Best sea days entertainment

[itchyfeet]

Which ships (lines) have the best sea day entertainment. I know this is somewhat subjective, but I'm not into Trivia and other games. Prefer enrichment lectures and entertainment that relates to the cruise.

[Hlitner]

We take many long cruises with lots of lazy sea days (sometimes more then 20 sea days per cruise). DW and I do not even seek daytime entertainment as we are happy just reading or perhaps attending a lecture (if there is a decent lecturer on the ship. But the one time (in well over 100 cruises) we were really impressed by sea day entertainment options was doing a short (6 day) Queen Mary 2 crossing (Southampton to NYC). The Queen was designed with sea days in mind and it shows. They have a real planetarium (with an excellent projector) and offer various shows in that venue...during sea days. They also have their own professional Shakespeare Company aboard who do shortened Shakespeare productions during many sea days. And then you have the usual activities such as dance instruction, lectures, trivia, bridge, cooking demonstrations, etc. Never a dull moment....unless (like us) you prefer to find a quiet corner for reading.

 

The best lecturers we have encountered have been consistently on longer HAL cruises. The best of the best was Dr. Alan Wright, a retired Astronomer who used to run one of the largest radio telescopes in the world. He gave 9 lectures (on a long transpacific cruise) and soon filled the main theater (sometimes standing room only) with his fascinating lectures. Following his last lecture he received a 5 minute standing ovation in the packed theater (we have never seen this with any other lecturer).

 

For those who take shorter cruises (less then 2 weeks) with few sea days, you just are not going to get a lot of special options. We have witnessed some passengers complaining on Caribbean cruises because they were bored during the single sea day. Cruise Director staffs (and budgets) have been slashed on most mass market lines which leaves them trying to fill an entire day without a lot of staff support. There is also pressure, from Corporate, to maximize onboard revenue....which means they want to "encourage" folks to do things such as going to an Art Auction (one of the big profit makers) or BINGO (also a revenue generator). You can be sure that the Corporate Offices of the mass market lines spend a lot of meeting time trying to develop profitable (for the cruise line) "activities."

 

Hank

[cb at sea]

You will want a more "upscale " line than the "mass market" lines. They do NOT do "enrichment" stuff at all. Hairy chest...hairy legs....all sorts of "hairy" contests! Trivia galore and bingo, bingo, bingo for BIG bucks!

 

Try a "luxury" line....

[OCruisers]

Having Enrichment Lecturers totally depends on the cruise itinerary on HAL, Celebrity, and Princess.

For the Caribbean and California/Mexico cruises it extremely unlikely there will be a lecturer. ;)

[Hlitner]

You will want a more "upscale " line than the "mass market" lines. They do NOT do "enrichment" stuff at all. Hairy chest...hairy legs....all sorts of "hairy" contests! Trivia galore and bingo, bingo, bingo for BIG bucks!

 

Try a "luxury" line....

CB, You know better than that :). Some mass market lines with some "enrichment lectures" would include HAL, Celebrity and Princess! But these lines also have their share of BINGO and Trivia. Happy to say that with well over 1000 days on cruise ships we have never played BINGO!

 

Hank

[jocap]

The winter cruise we take has 18 sea days, to the Caribbean and back, from the UK, so the daily lectures are greatly appreciated. They can be on many topics, although not often about cruising. One series was about old ships, though, and one was about marine engineering, which I found fascinating- the bridge/tunnel across from Denmark to Sweden.

We've been involved in a Speaker's Corner, where anyone can stand up and talk for 15 mins on their own topic; we've seen people building boats which have to sail across the pool; we been to exhibitions of work from the arts groups, and my OH enjoyed i-pad classes. Many other events- yes, there is Bingo, and the usual demonstrations, plus guided tours etc, and the "selling" lectures and port talks.... there's usually something on offer during the long sea days.

[Keith1010]

We have enjoyed fabulous enrichment with Crystal Cruises and also with Cunard on the QM2 crossings.

 

On sea days both lines have three lectures and a lot of other enrichment. In Crystal's case they offer 50+ enrichment activities during the daytime and in additional to lectures lots of other programs including many classes on various topics.

 

Keith

[Krazy Kruizers]

On HAL's longer cruises we have enjoyed the Enrichment lectures.

Many sea days we like to sit out on our verandah and read.

There aren't any hairy chest or hairy leg or any hairy contests on HAL.

[Rala]

You will want a more "upscale " line than the "mass market" lines. They do NOT do "enrichment" stuff at all. Hairy chest...hairy legs....all sorts of "hairy" contests! Trivia galore and bingo, bingo, bingo for BIG bucks!

 

Try a "luxury" line....

 

I have been to enrichment lectures on Celebrity and on their longer cruises also on Royal . They may not be on every cruise ,but they do exist. If you ever did anything besides work on getting tan, you would be aware of this! There are also many other things available like informative "chats" with the captain and/or other officers, cooking demos featuring the chef and staff , tours of the galley, backstage, the bridge(you may have to ask for this one), musical interludes (pianists,etc..), dance lessons. Again, if you ever left the pool, you would know that there are many offerings besides "Hairy contests" and BINGO. :rolleyes:

[Bambi93]

I'm looking for pickleball on royal Caribbean ? Is there any?