I have never taken a cruise, and friends and my own son rave about the experience. But given the reports on the air quality above a cruise ship as worse than Beijing in particulate matter makes me think it doesn’t really matter where you are on the ship. I think I’ll just lounge on the beach.
Concerns about air quality above a cruise ship is kind of silly when you realize that the ship is always moving. When it gets into a port, everybody gets off the ship to do things ashore.
Those cruise ships are about the cleanest environments as they have hundreds of crew members who are constantly scrubbing things down and keeping everything shiny clean. As soon as you leave your cabin, somebody is in there cleaning it and refreshing the fruit in your fruit bowl, etc.
The think I like best about the cruise ships is that you literally don't have to lift a finger to do anything that resembles work of any kind. In the staging area just before the cruise, your luggage is taken away to your cabin. You get up from your pool chair for even a few minutes and you will find your towel replaced with a fresh one. When you finish your drink, the empty glass magically disappears. Way less stressful then a trip to say Disneyland, where you are constantly trying to arrange transportation here and there and making reservations at restaurants and so forth. On a ship, all of that is done for you and you have your own assigned seating at the dining room. And if you don't show up, you get a voicemail in your cabin offering to bring the meal directly to you.
It's hard to describe to anybody who hasn't had the experience but once you have your first cruise, you are basically hooked for life.
“But given the reports on the air quality above a cruise ship as worse than Beijing “
What reports?
I’ve been in Beijing AND on 86 cruise ships......I don’t know what “REPORT” you’ve been reading, but you’re wrong.
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