{"id":607358,"date":"2026-04-26T11:50:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-26T11:50:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/607358\/"},"modified":"2026-04-26T11:50:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-26T11:50:12","slug":"woman-quits-6-figure-job-to-live-on-cruise-ships-and-discovers-complicated-reality-2-months-in","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/607358\/","title":{"rendered":"Woman quits 6-figure job to live on cruise ships and discovers complicated reality 2 months in"},"content":{"rendered":"

We\u2019ve all thought about it. Almost every one of us has been at the beach, at a resort, or on a cruise<\/a> and thought, \u201cWow, I really wish we could just stay forever.\u201d The dread of going back to \u201creal life\u201d hits hard on that last day of vacation, and it\u2019s hard to stop your mind from wondering what exactly it would look like to just\u2026 stay.<\/p>\n

Some bold folks actually do it. Cruise ships<\/a>, in particular, are a popular destination for people who want to permanently live<\/a> on \u201cvacation\u201d because they can be relatively affordable and come with built-in food, adventure, and entertainment.<\/p>\n

Emma, who is in her thirties, recently decided to pull the trigger and do exactly that. Earlier this year, she quit her six-figure job in order to live full-time aboard cruise ships.<\/p>\n

Emma\u2019s partner of several years makes a living gambling on cruise ships as a professional poker player. Emma, who goes by A Broad That Travels<\/a>, says he would be gone for weeks or months at a time sailing, and she finally had enough of all the time apart.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was a point in time where we were just apart for more than half the year while he was cruising and I was doing my corporate grind, and it was really difficult,\u201d she says. \u201cThere were some cruises and some adventures he was doing where I was like\u2026we have to do this together.\u201d<\/p>\n

So she decided to leave her six-figure career in corporate tech sales behind and join him. Though they had cruised a lot together, the couple had their first cruise as a part of their new lifestyle just two months ago, the first of a four-month stretch of non-stop cruising.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the day, if you\u2019re not with the ones you love and you\u2019re not doing something you enjoy, then what\u2019s the point?\u201d she says. \u201cWhat\u2019s the point of having a job that makes you a lot of money if you can\u2019t enjoy the perks?\u201d<\/p>\n

Everyone wants to know how Emma manages the finances of only working part-time and living on a cruise ship, and the answer is unique and fascinating: \u201cThe finances of the cruise actually work really well because we get free cruise offers from the casino. All we pay are port fees and taxes, which are minuscule in comparison to the standard costs of a cruise.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Emma\u2019s partner, Cael, for his part, also vlogs<\/a> about the inner workings of his life as a poker player and how he\u2019s able to get so many free cruises.)<\/p>\n

Living on Royal Caribbean cruises, sailing to exotic ports, partying, eating incredible food. They\u2019re living the dream. Right?<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Except Emma says that, while living aboard cruises is fun and adventurous, the lifestyle comes with its challenges. Two months into her journey, she was hit by some of the \u201cdark side\u201d of full-time cruising.<\/p>\n

Many people who choose to live permanently on cruise ships are older and retired, or have enough savings to live off of for a while. Emma is young and still working part-time in data analytics and studying for her MBA, which poses some unique hurdles.<\/p>\n

\u201cToo much of a good thing is challenging,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s fun and it\u2019s really difficult.\u201d<\/p>\n

Emma says the overstimulation\u2014the constant noise, music, people, crowds\u2014is a lot to handle. Finding a quiet space on the ship other than her tiny room to work or study has proven to be almost impossible. About four to six weeks in, she says in a video update, she found herself wanting to go home.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the biggest misconception is that people think it\u2019s going to be just fun non-stop and that I\u2019m on vacation the entire time,\u201d she says. \u201cI work and go to school, so I\u2019m quite busy!\u201d<\/p>\n

She says it\u2019s challenging to get up every day to work, study, eat normally, and exercise when the entire cruise atmosphere is built around excess and partying.<\/p>\n

The lifestyle can also, surprisingly, get lonely. Emma says that it\u2019s fun meeting people and making friends aboard the ship, but almost all of them disembark at the end of the week, never to be seen again. It\u2019s hard to build community and lasting connections.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m definitely missing community engagement, things like that,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

On the cruise, everyone is a stranger, all the time. The other high-status cruisers Emma and her partner meet are often much older, so making friends their own age is a challenge.<\/p>\n

However, Emma says that they have found ways to make it work, and they\u2019re adjusting to their new way of life.<\/p>\n

One thing that\u2019s helped is making connections and friendships with the staff aboard. Those are the only other people that are doing anything close to resembling \u201cliving normal life.\u201d<\/p>\n

They\u2019ve found other ways to find community, family, and friendship as well: \u201cWe [recently] sailed with family for a 10-day cruise and had a blast! It\u2019s really great to spend time with family after being away from home for so long.\u201d<\/p>\n

She adds that the longer they stay aboard Royal Caribbean cruises, the more they start to see some of the same familiar faces.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe also ran into some friends on a cruise last month that we met on a cruise in the summer of 2024 going from Miami to Spain,\u201d she says. \u201cWe ended up hanging out with them most of the cruise and catching up. We\u2019re starting to notice a little bit of a community of frequent cruisers!\u201d<\/p>\n

In the end, living permanently aboard a cruise ship (or any kind of vacation environment) seems appealing, but it\u2019s not for everyone. The lifestyle shift can be jarring, and it can be a huge adjustment.<\/p>\n

\u201cA few people have said it\u2019s their dream to do what I\u2019m doing and think there\u2019s no way anyone could have any difficulty with the lifestyle,\u201d Emma writes. \u201cWhile it is fun a lot of the time, and it is an amazing experience, there are also many aspects of living on a cruise ship that are difficult for me. Travel is often glamorized and I don\u2019t think people like when I break even a small part the illusion.\u201d<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared last year. It has been updated.<\/p>\n

The post Woman quits 6-figure job to live on cruise ships and discovers complicated reality 2 months in<\/a> appeared first on Upworthy<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We\u2019ve all thought about it. Almost every one of us has been at the beach, at a resort,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":607359,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[28,138627,263946],"class_list":["post-607358","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-cruise-ships","tag-royal-caribbean-cruises"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607358","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=607358"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607358\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/607359"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=607358"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=607358"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=607358"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}