The viral nine-month cruise is ending. Here’s what it was really like on board

(CNN) — Within weeks of Royal Caribbean’s nine-month-long world cruise setting sail in December 2023, the voyage unexpectedly became the center of a social media storm.

The prospect of nine months on a two-decades-old ship, sailing to more than 60 destinations with hundreds of strangers, captured the public’s imagination as passengers began posting on TikTok. It sounded more like the premise for a reality show than the trip of a lifetime.

For a moment it felt like everyone – even if they were previously oblivious to world cruises – was talking about the nine-month cruise and its “real life reality show” potential.

Social media followers waited to see how this social-experiment-at-sea unfurled. Would there be romance, conflict, drama, twists and turns? “Anything can happen,” is how one social media user ND, who was following along from land, put it to CNN Travel back in January. 

Nine months later, the voyage – dubbed the Ultimate World Cruise by Royal Caribbean – is finally wrapping up, reaching its last port, Miami, on September 10. To mark the voyage’s end, CNN Travel caught up with those on board to find out what it was like to spend nine months living at sea with the world watching along at home.

Passengers’ perspective

The passengers chronicling the nine-month cruise on TikTok ranged from a fiftysomething widowed solo traveler named Anthony McWilliams – who aimed to inspire followers to live life to its fullest, to a 26-year-old South African influencer called Amike Oosthuizen – who could always be relied on for a glamorous take on life at sea.

Also in the mix was lovable boomer couple Joe and Audrey Martucci, new to social media and posting under the handle @spendingourkidsmoney (this is a joke, Joe Martucci stresses to CNN Travel, there’s still plenty of money left for the kids). Fortysomething sisters Brandee Lake and Shannon Marie Lake demonstrated how to live with an adult sibling and not go stir crazy, while a Gen Z traveler known as Little Rat Brain posted chaotic, wry dispatches from sea.

Former NASA employee Bobbi Waterman and her partner Tam, posting @tam.and.bobbi, gained fans for candidly talking about traveling as an LGBTQ+ couple and Bobbi’s experiences as a trans woman. American traveler Angie Linderman garnered attention after she spoke movingly about her path to the Ultimate World Cruise, which included the untimely death of her parents and the discovery that Linderman lives with the BRCA gene, making her more susceptible to breast cancer and ovarian cancer.

For those looking for a behind the scenes glimpse at life on board, Royal Caribbean crewmember Julian Mendoza AKA @cooljul1 produced “day in the life” videos on board, while performer Daniele Salvatore Arbisi once managed to get the ship’s captain to came on his account @singing.sailor.

Each person offered a different perspective on the cruise. These multiple points of view perhaps partly explains the voyage’s virality – there was someone for everyone to relate to, and there was potential for clashing personalities.

“You’re putting all of these people on a ship for nine months and when they’re on the ocean, when they’re sailing, there’s no escape,” says British social media user Beth Anne Fletcher, who chronicled the cruise – largely from land – on her own TikTok account, @livingmy_bethlife. 

‘What drama is going to happen?’

Fletcher wasn’t surprised by the viral appeal of the cruise.

“If you’re interested in travel and you’re also interested in psychology and people, what more could you want?” Fletcher tells CNN Travel.

“They’re all there together, but they’re going to see the world as well. It’s almost like (reality TV show) “Below Deck,” but a nine-month episode.”

Still, for many of the passengers, the early social media furore was surreal and unexpected. Joe Martucci didn’t know how to spell TikTok before he posted his first video, spurred on by his kids. Even travelers like Oosthuizen, who had a pre-established TikTok presence, were shocked.

“I honestly did not think it would explode as much,” Oosthuizen told CNN Travel back in January.

Over the first month at sea, the viral fame reverberated through the ship.

“Soon, we had billions of people watching us and saying, ‘What drama is going to happen?’” recalls the passenger known as Little Rat Brain – or LRB for short – a 24-year-old American who has asked for her real name not to be included in this article for privacy reasons.

LRB, speaking to CNN Travel on the eve of the cruise’s end, says she understands it seemed like the “perfect setup for a reality TV show.”

“It’s a lot of people in a small area where pretty much everything is free,” she says. (Technically nothing was free – the nine month cruise cost anywhere from $59,999 to $117,599 per person – but unlimited onboard food and drinks was included in that sum)

“Any food you want… All the alcohol you could possibly want… You really have no responsibilities…” LRB continues.

In the end, those at home waiting for shocking dispatches from the Ultimate World Cruise were largely left wanting.

Headlines announced at least one on-board death, but elderly passengers passing away from natural causes is somewhat expected on a months-long voyage. The ship also rerouted from time to time due to world events, protests and extreme weather events – but it’s not unusual for itineraries planned years in advance to shift.

While those on board were occasionally irritated by one another, the people who predicted, as LRB recalls, “that there’s definitely going to be divorces, someone’s going to get thrown overboard,” were seemingly wrong (although divorce rumors were rife throughout the nine months).

Inevitably, social media interest in the cruise diminished as the weeks rolled on – after all, nothing stays viral for nine months.

“We definitely did see the interest die off,” says passenger Anthony McWilliams, adding that some travelers “took a hit emotionally” when their engagement dropped.

There was TikTok-based drama too – Amike Oosthuizen says her account was banned and then deleted.

“They said I was selling counterfeit goods, which I was not selling at all,” she tells CNN Travel. Oosthuizen set up another account, which never quite reached the dizzying heights of the six million-plus people who watched her early video chronicling the Serenade of the Seas crossing the treacherous Drake Passage.

For many travelers, the decline in online scrutiny was a relief.

“The attention sort of evened out as the trip went on, which I think was good as it allowed some of the pressure or energy around the trip to normalize, and allowed me to focus more on this experience,” passenger Angie Linderman tells CNN Travel.

Still, even nine months in, Linderman still saw people discover her social media for the first time.

“I still have people who are finding my page and reaching out because they also have BRCA or have also lost a parent and want to connect with someone else who has that shared experience,” she says.

While some TikTok users dropped off, others tracked the nine-month cruise to its end, living vicariously through the passengers as they explored the globe.

“We had people messaging us to say, ‘Thank you so much for taking me along on this journey,’” says Audrey Martucci, of @spendingourkidsmoney, who recalls a surreal moment when she and her husband were recognized by fans in Halifax, Canada.

“I have people that have been along for the whole nine months,” says McWilliams. “But then there’s also some people that are like, ‘Oh, we thought y’all were dead.’”

Forming connections

Fletcher, following along on land, responded to the ebbing public interest by posting fewer recaps as the months went on.

But, as she switched to posting about actual reality television shows, Fletcher continued to stay up to date with those on board, gradually building relationships with passengers, realizing “these people are just on their vacation, having a nice time.”

When the Serenade of the Seas docked in Southampton, in the UK, some of the passengers and crew invited Fletcher on board.

“It was such a surreal day, because we have been talking about these people for this long, and then to actually spend time with them, it was like being with old friends,” says Fletcher.

She particularly bonded with Joe and Audrey Martucci, dubbed “Cruise Mom and Dad” by their followers. The couple lived up to their moniker, welcoming Fletcher wholeheartedly.

“It was like meeting one of our kids,” says Joe, of their day together in Southampton.

“Beth Anne’s one of those people we will keep in touch with, probably forever,” says Audrey. “She’s such a special person, and we’re glad to be her friend.”

For Joe and Audrey, befriending a British TikToker some 20 years their junior – who wasn’t even on board the ship – was one of many unexpected, special connections they made over the past nine months.

Many of the passengers cite the friendships and community as integral to their experience on board the Serenade of the Seas. McWilliams calls fellow passengers Brandee and Shannon Lake his “sisters” and says he also bonded with Fletcher, as well social media user ND – who went from following the cruise from afar on her account @nchimad to joining the voyage for a week.

“The older you get, the less likely you are to make these kinds of friendships,” McWilliams says. “We’re really fortunate.”

Little Rat Brain says it’s been fun to be part of a “supportive, creative community on board” – even if she jokes the cacophony of camera phones occasionally gave “Truman Show” vibes.

Brandee Lake says she connected with different people on board in different ways – from shared love of adventure excursions or art, to the older travelers she sees as her “ship aunties and uncles.”

What unites everyone on board, Lake says, is “the underlying thread of this awesome experience.”

It’s an experience Lake suggests will “be hard to talk about to people when we get off the ship.”

The group also helped one another through trickier times together too. While living a permanent vacation might sound appealing, the travelers say it wasn’t always easy.

Joe and Audrey Martucci stress that while they “couldn’t ask for a better trip and a better opportunity” they did “get a little tired being on vacation.” They missed their kids and struggled being far away as major life events played out on land.

“Nine months is a long time,” says Joe. “I wouldn’t do a nine-month straight cruise again. It’s just way too long away from family, away from everyone and we started to feel burned out.”

“We couldn’t really catch up with sleep,” says Audrey, of the nonstop nature of the itinerary, before adding: “We do realize how first world problems this sounds.”

The couple says they eventually regained a sense of balance by taking time off and slower days when needed. Sometimes they’d skip Royal Caribbean-run excursions to “just wander in the wild” around a destination.

Preparing for the end

Many of the passengers were predicting a culture shock after stepping off the Serenade of the Seas for the final time.

“It was liberating to give up everything before I came,” says Lake, who abandoned her California rental lease to live out of a suitcase for nine months. “Now I’m like, ‘Oh, shoot.’”

Passengers were able to maintain connections with loved ones on land via regular video calls and even the occasional ship visit, but say long-distance relationships were tricky to maintain.

“These kinds of experiences, I think, sometimes prune your friendships at home,” says Lake. “Some will stay strong and maintain after – some might fall away.”

“At some points it was kind of difficult,” agrees LRB. “Because friends would be texting, ‘Oh, I had a sucky day at work,’ and meanwhile you’re like, ‘I saw the Great Wall of China, or I snorkeled on the Great Barrier Reef.’ Sometimes it did feel like a bit of a disconnect.”

Passengers also adopted different approaches to staying on top of world news and current events.

For Oosthuizen, as the months unfurled and she saw more and more of the globe, she felt like she developed “a world perspective.”

“It was so educational, seeing different cultures, seeing how different people get by,” says Oosthuizen. “I wouldn’t say I felt removed on the cruise.”

Joe Martucci adds: “You can’t go away for nine months and stick your head in the sand like an ostrich and say, ‘Yeah, I’ll worry about it when I get home.’ Because the world keeps changing so fast.’”

But Brandee Lake says she made a conscious choice to disengage and stay in a “bubble.” Consequently, she found a recent cruise stop off in New York City a bit of a shock.

“We haven’t been in the US since February, since we stopped in LA,” she says. “It’s much different now, because it’s high election season.”

Some of the American travelers on board say the atmosphere on board has become more tense as the US election approaches.

“I’m waking up to realizing that a couple of the people that I genuinely care about have different political views than me, and that has been something to navigate, a challenge to navigate,” says McWilliams.

And while there’s a sense of fellowship on board, naturally not everyone gets on.

“There is of course a small group of people that I will be completely fine never interacting with again,” says Linderman. “But that is how it goes, sometimes you don’t connect or click with everyone.”

Travelers living in close quarters with family members also developed conflict coping mechanisms over the past nine months.

“With families, you all know when you push each other’s buttons sometimes,” says Lake, who traveled with her parents as well as her sister. “You just have to walk away and then come back.”

Little Rat Brain, who shared a windowless interior cabin with her mother, insists this wasn’t the recipe for disaster it might sound. LRB just took time to herself when she needed it.

Many of the travelers emphasize that more than anything, they were grateful to experience this trip with their loved ones.

“Especially with my parents,” says Lake. “You just think how lucky that they’re here.”

There were also constant new faces in the mix, as some passengers joined the trip for shorter voyages.

Among the short haulers was American TikTok influencer Marc Sebastian, who got sponsored to join the cruise for a short stint, promising to “cause chaos” on board.

This chaos never seemed to particularly materialize. Instead, McWilliams spotted Sebastian getting emotional as he admired the icebergs of Antarctica.

“That makes sense that he gets it. He understands,” McWilliams recalls thinking.

A trip of a lifetime

As the cruise comes to an end, the travelers are reflecting on everything they’ve seen and trying to process the past nine months.

Lake says picking just one highlight is almost impossible, but the ship’s period in Antarctica was particularly special. Her pick is echoed by Little Rat Brain:

“The water was perfectly flat, and it was a mirrored reflection of these gigantic icebergs and there were just so many different shades of white, and it was absolutely incredible,” LRB recalls.

Meanwhile Angie Linderman speaks fondly of catching a train across India, as well as a stop off in Portofino, Italy, where she went “swimming in the water all day on this small little beach with the colorful houses above us clinging to the hills.”

Linderman says she will hold onto the feeling of watching “the sunrise over the falls at Iguazu Falls” or marveling at “the Great Wall of China at night with only my fellow cruisers around.”

Sea days were also special, Linderman says, especially “the countless nights dancing in the Vortex Lounge or at a silent disco or movie night with friends.”

The TikTok-famous passengers are now considering how to pivot their online presences. Some have income coming in from social media (“Not enough to live on, by any means,” stresses Little Rat Brain. “But it’s enough to go out to dinner with friends when I get back.”) But they suggest their main motivation to continue posting is to connect with now-loyal followers.

Many of the passengers have future travels planned, which they intend to chronicle on TikTok. Meanwhile Linderman has upcoming surgery to remove her ovaries and says she will be “sharing that journey online” with her supportive social media community.

There’s also talk of a reunion cruise, albeit for a much shorter stint, which will likely be chronicled online.

While there are upcoming world cruises on the horizon – such as four-month voyages run by MSC Cruises and Princess Cruises – there’s nothing quite as long as the Ultimate World Cruise on the horizon right now for the major cruise lines.

Royal Caribbean hasn’t responded to CNN’s request for comment about any plans for future nine-month cruises.

As for Beth Anne Fletcher, her interest’s been piqued by the prospective three-year cruise that’s currently stuck in Belfast, Northern Ireland, operated by start-up Villa Vie Cruises – but she’s not seen much social media content stem from that ship so far.

“I don’t think anything’s ever going to have the virality of the nine-month cruise,” Fletcher says.

“I’m not really sure if it will ever occur again,” agrees Little Rat Brain. “We just kind of just had a perfect storm situation, while, luckily, we haven’t sailed through any perfect storms. So I’ll take it.”

“Everything’s been as well as you can expect, for nine months living on a very tiny ship with the same people,” LRB says. “Incredible memories that will last a lifetime.”

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