The number one advantage of cruising for families with young kids in particular is that they only need to pack and unpack the one time – when they board and at the end of the cruise. Getting to see loads of different places and not having to worry at all about the bags, supplies and arrangements has its obvious advantages, with an attentive, professional crew always there to help things along. Arrive at a different destination on a daily basis, travelling while you’re asleep, and enjoy new experiences fresh and alert rather than sleepy and frustrated.

On the cruise ship itself, there’ll be no shortage of things to do for all members of the family. From fun quizzes, deck games and pool to fitness centres, boutiques, libraries, bowling alleys and even jogging tracks, these vast vessels are floating cities packed with entertainments and activities. Many ocean cruise liners have multiple cinema complexes showing the very latest releases, video gaming halls for the kids and teens, and sumptuous restaurants serving up food created by world-class chefs. With play areas with dedicated minders for toddlers, and discos and similar venues for the restless teens seeking noise and excitement, not to mention safe freedom from parental control, cruise ships offer the lot and then some.

Cruise destinations used to be fairly limited, but the oceans have opened up. Now you can choose from lots of different types of cruises and varied itineraries, these types of hassle-free holidays are becoming increasingly popular. Whether you want to explore destinations in the Mediterranean, Caribbean, Northern Europe, Far East, Australasia, South America or even the Arctic Circle, there’ll be a cruise calling out to you like a siren and you’ll be hard pressed to resist. Forget about drawing up complex, expensive and fussy travel arrangements because all you need to do is get to the departure point, unpack and simply take it easy, allowing the crew to do all the legwork whilst you just sit back and literally let the world go by.

Dealing with airport transfers, checking flight times, worrying about cancellations, collecting luggage and sorting out language problems are things that simply don’t exist when you go for the cruise option. Also consider that it’s much easier to keep to a budget on a cruise as opposed to on a traditional holiday, because on an all-inclusive cruise you’ve paid for it all up front and there are no rapidly mounting extras to factor in.

Take a break with a difference this year and give yourself a well-deserved treat that makes great sense whichever way you look at it.

Author bio: David Elliott is a freelance writer who loves to travel, especially in Europe and Turkey. He’s spent most of his adult life in a state of restless excitement but recently decided to settle in North London. He gets away whenever he can to immerse himself in foreign cultures and lap up the history of great cities.

Some other cruise related posts at Lifecruiser:

The Worlds Oldest Gun Ship: A Medieval Cog Ship
The Best Things to do on a Cruise in Hawaii
The coolest cruise is a Caribbean cruise
The top five Red Sea cruise destinations
Broaden your horizons when there are cruise deals to be had
Fabulous Cruise Alternatives
Cruising is the Perfect Gift
Top 5 Pacific Cruises For Your Next Getaway!
Mediterranean Dream Cruises
Top 5 Cruises for family’s on a budget
Luxury Dream Cruises
Bargain Cruise Ships Tips
 

Many people are also surprised to find out that the Red Sea is home to several beautiful beaches, as well as activities like scuba diving and swimming. You might want to check out special offers to visit the Red Sea on cruise deals at virginholidayscruises.co.uk.

Here are five top destinations to visit on a Red Sea Cruise…

Sharm el Sheikh, Naama Bay. Photo by Svetlana Grechkina

1. Sharm el Sheikh

One of the most popular destinations for a cruise in the Red Sea, although there is no main tourist attraction, but the beach itself attracts thousands every year.

While swimming, tanning, relaxing or exploring the beach are all great ways to pass the time, snorkelling and scuba diving make Sharm el Sheikh Egypt’s most popular beach resort.

2. Port Sokhna

Few people have heard of Port Sokhna, but it is where most cruise passengers disembark to explore capital city Cairo, which is only a few miles away.

In Cairo itself, there are countless attractions to explore like the Museum of Cairo and the Coptic Museum, but the Sphinx and Pyramids of Giza are the most impressive of all.

3. Luxor

Located on the banks of the Nile, Luxor was once the capital of ancient Egypt. Today, it is a top destination for travellers wanting an insight into its long history.

Passengers will usually disembark at Port Safaga and travel 45 minutes to Luxor to explore the Valley of the Kings.

Here, visitors can see the Tomb of Tutankhamen, the Tomb of Ramesses VI and countless other ancient historic landmarks.

4. Petra, Jordan

Parts of the Red Sea border the scenic country of Jordan, and there is nowhere more remarkable to visit than Petra.

Petra is a designated UNESCO World Heritage Site, and boasts several different structures carved from the famous pink-tinted rocks.

5. Hurghada

Although Hurghada may not be as big or popular as Sharm el Sheikh, it’s every bit as beautiful.

This coastal destination in Egypt is a stopping point for some of the cheapest cruises in the Red Sea. It offers great opportunities for scuba diving, swimming, snorkelling and horseback riding on the beach.

Going on a cruise on the Red Sea, you can visit historic landmarks, relaxing beaches and more.

Lifecruiser Love Cruise Holidays

Some other cruise related posts at Lifecruiser:

Broaden your horizons when there are cruise deals to be had
Fabulous Cruise Alternatives
Cruising is the Perfect Gift
Top 5 Pacific Cruises For Your Next Getaway!
Mediterranean Dream Cruises
Top 5 Cruises for family’s on a budget
Luxury Dream Cruises
The Worlds Oldest Gun Ship: A Medieval Cog Ship
Bargain Cruise Ships Tips
 

There are over 500 homes to choose from, and each home comes with its own iPhone loaded with information gathered from the host about the best things to do in the local area. Each home unique, but here are a few that have that extra little something:

The Boat House

Life doesn’t get much more luxurious than this. This stunning home with its lavish decoration is certainly a sight to behold and sleeps up to 12 people. Original Georgian features are complimented by elegant and sophisticated décor making this the perfect riverside house to drift away and dream the days away. Beyond the garden, which boasts a hot tub, barbeque and adventure playground, is the River Thames, perfect for an afternoon stroll to explore some of London’s finest waterside cafes.

Albert Terrace

This home is steeped in history having been built for a doctor of Queen Victoria. A wonderful mix of original period features in the sitting room, carefully blended with modern style in the kitchen, this house is as grandiose as it is comfortable. Stay here for your own slice of history in Primrose Hill.

Russell Garden Mews

For the more modern minded, this four bedroom family home is the residence of a DJ turned architect, and it shows. Clean lines and sleek style characterise this house, and if you head downstairs to the basement you even have your own dance floor! Located in west London it is perfect for visiting the famous Portobello Road market.

Lifecruiser Love Unusual Stays
 

If you’ve never cruised before and aren’t sure how your sea legs will fair, try the 3 or 4-night cruise. If you decide you like cruising Disney-style you can opt for the week long cruise next time. With a Walt Disney World Holiday experience you can guarantee there will always be a next time!

Don’t forget to pack your glad-rags on for the sail away party. Held on deck you’ll see great views of the partying, set against the shore and the open ocean. Look out for the Cast Members in the Port building waving goodbye to you with their giant Mickey hands.

Families or groups with five members or more can save money by booking two connecting staterooms, rather than several smaller cabins. Just make sure you request connecting staterooms when booking.

On your first day, don’t worry if you don’t make it to the disembarkation talk. Although everyone is told to attend, the staff rebroadcast it continually on the stateroom televisions for the rest of the day. Do something else while everyone is packed in the theatre, and then watch it later, at your convenience.

As well as great food available at the ship’s restaurants, spa sessions, varied shopping opportunities and more activities to choose from than you can ever imagine, on a Disney Caribbean cruise you’ll even get to wade through the waters to Disney’s privately owned island, Castaway Cay on one of the daily stops.

Snorkelling, souvenir shopping and sunbathing on the island are highly recommended. Indulge in a cabana massage, which is very popular with the island’s residents (so it must be good!). Dive down to the depths along one of the many beaches where you’ll come across an old plane wreckage where thousands of
colorful fish congregate.

Despite common misconceptions Disney’s not just for kids and the fun continues long after they go to bed. For example, there are noticeably less children at the late seating for dinner and in the audience during the late show. Whatever you do, don’t leave “Disney Dreams” early: this is a must-see show.

Disney cruise tickets are not yet available through the brand’s site so you will need to call to book; however tickets to the numerous theme parks for your Walt Disney World Holiday can be booked online.

Things constantly change on-board but these tips will hold you in good stead and prepare you to embrace the enchantment of Disney’s high seas.

Lifecruiser Love Cruises
 

As a boat lover (even though we don’t own any boat ourselves nowadays) I really love to see all those leisure boats, even though my absolute favorites of course are the old local fishing boats.

©Lifecruiser Love Boats

 
Some other boat related posts by Lifecruiser:

Gotland Photo: Fishing Boat with Swedish Flag
Travel Photo: Old Rowboat
Old Fishing Boat Coat
 

Nevertheless, it was a fantastic stop on the way, very enjoyable – and look who sit there looking out over the port: Mr Lifecruiser himself!

Needless to say, we’re really longing for our Europe trip now and to come to the French Riviera once again, meeting our friends and everything else there and on the way there…

©Lifecruiser Love French Riviera
 

The Stockholm archipelago is worth a visit even if you visit in the winter time – if you want a secluded place to relax.

You can find the Stockholm archipelago radio channel at radio frequency 90,2 or by their website Skargardsradion.se.

Click on the link up in the right corner that says: “Lyssna på WEBRADION” to listen to the player for Skärgårdsradion.

They even have apps for your mobile phone, which probably is the best alternative, to really get updated about everything related to the archipelago.

If you understand Swedish: don’t miss to check what my favorite actionreporters Jesse & Loogna are up too at the moment, lots of fun going on there!

©Lifecruiser Love Stockholm Archipelago Radio
 

As soon as we had installed ourselves in our cabin at the ship, we went to get a walk on deck, since it was such a lovely weather. Sun deck is never a wrong place to be when the sun is shining! Though before that, something fun happened…

When walking along the cabin corridor I noticed a man standing in the end of it, leaning on the wall, smiling and looking at us while we were walking towards him. I though it might be some kind of cabin crew or something since we were so close to the more luxury cabins, but coming closer to him I started to find his behavior more strange. He was looking at us in a way a crew member would probably not do and his smile got bigger and bigger….

When coming very close to him, about a meter or so we finally took a real look into his face and suddenly it came very clear: we know this man! Yes! It was a friend from our summer island, which we meet every summer when he and his family rent the fishing cottage from our farmer! Such a coincidence to meet at this cruise ship, right here, right now!

Even more of a coincidence were that he had been on a bus tour at the exact destinations as we had! How close we had been every day without knowing it…. Sometimes it’s so strange! Of course, as the well equipment guy he always is, he had something for us in the bag: yes, he has a tradition of making toasts with us, with whiskey! Skål x 3 for hubby, one for his belated birthday you see…. ha ha…

After that we went to the sundeck to get some… Champagne of course! Cheers my dears! Very suitable were that the theme at this cruise were: Fiesta! So we had Spanish music on the ship and very skilled Spanish dancers in the evening show – oh, how we enjoyed that!

We had a very pleasant cruise, the Baltic Sea were calm, the sunset were as nice as it can be… This time we arrived safe at home without any sea sickness! Hooray!

Though there was something that was not as it should: now hubby had got a terrible sore throat… oh, no, poor man! Was there no end on the bad things connected with our Baltic Cruise trip…? It really has been a mix of either very bad or very nice things on this whole cruise!

…and I can mention that me too got his cold when we arrived home, so we were sick for a whole week after coming home, hubby worse than me and he is still coughing.

I think he might need some more whiskey or what do you say? Ha ha…

You can see all Lifecruiser photos of Silja Symphony 2012 at Flickr.

Stay tuned to hear what we did learn from the cruise experience Stockholm – Tallinn – St Petersburg – Helsinki and what we really thought about it plus all the pros and cons…

©Lifecruiser Love Cruises

Related Baltic cruise posts by Lifecruiser:

How we escaped from a cruise and ended up in jail… Part 1
How we escaped from a cruise and ended up in jail… Part 2
Our night in Katajanokka Jail
Baltic Cruise Stop Tallinn – UNESCO Cultural Heritage
Saint Petersburg Souvenirs
The Idiots Sightseeing of Saint Petersburg
Photo: Illusionary Window
Baltic Cruise Stop Helsinki
 

We checked out from the Katajanokka jail hotel, took a cab to the railway station once again, put our bags in a locker temporarily and went to book a ticket at the cruise ship Silja Symphony at the internet terminals in the station. Choosing to read the booking site in Swedish, didn’t get us the right pages to book FROM Helsinki to Stockholm, it assumed that we were in Stockholm all the time, so we gave up and took the easy way: we went to the Helsinki expert stand in the station to get help.

There we could establish that it was more expensive to take the cruise home the same day, so we did book the next day instead, giving me time to recover from my… ehrm… toilet experienced night… So anyway, we needed to get another hotel for this night to finally (hopefully!) get some proper sleep. We did choose Scandic hotel for €132 per night and just uphills from the railway station.

We did check in and went to the elevators – and my, how suitable this hotel was for us! Just have a look at those elevator doors…

The room was satisfying, with free wifi to get in touch with peeps and the beds divine after the cruise ship beds and not having any sleep… but we went out anyway to see something more than just the hotel room, even though we had been sightseeing the day before and we have seen Helsinki before that too.

At the back of the hotel is a square, which has some pubs, among them Henry’s pub and we went for some beers even though it was too cold to sit outside. This day it was really freezing ice cold winds!!!

We also went for something to eat in the mall nearby there, some wraps we did eat watching people walking, no, stressing by. Have you ever watched people a Friday evening nearby any railway station or bus station? Oh my! People really are stressed… I got tired seeing them and we decided to head back to the hotel room and just have a relaxed evening there.

After being at our hotel room for a while, of course, the hungry monster in me did wake up. This time I might have had a proper excuse though, I mean: after emptying myself totally the night before, my body really screamed after nourishment to fill up the gaps with! So I asked if hubby maybe could go down to see if there was a hot dog stand or something nearby, I was craving for mashed potatoes or something potato-related to fill up with, but said that it could go with sandwiches from the hotel lobby.

I should have known, that as sweet as he always is, of course he did run around all the neighborhood for some mashed potatoes for me… without finding any and returning to the hotel – and of course: at the side of the hotel were he hadn’t been, there was the hot dog stand! Ha ha! How typical isn’t that?

After that we were both very full and sleepy so it was time to finally get a full night sleep – and not on top of any disco loudspeakers with a crappy bed with dirty bed covers, no, this time in proper, clean and very nice beds – feeling like the sleeping Beauty…. ahhh… life was good!

Next day we did relax as long as possible at the hotel room and then our bags went back to the lockers at the railway once again and then we went to the nearest Tapas bar to enjoy the sun with some beers, garlic olives, cornichons and salami to wait until we could take the tram to the cruise ship. Yum!

You can see all Lifecruiser photos of Helsinki at Flickr.

Stay tuned to hear how our last cruise leg was, if we arrived safe at home without any sea sickness – and later on what we did learn from all this and what we really thought about our experience plus all the pros and cons…

©Lifecruiser Love Cruises

Related Baltic cruise posts by Lifecruiser:

How we escaped from a cruise and ended up in jail… Part 1
How we escaped from a cruise and ended up in jail… Part 2
Our night in Katajanokka Jail
Baltic Cruise Stop Tallinn – UNESCO Cultural Heritage
Saint Petersburg Souvenirs
The Idiots Sightseeing of Saint Petersburg
Photo: Illusionary Window
 

Since Tallinn is a UNESCO cultural heritage site, the one day we had there was not anywhere near the time you need to explore it, but at least we got a glimpse of what it has to offer with it’s old defensive wall surrounding it, walking on cobblestone street’s feeling thrown back in time.

For the architecture freak, there is so much to see in this medieval town. Only the fortifications has plenty of terracotta towers, not to mention the churches, town hall and the fantastic Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, an orthodox church from the 1900 at the top of the hill at Lossi Plats.

We found this old town of Tallinn to be a real pearl and wandered around for hours and hours determent to get to see as much as possible before the cruise ship’s departure called us back to the port.

For the architecture interested, I can mention that we also found art nouveau architecture in a couple of buildings. Of course I couldn’t resist to tell you about a love story around them…

Once upon a time there was a beautiful woman living in one of the two buildings who was in love with someone, however it was not the poor rich man living in the opposite building, who fell deeply in love with this enchanting woman. She didn’t want him which broke his heart, so he said something like: " since you don’t want me, I will stare into your windows all the time instead" – and since then he is staring at the other house, from the corner of one of the gables (as a bust at the facade).

    

The woman lived in the building with the dragons on it and the poor rejected man in the opposite one. You have to really look for the unhappy man to notice him, so we nearly missed him.

Wandering around following the defense walls, up and down on the hills to get to the view points and on cobble stone streets, is really worth the effort. There is so much to explore in this medieval town. I truly understand why it’s a UNESCO Cultural Heritage Site.

When going on this cruise, I got a paper with me from a travel magazine, where there were tips about where to eat and there was especially one of them I wanted to check out, but do you think that I had this paper with me when getting off that cruise ship? No, not me. So we didn’t find it…

Instead we made a stop at the town hall square for some light refreshments and to rest our aching backs and feet after all walking on the cobblestone streets. Even though it seemed that most tourists also did stop there too, we didn’t find the prices so high anyway and sometimes one has to take what is possible. We could not walk any more.

Tallinn has been one of the most important trading ports in the Baltic region and was on the Viking trade route already. For me, the history is more personal: I have relatives over there which I have heard talking about their town, yet this was my first visit. Maybe not the last though!

It takes time to explore an UNESCO heritage site, so if you’re going there, make it your only destination or at least spend several days there to have time to really discover this culture treasure of the Baltic area.

Yes, Tallinn is a very interesting and beautiful town, perhaps especially if you love old architecture and photographing! In fact, so nice, that I didn’t even notice that I was dead tired after not having any sleep at the cruise ship. Also, we did have sunshine which did contribute to a very lovely day.

You can see all Lifecruiser Tallinn Photos in Flickr.

Stay tuned to read more about our sightseeing time in the next port of this Baltic Cruise: St Petersburg – which included an Idiot (or maybe more) and Russian Vodka!

©Lifecruiser Love Tallinn Old Town

Related Baltic cruise posts by Lifecruiser:

How we escaped from a cruise and ended up in jail… Part 1
How we escaped from a cruise and ended up in jail… Part 2
Our night in Katajanokka Jail