Back on dry land

© Simon Poulter 2017

So that was it, my first ever cruise. Seven days, three stops and over 2500 nautical miles travelled (or 3000 miles by very clever car). In maritime adventure terms, though, this was a mere Sunday afternoon drive. However, being my maiden voyage I had a limited idea of what a "voyage" would actually be like (my scope of knowledge being limited to cross-Channel school trips by car ferry, Sir Walter Raleigh's discovery of the potato, the Royal Navy travelling for several weeks to deal with the Argies in the South Atlantic, and Captain Kirk and the Enterprise and its five-year mission to boldly go where no toupee had gone before).

To some extent this spin around the Caribbean was not a lot more than an extended stay at a floating version of a Las Vegas 'resort' hotel, with the Oasis Of The Seas providing a dizzying enclosure containing 17 restaurants and 11 bars, four luxury brand boutiques, a running track, four swimming pools, six jacuzzis, an ice skating rink, yoga classes on the helipad, a casino, an open-air cinema which also doubles as a water show, and around 6,000 'guests' using 24 elevators (more of which later...).

The key difference, however, between Vegas and the Oasis is what you can do when the ship sails into a port. The choice of shore excursions is bewilderingly impressive, although the extensive options include plenty of premium-priced days out, some of which could set you back up to $145 each - heavy going if you're travelling as a family.

© Simon Poulter 2017

Plenty, though, are just happy to get off the boat for a bit to go shopping. Our final shore stop, Cozumel in Mexico, is a case in point. I say 'Mexico', but Cozumel is an island south of Cancún, and hardly representative of the whole country. There are long-distance excursions on offer, such as Jeep tours of Mayan ruins or dolphin encounters, but most of the disgorged passengers (including this one) seem content with heading straight for country star Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville chain restaurant to chug a giant cocktail and a burger, or do a quick whip round the shopping centre for jewellery bargains (a similar concept to the cruise terminal shops in Falmouth).

Cozumel is also a hub for these giant cruise ships: it's hard not use superlatives like "majestic" when you see several of these beautiful, gleaming boats berthed together. On our stop I counted five of them, including our own and its sister, Liberty Of The Seas from Royal Caribbean, and three from the Carnival line. The cruise industry is so competitive that you can't help but looking across at another ship and making comparisons of which had the nicer sun deck or the better looking swimming pools. That's also when you realise that the ridiculous number of facilities touted in the marketing blurb is all about breeding cruise line loyalty and even the sort of attachment to individual ships that people have for hotels.

But back to the shore visits. As with Haiti and Jamaica, you’d be hard pressed to feel like you’d absorbed Mexico for the day, but on the other hand, a day of pure indulgence in the sunshine, with some booze and retail therapy thrown in for good measure, is what holidays should be about. At the end of the day that's precisely what this cruise has been for the 6,000 on board. Some have been perfectly content to spend all seven days on a lounger doing nothing more strenuous than watching clouds skud overhead. Others have been on the gangplank at the first opportunity, like D-Day commandos champing to get ashore to zipline/kitesurf/snorkel/insert_activity_here.

© Simon Poulter 2017

And if truth be told, the shore visits provide freedom from a form of claustrophobia. That might sound mad for a ship as big as Oasis, but even in an 18-deck, 1100 foot-long gargantuan like this one, 6,000 people can very soon get on top of each other. On Saturday, our final full day at sea, with the sun playing hide-and-seek as we cut between Cuba and the Florida Keys, a shopping frenzy broke out in the 'Royal Promenade' as a rank of jewellery stands turned it into a ship-borne Hatton Garden. Like duty free catalogues on planes, there is a suggested glamour about it all, but the close-up reality is less so, with the laid out ‘designer’ watches and handbags looking more Peckham Market than upmarket.

With this retail feeding frenzy came zoo conditions as people, desperate for a bargain, stepped over their own to get to the front of the queues. This, then, leads me to the less savoury aspect of this trip: manners. We Brits are said to be distinguished by our observance of good etiquette, so the absence of it on board comes as an abrupt shock. Such is the urgency with which people have to get to their next meal or to the handbag sale that Ps, Qs and a basic "excuse me" suddenly become abandoned. I'm sure these same people are perfectly civil at home, or when out at the supermarket, but somehow a pre-paid floating resort experience gives them a sense of entitlement.

Nowhere is this more so than in the lifts. I mentioned this in my post the other day, but as the week has worn on, elevator etiquette has disappeared altogether. The 24 lifts on the Oasis never seem to be working all at once, which means the fight for space is excruciating. At meal times or any other peak period of inter-deck travel the lack of common courtesy is almost comically bad. Royal Caribbean claims the average age of its cruise passengers is 48, but on evidence of these last few days, I'd say it's at least 78, and these 'seniors' are a sturdy bunch. What they lack in walking speed they make up for in sheer bloody-mindedness to get to the front for coffee, discounted leather goods, free pizza - you name it.

I could go on about the elderly and their lack of manners (or lack of bipedal speed), but I can hear a voice at the back of my head saying "that'll be you some day". As I approach 50 on Saturday I sincerely hope that I don't become that discourteous or even that desperate to eat before 6pm, but then that also raises the question of whether I'd take a cruise again. I'll defer that for now. Because I know - and you know - that whether you're on a cruise ship or at the Get Lucky Big Casino Resort & Hotel in Las Vegas, there will still be an octogenarian riot for the Early Bird Special Buffet and there will still be a traffic jam of mobility scooters queuing to get into the breakfast cafes. Likewise the hotels of Benidorm and Magaluf.

Again, as I stressed a few days ago, I don't wish to appear a holiday snob. I just prefer a more genteel meal experience, and being someone who uses public transport to get to work, I like a holiday where I don't have to let a lift go because it's overfull, and I'll take the next one.  Or next but one...

Despite all this, as I settle into my final stop - an airport hotel in Orlando - I definitely feel more relaxed than when I arrived here, which surely is what a holiday should achieve. But where does this come from? How can the technicolour maelstrom that has been life aboard the Oasis Of The Seas be anything like relaxing? It's quite simple, and it covers two-thirds of this planet's surface. Sitting on my 'stateroom' balcony at various times over the last seven days, with nothing but ocean all around us, I have been rendered utterly placid. Normally on holiday I will spend most of it with headphones clamped to my head listening to music. I've just realised that I haven't touched my headphones since the flight over from London. The ocean has been all the soundtrack I've needed when I've needed escape from the hubbub onboard.

© Simon Poulter 2017

Living next to the Thames in Greenwich for the last year, I have come to appreciate the power of water, that commodity, essential to all life. When I need some meditation time, I will grab a coffee from Costa and just sit on the wall near my flat, watching the river go by. Over this last week, I've done the same, albeit with an entire ocean going past. And whether it's the sea air or the sense of perpetual motion, I have found peace and an almost zen-like calm. That, for those who've been asking, is my takeout from my inaugural cruise. It's not about the "dining experiences", or the amusement factor of an ice skating rink at sea on a ship touring the Caribbean. It's not even about the wonderful, entertaining company I've been fortunate to keep during this trip.

No, it's about the ocean. So here's my tip, if you're going to go on a cruise (and there's nothing that says you shouldn't), get a cabin with an exterior balcony.

© Simon Poulter 2017