Cruise ships are freaking big. They’re the biggest passenger vessels humans have ever built. In size and appearance, they look nothing like almost any other boat. So how did they get that way?
The predecessor of today’s cruise ships was the ocean liner: big, beautiful ships that sailed across the Atlantic. But ocean liners had a totally different purpose from cruise ships: They were for transportation. Everything about them was designed to facilitate an ocean voyage from one continent to another.
But air travel changed that. Planes eliminated the main reason to take a ship somewhere, and ocean liner business plummeted. So the industry pivoted and began selling a ship as the destination itself. The cruise ship was born. But the ocean liners, built for a voyage, weren’t ideal for the purposes of a cruise, and over the next few decades, the cruise ship began its evolution. And it has culminated in the behemoths we see today.
Scottie's Playtime 
They sure seem like Legionnaire’s incubators, to me, no matter the size. I used to want to go, back when “The Love Boat” was new, but I had a roommate who was a travel agent, got a free weekend “cruise” so she’d know what she was selling, and later had to get tested for Legionnaire’s. They never left the port, other than to move back and forth, but evidently a few people fell ill after the weekend was over.
I don’t begrudge those who take cruises and have never gotten sick, or known anyone who has. To me, the numbers are too high, though, and the fuel used could probably be better used in other purposes. But, it’s easy to be purist about that when really I mostly don’t want to get sick on a big boat!
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Plague ships?
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Hey Roger. During covid it sure seemed that way. Many people were trapped on board with no port letting them disembark. I wonder how many people lost jobs before the economy shut down. Hugs
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Hi Scottie.
A sobering thought about the aftershocks of Covid.
In the UK a few of what were once established chains of retail stores have gone to the wall and Covid seems to have been the last straw.
We must not forget it is still there. In the week ending July 29th some 4,000 cases were reported in England; 1,400 having to be hospitalised.
Even more sobering, is that consideration to potential for disease spread comparatively the world ‘Got Lucky’.
This is why Anti-vaxxers and allied Conspiracy folk get so hysterical; deep down their bodies and animal instincts are warning them all is not well, it scares them and they go into denial
You can’t shoot a germ or a virus, nor launch a personalised troll campaign against them on the net; they just don’t notice.
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Hello Ali. It does seem an expensive gamble that if you win you have a great time, if you lose you get very sick. I have known die hard cruisers that loved it and retired doing it almost full time. I have no desire to take a cruise. I have all I want and need right in my home, and I would be without my computers / internet for the length of the cruise. I would be bored. I got enough of the seas when I was in the US Navy. Hugs
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I can certainly see that, Scottie!
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We prefer river cruises with a max of 190 passengers! Cruises have never interested me but many people I know love them. I’m not a big socialized!
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Hello Nancy. I can understand that. We used to take evening dinner trips on the Florida Intracoastal Waterway. They had a meal and then evening entertainment. But I got tired of them. We moved to the West Coast and did more home entertaining. Hugs
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Would these stay stable at sea in a storm? Also just how many of the crew are experienced mariners ?
That picture looks like the opening shot of another Poseidon Adventure film.
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😎
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Hey Roger. It does make you wonder. An entire floating city with every amenity. If we continue to have unprecedented population growth, we might have to find a way to go to these to house everyone. I have heard of large cruise ships being floating homes for the wealthy, with apartments sold on them like ones on shore. A lifestyle of living on a ship going from port to port. Those require an independent wealth or way of having an income at sea. Hugs
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Interesting thought Scottie.
Though they better make sure those floating communities have seaworthy against hurricanes and winter storms.
Also-out at sea in international waters, far from land…Pirates.
They have been around as long as folk have been on water. Wealthy folk floating around the place would be very tempting targets.
Floating Communities could be possible but they better remember the very old saying ‘Stranger Things Have Happened At Sea’
Just a thought (or two)
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Hello Roger. Check this out. Hugs
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/12/07/can-you-live-on-a-cruise-ship-yes-and-heres-how-much-it-costs.html
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As Charlie Brown of Peanuts would have said…. ‘Good Grief’.
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