Posted on 02/15/2021 8:18:20 AM PST by Capt. Tom
As regular readers know, I’m a big fan of cabins with balconies. As I explained in a recent story, there’s nothing quite like being able to step onto a balcony on a ship to breathe in the fresh ocean air.
But that doesn’t mean I’m opposed to the idea of staying in a cabin without a balcony. In fact, at times, I’ll even book a cabin that doesn’t have a window — or, as they’re known in the cruise world, an “inside” cabin.
If you’ve never been on a cruise before, you might not even know there’s such a thing as a cabin without a window. But there is. And they’re actually quite common. Many ships operated by major lines such as Royal Caribbean and Norwegian Cruise Line have hundreds of windowless cabins.
That may seem almost unthinkable to people who are used to staying at hotels on land. After all, there aren’t a lot of hotels that have hundreds of rooms without windows. If there were, we’re guessing they wouldn’t be huge sellers.
But it’s fair to say that accommodations on cruise ships have their own set of quirks.
The upside of an inside The lack of a window isn’t the only reason to pooh-pooh the idea of staying in an inside cabin.
In addition to offering nary a peek at the world, inside cabins — named because they’re generally located toward the middle of ships, away from exterior walls — also often are the smallest cabins on any cruise ship. Many are downright tiny. That latter point can be a big turnoff for some cruisers.
But there are advantages to inside cabins, too. For starters, inside cabins often are significantly less expensive than ocean-view cabins. They also offer a sort of “less is more” minimalism that can appeal to a keep-it-simple crowd.
For me, at least, there are times when a cabin that’s inexpensive and modest in size is just fine — even if it doesn’t have anything in the way of a view.
After all, for the most part, I’m not taking cruises to spend a lot of time in a cabin. Like most cruisers, I get on ships to enjoy all they have to offer in their public spaces and to explore all the wonderful places to which they sail.
In that context, does it really matter if the room where I’ll sleep each night is big and fancy?
To steal a line from Arthur Frommer, the legendary guidebook author and guidebook company founder, “Most of the time you’re in your room on vacation, your eyes are closed.”
Frommer said that to me years ago during an interview about his favorite hotel rooms. He thought spending huge sums on fancy digs was a waste. His words stuck with me over the years and now, I see their wisdom.
Here are six reasons you might want to seriously consider the least expensive inside cabins on any cruise ship:
You’ll save money This is, for sure, the big allure of an inside cabin. They can be an incredible deal.
At the time of this story’s publishing, fares for inside cabins on seven-day Royal Caribbean cruises out of Galveston, Texas, in September, for instance, were running around 40% less than fares for balcony cabins. They were nearly four times less expensive than the least expensive suite.
Specifically, you could get on the line’s amenity-packed Liberty of the Seas out of Galveston on a Sept. 5 departure for just $479 per person, not including taxes and fees, if you were willing to stay in an inside cabin. That works out to less than $70 a day!
The thing to remember here is that all of Liberty of the Seas’ major attractions, from a sprawling, top-deck waterpark to an indoor ice skating rink and giant theater with Broadway-style shows, are open to everyone on board, whether they’re staying in the smallest or biggest cabin. So are nearly all of the ship’s onboard restaurants, bars and lounges.
Other than having to sleep in a smaller, windowless room, you’ll be getting much of the same onboard experience as someone who pays far more for a snazzy cabin, at a fraction of the price.
You’ll sleep like a baby There is no dark in the world like the dark of an inside cabin. Once you turn off the lights, it will be pitch black: the kind of darkness that’s almost scary to contemplate.
This can be a bit disorienting for someone who’s used to at least a little moonlight getting into their bedrooms at home. But if you’re the kind of person who has trouble sleeping with any kind of light disruption, an inside cabin can be pure bliss. You’ll go to bed without any worry about the morning sun sneaking through your curtains to wake you prematurely. And moonlight is definitely not a problem.
Inside cabins can be particularly appealing if you’re sailing far north around the summer solstice when the sun stays up for much (or all) of the day. We’re talking about places like Alaska, the Norwegian coast and around Iceland and Greenland. Ditto if you’re sailing far south during the winter to places such as Antarctica or the more southerly parts of South America.
You’ll spend more time enjoying the ship The trick to having a blast on a cruise ship is to dive right into anything and everything it has to offer. If it has a rock wall, you need to climb it. Karaoke? Get ready to sing. Leave no waterslide or late-night comedy show unexperienced. To do this, of course, you need to get out of your room. And there’s no better motivation to get out of your room than to have one that lacks much space or even a window.
Despite their small size, inside cabins often can hold as many as four people, thanks to pulldown bunks. (Photo courtesy of Princess Cruises) When I book inside cabins, I find that I get up and out early. Instead of ordering room service for breakfast, I’ll head to a restaurant with a view and then explore the ship more than usual in the morning. I’ll spend daytime hours playing on the ship’s top decks and evening hours out late at the bars, lounges and showrooms.
Related: 7 reasons you should splurge for a suite on a cruise ship
By offering you little more than a small, dark place to rest your head at night, inside cabins can be just the impetus you need to make the most of your cruise vacation.
You might get less seasick Worried about getting seasick on your next cruise?
The most stable place to be on any cruise ship is low down on the vessel near its equilibrium point, which is generally near its center. Since inside cabins are closer to the center of a ship than “outside” ocean-view and balcony cabins, they can be more stable in rough seas. The trick is to find an inside cabin toward the center of the ship in both directions — lengthwise and widthwise.
If you’re solo, you might avoid extra fees Nearly all cruise ship cabins are designed for two travelers, each paying their own fare, and solo travelers generally have to pay an extra fee to stay in one alone. But some ships have special inside cabins specifically designed for solo travelers. If you’re traveling alone and stay in one of these special solo cabins, you can avoid the extra solo traveler fee, known in the industry as the “single supplement.”
Miami-based Norwegian Cruise Line, which has been at the forefront of the solo cabin trend, now has hundreds of inside cabins for solo travelers spread across half a dozen vessels.
Related: 15 ways that cruisers waste money on cruises
While these solo cabins do have windows, they open up onto hallways, not the outside of the ship. They’re also unusually small, at around 100 square feet. But they’re also superbly designed to maximize storage space, and they’re clustered around exclusive lounges where solos can mingle at daily hosted happy hour gatherings.
Royal Caribbean, Cunard and Holland America are among other lines that have been adding solo cabins to some ships, too — many of them inside cabins.
There are a few ocean-view cabins designed for solo travelers in the industry, but they are very rare.
You might still get an ocean view (with a twist) On a few innovative cruise ships, there are windowless inside cabins that do offer a view of the outside world — thanks to the magic of technology.
On Disney’s two newest ships, Disney Dream and Disney Fantasy, some inside cabins come with “magical portholes” that show real-time views of the outside. They’re actually screens built into the walls of the cabin to give the illusion of a porthole view.
Royal Caribbean has gone a step further, adding large “virtual balconies” to inside cabins on some ships. These are floor-to-ceiling LED screens that show real-time views of the outside, built into the walls of the cabins in such a way that they offer the illusion of a balcony.
An inside cabin with a “virtual balcony” on Royal Caribbean’s Navigator of the Seas. (Photo courtesy of Royal Caribbean) If this idea sounds a little hokey, it is. But I’ve stayed in these cabins, and the illusion is surprisingly real. The addition of the screens really changes the feel of the rooms. The Disney cabins are particularly fun, as Disney characters sometimes make cameo appearances in the magical portholes. If you’ve got young kids with you, they’re going to love it.
It’s easier for the crew to clean up the smaller windowless room after you’ve blown your wine, sushi, and Bananas Foster all over the walls and ceiling.
One is treated differently if one is booked in a suite.
I didn’t know that! Thanks for that little item.
On Disney cruises, I prefer the “inside” cabins.
They have fake port holes with really cool classic Disney classic scenes constantly running on them.
-randomly, Peter Pan flies up, peeks in, winks at you and flies away.. stuff like that.. it also represents the actual time of day (sunrises, sunsets..)
On the outer rooms with real portholes, you see water... it’s not always pretty.
No porn?
I think it depends on the cruise duration and the age of the passenger. For us no balcony no go. One of my favorite things in life is to sit on the balcony and watch the ocean and landscapes go by.
6 reasons I’m happy booking a windowless ‘inside’ cabin on a cruise ship.
The one bad reason do you hear water running?.
We always go for the balcony ,, inside cabins make me feel like a bat in a cave. I do a lot of pic taking and video taking as well. Hard to spot a bear or whale from your inside cabin altho Disney is probably working on it.
A Magic Porthole?? a novel idea.. but just not the same.
You are correct, most folks don’t use the balconies that much. Their loss.
I’m talking about how claustrophobic I’d be in an interior windowless cabin on a boat if there was a storm, threat of shipwreck, or a hostage type situation.
Bride and I went on 1 cruise. Oasis of the Sea. We were young and in love. ( still are but not as young). I spent the money on a balcony, one of the slightly larger ones. Anyway, we aren’t into buffets, we don’t eat that much. We mainly ate in the restaurants rather than the dining halls.
The Stewart, or whoever it is that looks after the rooms and guests was great. You would never see him until he would just pop out and see if we needed anything. We would have a big smile on his face as we would head back to the room.
Long story short. We had a good time but since we don’t gamble, don’t shove massive amounts of mediocre food down our pie holes, we spent lots of time in our room. There really wasn’t that much to do on the ship. So we had a week of ummm exercise. Balcony was great. Good time but did that been there but probably will never do it again. Wife did see a shark chase a guy out of the water on that trip after we left the ship in FL. It was right in front of the life guard. Never seen a life guard run up and down the beach screaming get out of the water so fast and so loud. I missed it. 😵
That’s an entire different story about stupid people.
We took a lot of cruises back in the ‘90s when I was a travel consultant.
During the presidential election of 2000, we were on a 19 day cruise from Bangkok to Sydney. I had gotten a great travel agent fare from Princess, and then a couple of weeks before departure,
Princess came out with a $999 pp sale rate for the general public for an inside cabin which even beat the travel industry rate.
We were in the last cabin aft, and only had to step out the door then through some double doors to be on the fantail where there was a hot tub and outside steps up to the buffet.
The studies you site relate to the coastal cities they pass by and frequent, and are usually related to auto emissions. There's no question that power plants, and that's what a large ship operates, pollute. Ironically, more recent and most of the large ships are electric powered. That smoke coming out of the stack is one of the costs of electricity.
The good news if you're on the ship, you aren't breathing the gasses leaving the stack, they're behind you within seconds. As I noted, the studies relate to onshore particulates, so if you're lounging on a beach with any cruise or cargo traffic, and they all do, you'll be breathing it. Pretty much anywhere in the world. Need to find beaches without either cruises or significant economic activity. Cruise ships emit about 4 times the co2 as airplanes. Transporting 100 to 500 times as many folk.
As to Beijing, although there's an occasional clear day, frequently visibility doesn't exceed a couple hundred yards. Breathing the air there you understand why they wear masks
I was on the USS Rose, a troop transport with 1,500 puken, Soldiers and Jarheads going to Germany in 1960 in the winter.
I had a central bunk, covered with puke.
I hated every minute of that trip and there is no way I'd ever spend a dime of my money to get back on an ocean going vessel.
My brother was a swabbie and my son a Captain in the Navy, but I'll take a foxhole, and fly me there, please.
Every three or four years Mrs Afterguard and I go cruising the Virgin Islands both US and British. We usually do it for 7 nights and have an absolutely wonderful time! We go to all the places we want to go and stay as long as we want. Of course the “ships” we cruise on are usually less than 50 ft long and are sail powered. We buy our own provisions and cook our own food and the sunrises, days, and sunsets are spectacular. No crowds onboard. It is paradise! It’s expensive so we can’t do every year, but it’s worth it. I cannot imagine cruising with 2000 or 3000 stinky people. Lol.
My wife and I used to do that regularly with friends, in between cruise ship cruising, when we found by cruising an area we wanted to spend more time in.
Offhand I can remember some of the boats we chartered, a C&C 42 sail-an Oday 37 sail, a 42' Trawler Yacht, a CSY44 sail.
IN those days the Morgan 41 and the Gulfstar 50 were the most popular sailboats to charter in the Caribbean.
We cruised the British and American Virgin Islands and the Grenadines.
Those were the days my friend , we thought they would never end.-Tom
there’s nothing quite like being able to step onto a balcony on a ship and jumping overboard.... : )
Thats just f ing goofy
Indeed i roam back and forth getting dressed and shaving on sea days its wonderful I have even slept out there at night
When we book an inside cabin we turn the television to one of the ship’s outside camera channels and turn the sound off. We leave it like that over night. Makes for a dim night light and when the sun comes up it tells us gently it’s time to rise and shine.
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