how do you get the time off??

[Tao Diva]

DH and I get 3 weeks off a year and we get to pick when. Starting 2011 I will have earned 4 weeks vacation and plan on using my "extra" week to treat my adult daughters to, you guessed it, a cruise!:D

[AstroExeter]

I have my own mutli-national business covering 12 countries so I use the excuse of inspecting the clinics to travel! :D

[househunter]

I am self employed and have a great co-worker that watches my business while I am gone and my husband has 6 weeks of paid vacation each year and can call a replacement for any unpaid days that he wants. We don't cruise multiple times per year but we do spend a month in Cabo and take several other shorter trips throughout the year.

 

It's the only reason we work so hard- so we can travel! When we are home, we both work 60+ hours per week.

[Two-Step]

I have 3 weeks paid vacation per year and a boss that loves cruising with his family as much as I love cruising with mine so we help each other find good deals :)

[Roadtripster]

 

It's the only reason we work so hard- so we can travel! When we are home, we both work 60+ hours per week.

 

Sounds exactly like me! LOL

 

I average 60+ hours a week, usually more like 70. I work ALL holidays and most weekends. This summer, well from mid May, I only had 3 weekends off. Every other weekend was a double shift both days.

 

Advantage to that is I rack up tons of extra PTO hours. Our PTO goes by how many hours you work. So I just keep building up my PTO hours. Plus, when you work a holiday you get an extra 8 hours added.

 

Disadvantage is DH doesn't have nearly as many days off available as me. So, I roll over a ton to the next year. Can't find anyone else to cruise with me so they just keep sitting there waiting for me to use them. LOL

[silverado44]

6 weeks of paid vacation per year available anytime during the year with 1 week notice.

[lady_cruiser]

I'm 61 and almost retired so I will be able to cruise more often after retirement. For now I work in the Administrative Offices of a school system so between my holidays and generous annual leave (vacation) it is easy to take off whenever a cruise comes up that I am able to afford.

[okgirl]

I work for a large corporation and get 32 days of paid vacation a year

[going to see the world]

Hello - "going to see the world" from a fellow Pennsylvanian. We are in our 40's. We have a daughter just out of college and a 6 year old DD. We both have great work flexibility. We don't drive fancy cars and I have yet to receive a flawless diamond. We purposefully save for travel-almost as if it a necessity. We have been blessed to have 28 cruises under our belt so far-some more luxurious than others. It seems to be the only time we are all focused on making memories - not work, household chores, texting, boyfriends(not me, DD of course), etc. If we only had 5 days vacation per year - there is no doubt we'd spend them cruising. The memories are priceless!

 

How do you get to the ports? What side of the state do you live on?

That seems to be where most of the money spent goes :(

[xnavydoc2]

Work really is over-rated.

 

 

Yeah, when I retired, I "Took To It" quite well. Didnt EVEN need to go into training.:)

[RetireeWannabee]

Planning ahead, normally 1-2 years in advance.

 

I was working at a non-profit and had 30 days off a year (that's everything, sick, holiday, vacation, just plain don't wanna go in ...) I don't get sick often and many holidays aren't big for us so I worked em, usually having more than enuf days to blow on whatever I wanted - long trips, short trips, lots of time at Christmas, whatever.

 

Unemployed right now, but, planning ahead ought to take care of it, no matter what the paid time off structure is.

 

I have a trip to Cabo planned for first wek of Feb and it's non-negotiable - I'm going! I'm trip coordinator and have been planning it since June 2009.

[Bookish Angel]

I work part-time, writing, producing and announcing for public radio. Most things in features and soft news can be recorded well ahead of broadcast unless it is time sensitive.

 

I went on a month-long vacation last year and wrote and recorded ahead where I could. For other things, my boss, the news director, kindly did those things that did not have a long lead time.

 

I can technically be gone up to 6 consecutive weeks at a time though the longest I have been gone from my office is 28 days.

[geoherb]

My DH teaches at a community college, so we're limited to his break schedule. He is a 12-month employee, which doesn't give us much other than a two-week break in late July to early August and a two-week break at Christmas and New Year's. This year he got a full week for a spring break. Next year, it's only a four-day, not counting the weekend--Thursday through Tuesday off.

 

Last year we managed to go at Thanksgiving. He scheduled tests and got subs to give them. He did not have a Tuesday class, and the students got Wednesday off in addition to Thursday and Friday.

 

I get five weeks of vacation a year plus always carry over six weeks. But my problem is we're down to two people in my office and someone has to be there. I'm getting Christmas week this year but may not get it next year. My co-worker's vacation this summer cut into our available time for DH's schedule. So we ended up going to Alaska instead of Europe. I know we won't be able to fit in three cruises next year, and even two may be doubtful.

Edited September 8, 2010 by geoherb

[STARFISH*4]

if we didnt own a business and live near a port city; we definitely would be cruising more...hubby has the vacation time.

[read52]

I am a teacher. We get 10 days off in a year. 3 days can be personal days and the rest are sick days. If we don't use ourdays, we lose the personal days but the sick days can build up. At one time you could keep up to 30 days for a severe illness. Now we can keep 40 days. I have worked for this school for 22 years and never used all my days. About 5 years ago, my husband was sick so I used the 30 days. Since then I have built up my time again to 30 days. But the saved days can't be used for vacations only illness. My husband became disabled so we can go during my vacations (Easter and summer).

[ATL2LAS]

I work hard, I play hard. I get 2 weeks of vacation a year. I set up 2 bank accounts that places $20 a week in each. I can only withdraw the money once a year and it has to be by phone. Out of sight, out of mind. Each account is for a different cruise. 2 per year.

[Skywench]

I'm a flight attendant and have a very flexible work schedule.

[Bill S]

DW and I have been retired for several years and that gives us a lot of freedom cruise when we want to do so.

Prior to that, DW was an adminstrator with the school district, so she was not tied to the school schedule. I was a partner in my firm, putting in 50+ hours per week, also working on many weekends, so taking time off was not an issue with my other partners.

Yes, I delegated my responsibilities amongst several employees in my absence--good training opportunity for them, yet they always were happy to see me return an assume those duties again. ;)

[ncovert]

For those of you who cruise constantly...how do you get out of work that much??

 

I still seek to know the answer to this.

 

It is easier for me because of my work schedule, but still... I see people months at a time. I want to retire on the high seas :D

[ducklite]

Husband gets around five weeks a year, I'm in sales and officially get three weeks, but I do a lot of overnights and weekends so my boss doesn't care if I take extra time within reason. We did a two week vacation already this year, and have a long weekend to the west coast coming up. I watching airfares and trying to do a long weekend in LA before the years over or maybe in January to visit friends out there. I've also had 20 off due to a medical emergency this year. One week I did nothing, the next I answered a few emails and phone calls, the rest were taken one or two days at a time for various treatments and consults.

[momofmeg]

I still seek to know the answer to this.

 

It is easier for me because of my work schedule, but still... I see people months at a time. I want to retire on the high seas :D

 

I used to feel that way but I am not as enthused about cruising. I do feel to visit some places, it is the more economical way to see them. I guess sometimes a cruise for me is ferry service. My former dream of retiring and cruising forever if I had unlimited funds is gone now. Lol! and it was really only a dream for us never practical anyway.

 

Now if we had the unlimited funds I would choose say Costa Rica, with a house up in the mountains, high enough I could also have along distance view of the ocean. Realistically, I think a one room condo suite at Myrtle Beach with trips every fall up the Blue ridge parkway to get my "fill" of the moutians.

[Bookish Angel]

My boss is extremely flexible about my part-time hours so it is never an issue. I can be gone up to 4 weeks with no difficulty by writing and recording ahead, etc.

Edited August 21, 2014 by Bookish Angel

[dancinman66]

I work for

Myself and set my work up so can do it anywhere

So I take work with me

Means I have to dedicate time on the cruises for work and this includes significant port time also

 

 

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[Illyria]

I get 6 weeks of vacation; my husband only gets about 4. With some really good planning we could take 2 cruises but usually it works out to one long cruise/vacation (2.5-3 weeks) and then another week or so for something else (like this year we took a week off to go to Iceland...then I had to take another 2 days off because I caught the flu on the flight back :( ) Have to leave a few days off available for emergencies, getting sick, waiting at home for a building contractor, going skiing in winter, etc.

[Jacs]

I feel for people who only get 2 weeks vacation per year! :eek: In Australia you get 4 weeks pro rata paid vacation per year as law, and some industries get more. I get an extra 2 weeks unpaid leave per year if I want it as the company shuts down over Christmas. Hubby works a lot of overtime that he takes as toil so rarely has to use his normal leave, or adds it together to take a long holiday. Each year we usually do a 3 week overseas trip and then a couple of weeks away at the beach over Christmas.