I Experienced Cruising in a STORM – The Reality Surprised Me!

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to cruise through hurricane-strength winds? I experienced it on my last cruise and the reality of it probably isn’t what you’d expect.

Normally if you take a cruise in a balcony cabin you can expect your own little private place where you can see out but nobody can see you. That isn’t what happened on my last cruise though because I booked a balcony cabin that faced inside the ship, directly at other cabins.

This type of room is one of the most controversial and it certainly took some getting used to, there were pros and a few cons that I hadn’t thought about pre-cruise and I saw and felt, some interesting things from up here.

There are plenty of reviews and videos that warn people not to stay in this type of cabin but when I saw this video (https://youtu.be/G4Ee1lDt2jg?si=F0RUimaUzOwNVv3I), I knew I had to book one to try it for myself.

A couple of months before this I took a cruise on a very similar ship owned by Royal Caribbean. Our promenade balcony cabin had no clear view of the ocean and we had a couple of issues with noise, soot and general privacy. It looked as though the MSC cabin might be better in a few ways, or so I hoped.

When I cruise I usually book what is called a Guaranteed cabin where you don’t pick the specific cabin location but I knew exactly what cabin I wanted so I did pay slightly extra to book this room. I wanted a cabin towards the back as it looked like we would have a good ocean view as well as the promenade but I hoped that we wouldn’t feel too much engine movement from there.

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We have noticed what appears to be an upturned life raft in the water which went down the starboard side of Aria this was just one of three announcements made on my last Cruise when we encountered a storm off the coast of Spain when I Imark the cruise which was

A 13 night trip sailing from the UK in October I knew that I was taking a risk our cruise had a lot of SE days it was scheduled to pass through the notorious Bay of bisque and I am somebody who does get travel sick so I was a little

Nervous I’ve cruised through the Bay of bis before and the weather’s been fine even in winter so when I booked this cruise I was quietly confident that it would be okay this time too perhaps too confident the itinery that we had chosen was meant to start with two Cay sailing

To Lisbon in Portugal I don’t usually like to book a cruise with a lot of seay but my family wanted to cruise from the UK to somewhere sunny and it does take at least 2 days to find some sunshine in October this actually turned into more

Because it was too rough for us to dock but at this point I thought that I had two c days ahead when we set sail we quickly settled into life on board it was a little rainy as we left Southampton but nothing out of the ordinary we enjoyed our time eating

Watching the entertainment and exploring this massive cruise ship I was really impressed by the big Atrium this amazing Dome area and more than anything I was excited to be with my family heading off on what would be an adventure I was cruising with an extended family group

That included children so I was really hoping that the weather wouldn’t be rough for their sake after all I am the one who is always telling everybody how much fun cruising is so I wanted to be right about that the ship that we were on board was Pano’s Aria which launched

In 2019 and I hope that the fact that this ship was new would protect us from any movement if we did get bad weather generally speaking newer bigger ships have better stabilizers and when I felt unwell in the past it’s normally been on older ships the first day at Sea was

Relatively smooth I barely noticed the ship was moving and that is pretty normal I can’t even count the number of times I’ve been been a dinner and we’ve sailed away and I’ve not noticed I did a live stream recently the ship sailed away while I was live on my YouTube

Channel and I only noticed because the internet started to drop out that is how little a ship can move when the weather is normal on a regular day on a cruise you can play pool without the balls ever rolling to the side the dancers and the acrobats will perform without any issue

And it’s completely normal to forget that you’re on a ship you can even find ice skaters who can do things like this which I think shows how little the ship is moving because you would not risk a swing like this if the ship was rocking and rolling I’ve taken full cruises

Where I’ve hardly felt a thing but sadly this wouldn’t last for us this time waking up on the second day it was clear that the weather was getting worse and the Seas were getting rockier I started to notice things in my cabin moving slightly it was very slight but still it

Was enough for me to notice my cabin was right at the front of deck 12 and it couldn’t have been any further forward as far as movement goes it’s always worse at the ends of the ship I did save money by not picking my specific cabin

Location and I figured if there was a lot of movement I would just spend my time in the middle and further down the ship anyway if I was in the cabin I would probably be in bed or I would be in the shower I did have a shower

Problem on this Cruise caused by the rocking but more about that later the captain did warn us that we might feel some movement and that it will be getting progressively worse as the day went on interestingly it was going to get worse as we left the Bay of bisc the

Actual Bay was relatively calm and the storm that we found was just below it we were expecting to hit the worst of the storm in the evening overnight and into the next morning it was always the captain who made these announcements which I thought was really nice I really

Don’t need to be told about bad weather twice and as soon as I heard that the Seas would be getting rough I took my seasickness medicine my personal favorite at the moment is the brand quells it is absolutely magical and the only side effect I get from it is that I

Have really weird dreams and I do feel sleepy but that’s okay on the cruise it is no problem if you want to have a on a cruise that is what Cay are for and we certainly wouldn’t be outside enjoying the outside decks arvia does have a

Ropes course and a golf course but they were of course closed I’ve said the word course way too many times course course horse divorce I was feeling okay at this point but sadly not everybody in my family were coping so well I feel so much worse when I bring somebody else into a

Situation where they feel unwell I would prefer it to be me to be honest I can get on with it I cruise a lot it really doesn’t matter but either way all of us were looking forward to docking the next day that didn’t happen though and when

We were in the clubhouse Lounge watching a game show the captain made an announcement he said that the weather forecast for tomorrow is looking pretty awful with winds over 40 knots expected at the Port together with heavy and torrential rain throughout the day i’ been looking at the weather forecast for

The next day in Lisbon 2 and it looked as though it would be raining every single hour hour I didn’t think that that would be too much fun I have visited Lisbon in the rain before and it is beautiful but it’s very very slippery you do have to be careful there last

Year I boarded a cruise in Lisbon on board ironically the Norwegian son and I was so drenched I was drenched through by the time we got on the ship that I had to dry my hair under the hand dryer in the public bathrooms I was soaked it

Was still a great Cruise though I just wish I bought maybe a better coat as much as I love Lisbon I wasn’t surprised to hear the captain say that our port stop would be cancelled this has happened to me on lots of cruises in the past so I wasn’t too worried about it

The captain did say that we would be getting another Port the day after in Jaa which to be honest I was very happy with I love Jaa the weather forecast in Jaa was looking sunny and listening to the noise the other guests made when they made the announcement I think they

Were happy to have a stop in jotter too we have instead managed to secure a birth in jalter for Wednesday what this meant though was that we would be on the ship for another day the captain said the weather would be getting worse and that we would feel the movement so we

Should be careful I do have missed port cover as part of my travel insurance policy so I will be getting a fixed amount back for missing the port I was quite happy with that honestly my options will either go to Lisbon in the rain or go to jalter in the sun plus get

A cash lump sum I haven’t got the money yet but my claim has been submitted and it will be with me soon if you need a travel insurance policy just click the travel insurance button on my website and my guide will show you step by step

What to look for never ever ever ever ever take a cruise without Cruise specific travel insurance don’t do it please promise me now you’re going to get travel insurance in the middle of this second night I woke up to go to the toilet and I got a shower door right to

The face I didn’t have my hands up or anything because I wasn’t expecting there to be a door there so it did smack me head on what happened was that the shower door had swung round and into the position of the regular door so when I

Opened the the regular door and went to walk in the second door the glass door was right there so I hit it I was fine I was just a little confused as it was the middle of the night I was surprised that there wasn’t a magnet on the shower door

Or something to stop it from doing that if it was a child or an oap it could have been a much bigger problem your britishism of the week is an oap I recently said something about oaps on a live stream and I was surprised to find

Out that this is not a worldwide term oap just means an old AG pensioner so you might have a oap discount at the cinema or for lunch the same way you would have a senior discount it’s the same sort of thing just means someone who’s a retiran age when the sea was

Rough we did have quite a lot of noise from our balcony our balcony wasn’t protected at all so the wind would whistle through even if the door was completely closed my family had a cabin further along and it was kind of set into the side of the ship so they didn’t

Have any problems with the wind I can sleep through almost anything so it didn’t bother me but one thing that did bother me was was that the safe door kept banging and the Wardrobe doors would open I ended up just putting a towel over the safe to make it be quiet

And I propped the Wardrobe doors with cushions from the sofa and that fixed the problem in the middle of the night I was 99% asleep when I did that so I’m pretty impressed with my nighttime problem solving skills generally around cruise ships you’ll find that a lot of

Things are tied or they’re glued down to stop there being any way that things could fall over when the seas are rocky a cruise L will often close the outside decks because they don’t want people just getting blown around it could be quite dangerous the downside of this

Apart from the fact that you can’t get the fresh air from outside is that everybody is inside the ship on our cruise there were 5,335 people on board Aria and she did handle the people very well it wouldn’t be uncommon to struggle to find a seat

In a bar or a lounge on a day like this but we didn’t ever find that to be an issue maybe that was helped by the fact that some people were perhaps in their cabin feeling unwell the sick bags did come out at one point it’s definitely

Just a incase proportion but I’ve never seen somebody actually be just randomly sick on a cruise a friend of mine Johnny recently told me a story about how someone threw up in a pint glass but I don’t think we need to hear any more about that story I think some people do

Imagine that in ruffies you would be walking along the corridor at 45° or plates will be smashing on the floor but that really isn’t the reality sometimes when you walk you might sway to the side it just looks like everybody is drunk and if you put down a pencil it may roll

But that’s about it cruise ships are designed for the weather and if the weather is going to be bad they will usually avoid it it’s not in anybody’s interest to make the experience of the cruise bad sometimes things are out of the cruise ship’s control though like

The Lifeboat that we would find a little later the captain made an announcement the next morning and told us that overnight we had technically gone through 8 m high waves and we had Winds of 65 knots which is around 75 mph technically 74 mph is the cff off for

Hurricane strength winds so we sailed through hurricane strength winds I don’t think I’ve ever encountered wind that strong on a cruise before but arvia handled it very well it was definitely not the roughest cruise I’ve been on the record for that is saved for the ship I

Took through the Arctic Circle I sailed on a 25-year-old ship to find the northern lights in March so really WTH weather was to be expected in that situation what is fun is walking up and down the stairs when the seas are rough for a few seconds it would get really

Really easy you would have like a power up and then it would become really hard it was like being light and then heavy it’s great fun if you don’t get seasick the majority of people do not get seasick and there are so many people who love rough seas and plenty of people who

Are really disappointed when they can’t feel the ship move the statistics say that around a quarter of people are susceptible to travel sickness and unfortunately girls are more likely to be travel sick than boys which doesn’t seem very fair I definitely would have preferred to have been docked but the

Rocky weather didn’t stop me from doing anything that I wanted to do we listened to some live music wandered around the inside of the ship and we ate whenever we were feeling hungry if you are prone to seasickness it’s definitely not a good idea to eat really big meals it’s

Also not a good idea to let your stomach be empty so kind of a constant stream of small amounts of food just imagine you’re a little bird and you’re just eating seeds all day I don’t really drink alcohol and that definitely helps me in this situation some foods like

Apples and ginger are meant to help I I’ve tried the ginger sweets before but I would much prefer to just eat a gingerbread man or a Ginger nut biscuit it was around now that the captain made an announcement that said that a Cadet had spotted a Lifeboat or a life raft in

The ocean the captain said we are turning around so that we can verify if there is anybody in the water that needs assistance like most people on the ship we went outside to try and have a look for this life raft I really hope that we wouldn’t end up seeing anything that we

Would regret rets but curiosity did get the best of me the first thing I noticed was this line in the water where the ship had spun around really fast we were heading back the way we had come because that was where the Lifeboat was cited something called Solus safety of Life at

Sea means that ships are required to help out anybody who might be in danger Solus is also the reason you have to do a safety drill before the ships set sail and I like to think that the ships would help each other anyway but it is nice to

Know that they have to the captain said that he would update us on what they found and after a while of staring out to see trying to convince myself that I could see some orange blob somewhere we did see it the ship was turned in away

So that we could use the wind to our advantage we could turn and sort of let the life raft come to us it felt like it took quite a long time but slow and steady wins the race and that it did luckily the wind and the bad weather had

Calmed down by this point and the outside decks were open again the life raft was brought on board and we were told that they had identified the ship it had come from and that there wasn’t n anybody in the water who needed our help I can’t imagine how that cool went hello

Ship we found one of your lifeboats you have that’s strange Hudson was supposed to be looking after them yep just checking all is okay it’s fine thanks I’ll see what Hudson’s doing Hudson are you taking a nap I assume that our ship took on the life raft after that I can’t

Imagine a cruise ship would leave the ship at Sea plus if they did that every single ship that came by would have to stop and check if all is okay and that would delay an awful lot of ships I do wonder if original ship will ever get

Its Lifeboat back maybe we left it in Port for them and they did like a click and collect and collected their life Ro although the waves may have been the highest I’ve ever experienced I didn’t feel unwell on this Cruise sadly the same could not be said for the cruise I

Took into the Arctic Circle it was absolutely worth it we saw the Northern Lights it was fantastic but blim me it was a rough trip to find out what happened and who I would recommend this trip to plus How many pairs of socks you need to wear if you’re in the Arctic

Circle check out this video next