choose shore excursions and have some we all want, some only a few do. We know we'll probably run into each other, and make plans during the day, but it's up to each of us.

 

My best advice is to talk it out ahead of time.

 

We don't have any adjoining cabins, and we all did guarantees since we didn't care how close we were to each other.

 

 

This is how we've done it, also. We linked for dinner. And we all just planned our own daily stuff. Occasionally, we'd be doing the same things as the others, sometimes not.

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We have one rule we ALWAYS stick to when we cruise with friends. We cruise every year with a couple we meet on Princess is 2006 and we have done 4 B2Bs with them plus 7 day cruises. During the day we all do our own things. If they are the same things great, if not we talk about our day at dinner. We always tell each other what we plan for the next day and where we'll be sitting during the day, at sea or when we get back. We consider them our 'cruise buddies'. (They live in Flint, MI and we live on the NC coast. Three times they have driven to our house then we go to the cruise together. They have also flown or driven to the port.)Just have everyone do their own thing for a happy cruise.

(A neighbor cruised with her church and hated it because she was asked, more than once, "Why didn't you come with us?"!)

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We cruise every year with a couple we meet on Princess is 2006

 

Something about them NC people... we also cruise every year with a couple from NC whom we also met on Princess in 2006 (good year). :) We either fly in together (thru CLT), or meet up the night before for dinner and drinks, and stay at the same hotel pre cruise.

 

Only one rule with us - no rules. We come and go with or without each other, normally meet for pre-dinner drinks, and most often - but not always - dine together. Have become, and stayed, very close friends this way.

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Yes...you must allow everyone to go their own way and do their own thing.....you'll find you'll "meet up" when it's convenient....and having dinner together is always nice, but not needed EVERY night, if some of you have other plans!

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Hi - we went on a cruise with my mother, brother and SIL (and their daughter) two years ago. And are planning to cruise in August with 4 other couples.

 

Our 'rule' is that we meet up at dinner, so we have fixed dining. Otherwise, we are all on our own. We choose shore excursions and have some we all want, some only a few do. We know we'll probably run into each other, and make plans during the day, but it's up to each of us.

 

My best advice is to talk it out ahead of time.

 

We don't have any adjoining cabins, and we all did guarantees since we didn't care how close we were to each other.

 

I would not even make the "meet at dinner" rule a hard and fast rule. Most of the time we do that but sometimes we want to eat at a different time or sometimes somebody wants to do the extra cost dining.

 

As suggested, talk it out ahead of time and don't be together all the time.

 

DON

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We did a river cruise with another couple the cabins were close but not next door

Set the ground rules ...we said do your own thing & we will meet up for dinner

if we happen to see you at the same time for breakfast OK

do not plan too much together time

We like to do our own thing in a lot of ports they like to be held by the hand for tours

Just know your own touring style & make it clear that you are not expecting to spend every waking hour with them ;)

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We have been cruising with a couple from Texas we are from Michigan, we met on CC. The first cruise we did different things and ate together sometimes. After that we now do everything together! In fact we just did a Vegas trip together. I think it is different if you are not family and only get to see each other once a year like we do. Just go with the flow and have fun!

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Thank you all so much for your insight -- you all seem to have a common view. I did not expect that -- I thought every poster's response would be different! Very interesting, and very informative!

 

I definitely want to discuss expectations with my sister and BIL. I have a feeling their expectations (well, primarily those of my sister) about how often we four would be together on board will be higher than what most of you describe. Somehow I think that if we simply expected to "meet up" in a random way (except for dinner), our cruise together would not be much different than any other cruise DH and I have been on, where we might accidentally meet up on board ship with someone we had met at dinner or on an excursion. And I am not sure that that is exactly what my sister has in mind if we cruise together. So I think we will set up a few more "dates" (times and places to meet up) than it seems most of you think is probably ideal. This might be a good thing, as I doubt we would do many excursions together. But as many of you have said, I don't want us to try to stick too closely together!

 

I will take under advisement your expertise, and that of others who may post. This is why I asked those of you who are experienced -- to get some perspective on what you feel has worked, and consider what ideas to bring up when I discuss with my sister. She's not on CC, so I know she won't be soliciting others' opinions.

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We travel with a group that ranges from 10-24 people for the past 6 years. We have set time dining, otherwise everyone is on their own. We usually end up at the same places but no one is 'forced' to do anything.

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Last year went on a cruise with SIL and BIL. Their first cruise. We met in the morning went over the plan of the day. There were times we met during the day, tea time, trivia, etc. and we always ate dinner in the MDR together. Excursions, some together and some apart. It was very enjoyable and we are planning another cruise with them this September. I imagine because this will be their second cruise they will be more on their own and we won’t have to do the plan of the day meeting.

 

We also cruise often with our good friends and we like to have adjoining cabins, that way when we are up and about, we rap on the wall, they rap back and we get our day started. Love to go “night clubbing” each evening and have so much fun together. They like the beach and sun, we like touring so we each do our own thing in ports.

 

Cruised with 3 other couples once and we only met up at dinner for conversation. Everyone went their own way. One couple hit everything on the plan of day. We were glad we weren’t involved…lol

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We have cruised with friends and family. Have a talk with everyone - about what you all expect. Get things settled before you cruise. When we went with SIL and her husband - we let them know they needed to do some research as to things they really wanted to do. Since we are the cruisers we made suggestions as to excursions and the specialty restaurants we wanted to do. Our cabins were really far apart - I had booked guarantees and asked not to be in adjoining cabins.

 

We did dinner together every night. Happy hour drinks did not work as a meeting time as we did our HH drinking for free in the Diamond or Concierge Lounge (a Royal Caribbean perk for past passengers with enough points. We did a couple of the ports together - it worked out very well getting a lot settled before we left for the cruise.

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We cruise mostly just the two of us.

However, we did take one cruise with my daughter and her boyfriend.

We had agreed to dinner together every night. We also scheduled one excursion together which ended up being cancelled.

No other plans together when we boarded. We ran into each other all of the time. Even ended up on the tender at Half Moon Cay. So, we spent a lot more time together than planned but we were not joined at the hip. Had a wonderful cruise.

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Only one rule with us - no rules. We come and go with or without each other, normally meet for pre-dinner drinks, and most often - but not always - dine together. Have become, and stayed, very close friends this way.

 

We cruise once or twice a year with 3 other couples and our one rule is the same.........no rules. We do happen to have similar interests so frequently private tours are arranged that we all go on. We do usually meet for dinner at night but that is not in stone. If one of us wants to do something else that's fine too. No questions asked and no explanations required. We rarely link up on the ship during the day unless we just run into each other. We give each other space and respect each other's privacy. We have been cruising together for the past 7yrs so what we are doing works for us.

Like others have said, discuss your expectations with each other BEFORE you travel.

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This fall my husband and I are going on our 3rd cruise with my friend, her husband and her bowling club... My cousin also joined us the last two years...unfortunately she cant come this year. :( Talk about feeling out of place the first year...or so I thought...

 

Cruising with a group is a lot of fun... It's nice to know that at dinner you will be sitting with people you truly enjoy talking with. I enjoyed catching a few activities with my friend, just us girls.. Spa, yoga, bingo. My husband hung out with some of the guys, hit up the sushi bar (I hate fish... So he really enjoyed)... Some times we do excursions together if its something we all like, if not we part ways and do what we enjoy, after all it's a vacation... We need to relax and enjoy. During the evening we had a lounge that we meet up at to talk and enjoy some drinks... We knew that before dinner this was where everyone would be.... We would hit a few shows together too. We bring dominos with us to play some games at night too.

 

To keep in touch with each other we book rooms close by if it fits with everyone's budgets. We bring dry erase boards and post where we are at and what's up after that so if they want to come lounge at the pool they will or if I'm looking to hang out I can see where they are.

 

As you know there is so much you can do on a cruise that its easy for everyone to enjoy themselves yet connect enough to have time together. But with all that together time, alone time is good too...I always book one dinner in a specialty restaurant for my husband and I to reconnect and have some time for just US.

 

 

Kari

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We must be different than most of the posters on this thread. We always cruise with friends and family. Our upcoming cruise will be our 5th cruise together. Not everyone has been on all of the cruises. But most of us. This time there are 16 of us cruising together. We have always gotten side by side balcony cabins. We ask the Steward to open the balcony doors. We usually have our coffee on the balcony's and discuss what everyones plans are for the day. We usually do most excursions together but not always. We sometimes dine together. I guess what works for us is that no one has expectations of what others should be doing. We all get along great and enjoy being together. Our one unbreakable rule is if the curtains are closed on the balcony door: DO NOT DISTURB! ;)

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This fall my husband and I are going on our 3rd cruise with my friend, her husband and her bowling club... My cousin also joined us the last two years...unfortunately she cant come this year. :( Talk about feeling out of place the first year...or so I thought...

 

Cruising with a group is a lot of fun... It's nice to know that at dinner you will be sitting with people you truly enjoy talking with. I enjoyed catching a few activities with my friend, just us girls.. Spa, yoga, bingo. My husband hung out with some of the guys, hit up the sushi bar (I hate fish... So he really enjoyed)... Some times we do excursions together if its something we all like, if not we part ways and do what we enjoy, after all it's a vacation... We need to relax and enjoy. During the evening we had a lounge that we meet up at to talk and enjoy some drinks... We knew that before dinner this was where everyone would be.... We would hit a few shows together too. We bring dominos with us to play some games at night too.

 

To keep in touch with each other we book rooms close by if it fits with everyone's budgets. We bring dry erase boards and post where we are at and what's up after that so if they want to come lounge at the pool they will or if I'm looking to hang out I can see where they are.

 

As you know there is so much you can do on a cruise that its easy for everyone to enjoy themselves yet connect enough to have time together. But with all that together time, alone time is good too...I always book one dinner in a specialty restaurant for my husband and I to reconnect and have some time for just US.

 

 

Kari

The dry erase boards are a new idea on this thread -- did you attach them to the outside of your cabin doors? And did the pens stay with the boards or did you find they "disappeared?" Did you have strangers writing on your boards, or changing what was written?

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