Taking sea passage across the Atlantic—how?
I’m looking for realistic alternatives to flying across the Atlantic Ocean.
I write this from an airport. I utterly despise flying. I hate it. I dislike literally every step of the process. I find the security screenings degrading despite the supposed advantages of TSA Pre-Check and Global Entry. I find the inefficient, class-based boarding process to be a complete waste of time. I am offended by the ridiculous itemized charges for luggage. Flying wreaks havoc on my body—my legs do not fit in their tiny seats and my head does not rest comfortably against their poorly adjustable headrest. Breathing stale, recirculating air for eight hours next to a coughing madman is unpleasant. When landing, without fail, the change in air pressure annihilates my sinuses, causing me a non-trivial amount of pain. I do not like it.
These factors, primarily, as well as some preference for an environmentally friendly lifestyle, have led me to ask for ways to avoid using an airplane to cross the pond.
I would be willing to pay somewhat more and spend considerably more time in transit to avoid flying. If it’s to be a particularly slow voyage (more than a week, as I imagine is typical), I would need an internet connection to work my job; something that can sustain a connection to a virtual machine, or in an ideal world take video calls. I have no other particular needs.
I obviously cannot take a train. I am left with only two options as a non-working passenger (I think): a cruise, or a cargo ship. The former sounds expensive. I have heard of people doing the latter but at a glance all I see online is “service paused due to COVID-19.” Surely that cannot truly be the case in 2023, though?
Does anyone have experience doing this? Can you offer advice on where to get started, what the experience is like, and what pitfalls to avoid? I am honestly almost at a breaking point here. I am obligated to take several transatlantic flights in the next year and I really cannot bear to continue doing this. I am open to ideas even if not all my criteria can be met. I appreciate any comments.
You got me curious, so I did some cursory research and it seems exceedingly impractical. There is like one cruise ship that crosses the Atlantic, but it’s super expensive (as you’d expect from a cruise ride that last a month).
Cargo is indeed the other option. There’s very few seats, because a cargo ship can only have up to 12 passengers before it needs a doctor. Prices generally seem to be ~$100/day, and a cross Atlantic voyage would be 40 days or so, so that’s 4000 right there. You would not have internet, unless you get satellite internet on your own. There’s no entertainment, and you must eat what the crew eats (eg the cheapest food the company can get).
For that price, and the insane amount of time, I’d imagine toughing it out with an upgrade to business class would be far better.
I see one normal (?) transatlantic cruise (Queen Mary 2) for about $700 in the off-season or $1200+ in the on-season. Somewhat inconvenient timing, but I could possibly make it work.
I don’t think it takes 40 days to cross the Atlantic by sea. I see the MSC Alessia crossing in about 14 days; the rest of the journey is additional stops I wouldn’t need to take. But it’s unclear to me if I can buy passage for just part of the voyage. Even if I can, it does seem expensive (guessing around €1500?). I would maybe still be willing to do it.
I’ve done one container ship trip as a passenger - just over a week, although departing Singapore rather than transatlantic - and it was an amazing and surreal experience that I’d highly recommend.
Very rough rule of thumb is an hour on a plane maps to a day by sea, so you’d be looking at about a week each way transatlantic. You’ll want to account for realistic potential delays up to a day or two as well in your planning, although it’s worth remembering that you’re just along for the ride; the combination of much slower movement and the prioritisation of cargo, not passengers, means there’s a slim but nonzero chance of something really screwing up the schedule beyond that. Not something I experienced, but one to bear in mind compared to the worst case delay in air travel which is generally getting a flight the next day.
That was all back in the late 2000s, so I definitely can’t comment on practicalities or post-COVID changes. Internet access on board was a straightforward answer back then: there wasn’t any. Nowadays Starlink should be capable, but I have zero idea how prevalent that is on commercial ships or whether it’d be available to passengers even if it is physically on board. Extremely happy to answer any questions about other specifics if you have them, though.
I’ve idly looked at doing a trip by sea again - traditional cruises don’t particularly appeal to me, and normally just do a loop anyway, but apparently you can often get tickets point to point on a “repositioning cruise” where they need to take the ship somewhere else anyway. Experience is apparently pretty similar to a normal cruise but a lot cheaper, so if one happened to match your schedule it could be interesting - for me at least that’s something I’d be more interested in trying for the experience than just going on a loop around some ports, although the vibe still sounds a bit odd.
There’s also (I believe) just one remaining ocean liner - a passenger ship designed specifically for long distance point to point travel - which is the Queen Mary 2. In practice it’s operated like a cruise, by a cruise line (Cunard), but if you can get a reasonable price it’s likely to give more of that traditional ocean voyage feeling just by the nature of how it was built and the itineraries it takes because of that.
All that said, the reason I’ve never done it again is the combination of time and the need to remain connected for work if I am going to spend weeks at sea. I actually love flying too, in a lot of ways, but slower travel really appeals sometimes - so if you do find a way to make it practical I’d be excited to hear!
That sounds fascinating, but it’s locked behind an invite-only signup, unfortunately.
Are your dates flexible? Several cruise lines offer berths on repositioning cruises for comparatively cheap. However, they are moving Ships from one market to another for a whole season. These cruises go in one direction one one date per year and then in the other some months later.
I would look into cargo ships
If the seabound route doesn't end up working out for you either due to logistical and/or financial considerations, and you've never tried the flight in business class, it's something I'd definitely recommend. It's almost an entirely different experience in the air, and access to the lounges in each airport really go a long way as well.
I can only speak to Lufthansa and Air France, but both really open up your eyes to what flying could and should be like. And if you have time and flexibility in your schedule to plan it out ahead of time, you can get the prices down to something somewhat manageable.
I have no solution except to say you really have a way with words when you're miserable. I felt like I was about to read the first chapter of a Dostoevsky novel.