After spending time on a floating resort soaking up the sun and being waited on hand and foot real life gets to be a bit tedious. There is no tactful way to put it, compared to how you are treated onboard cruise ships, real life sucks. Cooking, cleaning, doing dishes and running errands are all jobs that need to be done; they are just no fun to do. After being treated as if you are royalty it’s only natural to be resistant to having to do things for ourselves.
So what’s the best way to combat post-cruise depression? Here are five things I like to do to fight post cruise depression.
- Schedule your vacation to be longer than your cruise - I don’t know about you but after taking a cruise a need at least one decompression day. Some people like to stay in the city of embarkation for a day before traveling back home. This gives them a chance to unwind and reminisce before getting back to your real life. Others like to get back home so they can spend a day or two lounging around the house before heading back to work. Personally I don’t care where I am as long as I’m lying around doing absolutely nothing before heading back to the real world.
- Clean your house before you leave – My girlfriend and I both believe in making the house as spotless as possible before going on a cruise. My reasoning is because the last thing I want to do when I get back home is clean. Her reasoning is she wants the house to look like a museum in case we die while on vacation (really pleasant thought). She says if something happens she wants everyone to know we were clean people, lol. Whatever reasoning you need to conjure up to clean, just make sure you get it done. You’ll definitely appreciate it when you get home.
- Make that first day easy for yourself – This means two words for me, “take out”. I do most of the cooking around here but that first day back I just can’t bring myself to do it. Luckily, I have quite a few good take out restaurants around me that are a lifesaver that first night back. With a day off, clean house and dinner cooked by someone else it ends up feeling like I’m still on a cruise.
- Look at pictures – This one is a double-edged sword (best enjoyed with a bottle of wine). On one hand it’s kind of sad reminding yourself that your vacation is over (especially when it’s likely you won’t be having another for quite a while). On the other hand you get to re-live all of those great moments you just experienced; which always bring a smile to my face. I tend to take a ton of pictures. It’s not unusual for me to come home with over a thousand pictures and hours of video. That’s a whole lot of cure for post-cruise depression which is perfect since it usually takes us days to get through them all.
- Book another cruise – the number 1 way to get over the depression of ending a cruise is to book another. Some cruise lines allow you to book a future cruise while on your current cruise (usually with the added bonus of receiving onboard credit), that’s an immediate remedy for the post-cruise blues. Personally, I thoroughly enjoy the researching and planning portion of booking a cruise so for me doing it from home is better. My girlfriend gets the post-cruise blues worse than anyone I have ever met so I use the thrill of planning out the next one to snap her out of a funk.
So, those are the ways that I avoid getting sucked into the black hole of post-cruise depression. What is your weapon of choice when it comes to fighting off that feeling you get when vacation time is over and it’s time to get back to real life?
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