Choosing a World Cruise

[sandiego1]

@Port Power and I have some different criteria. Some of what’s important to them isn’t important to me and vice versa. Everyone has their own preferences and reasons for them 😀 If I was a drinker and solo traveler, I would want alcohol and excursions included (for safety and company each day).

With our suggestions and perhaps reading a few WC blogs, you can come up with a prioritized list of your criteria and start checking boxes for each cruise line.

 

TheInsideCabin.com has a list of HAL WC blogs. Pete has a lot of great info about WCs on his website too. You can check other CC pages to find blogs for other cruise lines. I read several before we booked the 2019 and still follow several people now. Lots of packing, logistics, and tour suggestions in the blogs too.

[aungrl]

13 hours ago, sandiego1 said:

For our 1st WC (in 2019), our requirements were - not in priority order:

 

- full circumnavigation. I wanted to go completely around the world, not start in 1 country and finish in another (now not as important for future long cruises)

- East to West travel since it’s much easier to gain 1 hour every few days, than lose 1. Plus it’s harder on the crew. They still have the same amount of work to do, but only have 23 hrs to they lose an hr of sleep.

- Few, if any, included excursions. We are very active and much younger than a typical person on a WC. We don’t want to be stuck on a bus of 30-40 people. The tour can only go as fast as the slowest person. Plus all the long waits for people after a bathroom stop or “free time” when few people show up at the meeting spot at the designated time. We wanted to be independent.

- I don’t drink alcohol, coffee, or soda. Included beverages would be wasted on me and not worth the all inclusive price. DH does drink alcohol so he just pays by the drink or buys wine packages for dinner.

- Ratio of port to sea days. We wanted more than 50% port days.

- Price per day was a consideration, but not the driving factor.

- Availability and location of a desired cabin. Since we were newbies, we didn’t have preferential allocation of cabins (HAL allows current WCers the ability to book the same cabin year after year). We were very lucky to get a cabin we liked in the desired location.

- Ports - we wanted to experience as many new places as possible and not cities we had previously visited.

- Didn’t want to have to dress up for dinner every night in the main dining room. Some lines require a minimum of “country club” clothing. We wanted to be able to wear nice jeans (or capris for me) at dinner most nights and get dressed up for formal nights. DH didn’t want to wear a sport coat or jacket 

most nights.

- Size of ship - we thought ~1000 passengers was a good size. Didn’t want to go on a ship that only had 200-500. Many people are repeat customers and we didn’t want to feel left out since we didn’t know anyone. With a larger ship, we thought there was a greater chance of more newbies.

 

Hope this helps.

What ship/line did you end up selecting? And, did it meet your expectations?

[aungrl]

2 minutes ago, aungrl said:

What ship/line did you end up selecting? And, did it meet your expectations?

Sorry, I was reading backwards and just saw your reply.  Too late to delete this one, though.

[cruisermsoon]

Have a look at the Azamara 155 night world cruise on Azamara Onward, It's a lovely small ship, around 600 on board, and not as expensive as many of the other offerings. Plenty of inluded extras, like air and a generous on board credit. 

[Travel Lady in CT]

I've chosen my first WC... Oceania Vista, Miami to Miami in 2026.  Thanks everyone for your contributions!

[2ndsailing]

We are on the Azamara Onward World Cruise. It has been fabulous and we're loving the experience. If you go to the Azamara cc page under "currently onboard" or something like that, one of the World Cruise guests has been posting photos and giving lots of information about the extra surprises Azamara is doing.