Looking around a Royal Caribbean cruise ship, you’ll undoubtedly see many families enjoying their vacation together.
Cruises are an excellent vacation choice to suit many different travel styles; in fact, it’s not uncommon to see multiple generations traveling together on a cruise ship for this reason.
I grew up as a cruise kid, taking to the high seas with my parents and sister year after year for family cruises. Even into high school and through college, our family of four made it a priority to continue taking cruises and traveling together.
Being married and living thousands of miles away from home now (my parents in South Dakota and I in Florida), continuing to cruise allows us to have quality time together as a family. My husband is a military pilot and, unfortunately, his demanding work and deployment schedule hasn’t aligned recently with our family cruises.
Now, as I near my 30s in the coming years, I still prioritize cruising with my 62-year-old parents - but it’s a totally different dynamic than it used to be.
We have yet to take a family cruise in my adulthood that hasn’t had its fair share of tiffs, head-butting and even a few tears. Honestly, it seems like the bigger the trip, the more opportunities for drama to arise.
All this to say, I wouldn’t change it for the world - we love our family unconditionally even when they drive us nuts, right?
In October, I set sail on Royal Caribbean’s Odyssey of the Seas for a 12-night Holy Land cruise to Israel. This sailing was a bucket-list itinerary for my dad, as he’s dreamed of visiting the religious sites in Israel for the last decade. With the pandemic pushing back our plans, we finally made the trip happen!
My husband was booked originally to join, but (as anyone with a family member in the military knows) those plans had to change with his training schedule.
It would be just the four of us with my sister and I sharing a cabin and our family of four finding a new groove while navigating this port-intensive, culturally immersive cruise.
Here are my best tips for other adults looking to survive a cruise with your parents.
Pack your patience
My best tip for cruising with your parents is to pack your patience - and a lot of it!
With each family cruise we take, I have to remind myself there’s always an adjustment period when the four of us are spending that much time together. Without my husband there to create a natural separation in the family between the two of us and the three of them, the four of us have to get used to each other again.
Traveling and cruising meshes everyone together quickly, but that’s not without a learning curve to adjust to a new dynamic.
For our family, this means my dad’s always in a hurry and my mom is a notorious worry-wart. I’m the bossy, outspoken older sibling while my sister can be oblivious at times about the plan. I know these things about our family and I have to remind myself to be patient and accept everyone’s quirks.
My patience was immediately tested as my sister and I flew to Rome from Paris to meet up with our parents prior to the cruise. As we tried to find a meeting point, mom and dad were in a tizzy trying to figure out which terminal they landed in and where their shuttle was picking them up.
“Here we go” my sister and I laughed to one another as we heard them frantic on the phone, attempting to read signs in Italian about where they were.
Packing your patience also involves allocating more time than you think for travel and cruising logistics.
For instance, my dad prefers to get to the airport or train station way before we need to (I’m talking like 3 hours before departure). While I certainly don’t need that much time to catch a flight or train, I would rather be patient and wait additional time at the airport than create unnecessary stress for my parents.
Similarly, cruising has continued to utilize technology to improve the onboarding experience; however, this requires most passengers to be familiar with their phones and the Royal Caribbean app.
While my parents are pretty tech savvy, be prepared to help with technology to ensure they can keep up.
Go at you parents’ pace
When you’re an adult cruising with your parents, it’s best to take everything at their pace. Remember, it’s easier for you to slow down than it is for your parents to speed up.
It’s not always easy to come to terms with our parents getting older and seeing their capabilities change over the years. While my parents are still relatively young and healthy in their early 60s, my sister and I try not to push them too much.
We would rather go a bit slower so we can all enjoy our time together than pressure our parents to do more than they are comfortable with.
For example, while my sister and I loved the convenience of riding electric scooters around Paris before we boarded the cruise, we knew our parents would simply not be able to ride these scooters - nor did we want them to for safety reasons!
Instead, we would take point to order Ubers or taxis for the four of us so our parents didn’t have to navigate these apps or attempt to hail a cab in a foreign country.
Similarly, we picked excursions and activities that could accommodate our parents with what they were comfortable doing. Pushing them to keep up with us could be a point of contention.
Take time for yourself
There’s nothing wrong with taking some time to yourself when cruising with your parents. Having time to yourself is a great way to ensure you are properly getting your rest and it also ensures you don’t get burnt out.
Personally, I prefer to go to bed earlier than my parents do these days - how the tables have turned!
Instead of forcing myself to stay up late and attend every show, trivia and gameshow in the evenings, I don’t have a problem excusing myself for the night. This alone time is something I enjoy having to myself when traveling with my parents.
Sometimes I use this quiet time to catch up on remote work, blog for Royal Caribbean Blog or FaceTime my husband.
Having this time to yourself isn’t selfish - remember, it’s your vacation too. You are getting plenty of quality time together, so you don’t need to spend every waking moment with one another.
I’ve even had times on an excursion or tour where I didn’t feel like waiting around for my parents while they were slowly meandering or shopping; it’s okay to walk away once in a while to have a moment to yourself and separate from the group.
Plan ahead strategically
Making appropriate plans that everyone in your family can enjoy is another great tip for cruising with your parents.
While my husband and I might prefer doing independent exploration in port rather than excursions, this doesn’t always work best with my parents.
On our 12-night Holy Land cruise, we booked 3 full day excursions in Israel and a full-day tour in Santorini. I made sure that none of the excursions required too much walking or hiking on uneven surfaces, as I didn’t want my parents to overdue anything.
Santorini can be a logistically challenging port because you are not only required to tender from the cruise ship, you are required to take a cable car, donkey or long walk down a lot of stairs. The cable car can get very congested during busy days, which can compound an already stressful situation.
However, if you book the right excursion that involves coach busses, you can avoid this predicament.
Although my husband and I didn’t have any issue a few years ago doing the stairs at the tender port, I knew this would be very stressful for my parents to deal with the donkey or cable car.
For this reason, I purposefully chose an excursion that utilized coach busses to ensure we weren’t put in this potential situation.
Planning ahead to ensure everyone is comfortable with the excursions and tours is key for successfully cruising with your parents. Read the warnings carefully and make sure your parents are okay with the tour requirements.
Set realistic expectations
You know your parents just about as good as anyone, so set realistic expectations with yourself before heading out on your cruise.
My parents are notoriously bubbly, Midwestern-friendly and very talkative. They can be loud - and we all know it. This can certainly draw attention to our family when cruising, even though they are just being themselves. But, I mentally prepare for this and accept that it's going to happen when we cruise together.
After traveling a lot on my own or with my husband these days, these are things that I notice more when I am back together with my family. You only ever know your own immediate family growing up, so you are used to whatever that dynamic is.
These days, my husband and I naturally have our own family dynamic, which can add to the adjusting time when I am cruising with my parents.
But, this means we always have a lot of fun together laughing, talking and catching up when I cruise with my parents. It might also mean that I have to eat dinner at 5:00pm, though!
Go with the flow
When I cruise with my parents, I have to remind myself to go with the flow often.
Sometimes my parents have different interests than I do these days, which is totally fine! It’s tough to please everyone, but this means there will be compromise on how you spend your time both onboard and in port.
While my husband and I might enjoy trying out small coffee shops, eating local cuisine and sipping on a seaside cocktail, my parents aren’t necessarily interested in doing that. They will appease me once in a while, but our cruising styles are a little different.
I remind myself that if I wanted to do exactly what I’d like to do on a cruise, then I would have simply taken a cruise without my parents. We are there to experience these moments together and that quality time is most important.
Sometimes that means going with the flow if everyone in your family is able to agree on what to do, where to go, etc.
Also, don't forget that your parents are also adjusting to traveling with you in the same way you are adjusting to cruising with them. When I told my family about this article, my mom joked about wanting to share what their experience is like cruising with adult children!
Enjoy the moments
Time together is precious, especially as you get older. Moving to Florida because of my husband’s military service means that I don’t get to see my parents very often.
While traveling and cruising with your parents as an adult can come with its challenges, it’s also an incredible opportunity to make new family memories together. It’s hard for me to turn down that quality time with my parents while they are relatively young, healthy and still able to travel.
Although we can have our inevitable scuffs when traveling, I wouldn’t trade the special moments and experiences we’ve had together for the world.
I love that my family still enjoys cruising together, even as my sister and I have become grown-adults.
Seeing my mom with tears in her eyes as my dad stepped into the Jordan River in Israel - something he’s always wanted to do - makes everything worthwhile.
Quality time with your parents is priceless, and I will continue to prioritize cruising with my family as long as I am able.
