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"We definitely are the youngest Black people on the boat," Brandee Lake explains. Users have expressed interest in following the Lake sisters in particular to see their perspective of traveling the world and taking part in a cruise as Black women. "I would say the majority, like the overwhelming majority of passengers, are retirees (or seniors)," she explains, summarizing that number as being at least 90% of the passengers. Speaking to TODAY.com, 29-year-old Alé Kenney says that the cruise isn’t just a massive voyage made up of TikTokers and Generation Z. Passengers are currently staying on Serenade of the Seas, a ship that had its maiden voyage in 2003.
Not all passengers set out to become influencers
Part of the fun of the UWC is that it has attracted everyone from social media-savvy Gen Zers and millennials to boomers and the elderly. (One couple made videos on board joking about how they spent their children’s inheritances on the trip). At the same time, the cruise hype also illustrates the potential risks of virality and social media culture itself. Several nine-month cruisers told NPR that they feel the drama is coming not from the passengers, but from people watching at home.
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They encouraged him to start posting them on TikTok, which Martucci suspects has something to do with his tendency to mispronounce words. He set up an account called @spendingourkidsinheritance, which he emphasizes is a joke. Onlookers wondered about the practicalities of life on board the cruise, which was first announced in late 2021 and starts around $59,999. And they relished the potential for drama, especially since aspiring passengers can theoretically join at any time for individual "segments" before the cruise docks in September.
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LRB describes the first 24 hours on the Royal Caribbean ship as a "whirlwind experience." For Linderman, she wants to use her new platform to share with others why she signed up for the cruise in the first place. Linderman has the BRCA2 gene, which means she is at a higher risk for certain cancers.
After getting out of bed and meeting up with other passengers for an excursion, Sebastian filmed himself stating that he and two others had come together to form an alliance on the ship. Sebastian announced that he would be boarding the cruise in Antarctica in partnership with Atria Books, a division of Simon & Schuster, who “jumped at the chance to be a part of this viral moment,” according to Business Insider. He said this content would be of the likes of the viral Fyre Festival and Bama Rush documentaries. As this is the longest cruise ever offered by Royal Caribbean, it’s no surprise that the sailing is drawing a lot of attention online. TikTokers are expecting drama — and anything is possible with 650 strangers living together on a boat. In a TikTok shared last week, Harms featured a comment that claimed that one person had already left the boat, and another had been diagnosed with COVID.
Meet the ‘cast’ of the 9-month cruise that’s taking over TikTok
If you read the comments made to the cabin tour video, there's people who can't believe little_rat_brain would stay in an inside room for 9-months. Anyone that's been on a cruise ship would tell you these sort of things happen. The comments are also a hot bed of people that have never cruised and/or Never Cruisers that like to share their opinion on why cruising is silly. In the lead up the world cruise, a number of people booked on the cruise started publishing videos about the cruise and used the #RoyalCaribbeanUltimateWorldCruise hashtag. Royal Caribbean's Serenade of the Seas kicked off the world cruise on December 10 from Miami, and she will spend 274-nights traversing the world with hundreds of people onboard for the entire transit.
From Gen Z influencers to wealthy retirees — all the main characters on board
Traveling with their parents, Brooklyn and Madison Schwetje take their roles as the eyes and ears on the ship seriously, posting tons of content for their growing audience. They share vlogs of unglamorous sea days, featuring bad weather and laundry duties, as well as the highlights, such as what it’s really like to visit a World Wonder. "It's been fun to kind of just follow what truly feels like a TikTok reality show," said Kara Harms, the founder of a lifestyle travel website who has been posting videos and a now-viral bingo card about the cruise from her home in San Francisco. This isn’t the first time TikTok creators — competing for views with millions of other accounts — have mined videos posted by others to manufacture their own genre of online reality TV.
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Experience everything you want in this fun-filled weekday itinerary. Plan a Bahamas excursion on board your cruise vacation; swim, play, snorkel or just unwind in the sunny Bahamas. The nine-month vacation is scheduled to last for 274 nights as the Serenade of the Seas visits 11 world wonders and more than 60 countries. His videos have racked up an impressive amount of views, with his experience of the Drake Passage -- the body of water between South America and Antarctica -- being seen over 9 million times. “I don’t like putting rumors out there, but I think we also, the passengers that invested so much money and so much time to see the world, we deserve to know what is going on, what the plans are, what Plan B is,” Adita says in her video.
There’s not much drama aboard the Ultimate World Cruise, but TikTok users are obsessed
Martucci described the cruise as "a floating city of 2,000 people," and said he didn't feel anyone was intentionally trying to cause drama on board. In fact, he said Wednesday, the response to his account being hacked demonstrated how "we all look after each other." More than 30 cruise influencers are now in a group chat, Oosthuizen said. She said they see each other pretty often, in passing and on purpose — but not always to make content. "It is kind of a lot taking it all in but it's also been fun," she said.
You need to have balance,” one TikToker said in a video about concerns for the passengers aboard the ship. The most prolific creator so far has been @amike_oosthuizen, a South African influencer with more than 200,000 followers who is on board and working remotely with her husband. Her video titled “what I eat in a day on a nine month cruise”, where she takes viewers on a trip to the ship’s all-day buffet, had 3.9 million views at the time of writing. Some of her food included fruit, yoghurt, a muffin, oatmeal, and a smoothie.
For lunch, she has a salad, a burger patty with cheese, and a plate of vegetables. She finishes the day with fish, noodles, corn, and slices of watermelon. Kisha Peart, one of the at-home cruise commentators, told NPR that she originally started posting to share her insights as a former cruise ship employee.
She has put a lot of effort into her cabin decorating, but plenty of people do this sort of thing on any cruise. Like so many things on social media, a bigger deal was made out of it than it really is. The problem is the media picked up on it, and is reporting on the sort of things happening so far on the cruise as if it's something new, when it's really not. Aside from that, TikTokers on the trip have been privy to other individual incidents on board.
A 9-Month Cruise Is TikTok's Favorite New 'Reality Show' - The New York Times
A 9-Month Cruise Is TikTok's Favorite New 'Reality Show'.
Posted: Tue, 02 Jan 2024 08:00:00 GMT [source]
After all, the voyage's 9-month set up brings back memories of isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic and quarantine. “I made an Ultimate World Cruise Bingo card for anyone else who is buckling in for this nine months TikTok reality show,” user @whimsysoul shared in a video posted shortly after the ship’s voyage began. There were also videos alleging that passengers only joining the cruise for a segment, instead of remaining onboard for all 274 nights, were being excluded by passengers completing the whole voyage. There’s also been videos both ranting and raving about the quality of the food onboard, as well as theories about what will happen to passengers after nine months of only eating cruise food. Joe and Audrey Martucci, who are currently onboard Serenade of the Seas, saw their TikTok skyrocket to over 89,000 followers after they started posting content about the cruise.
Royal Caribbean’s Ultimate World Cruise is a 274-night trip that began on Dec. 10, 2023, when it left from Miami and is expected to come to an end in the same place on Sept. 10, 2024.
Most recently, passengers have taken to TikTok to address rumors that the World Cruise, which is currently scheduled to end on September 10, 2024, may be cut short due to unrest in the Red Sea region. Only three weeks into the Ultimate World Cruise, bad weather led to massive amounts of flooding on deck 12 onboard Serenade of the Seas. ”, says Sebastian in his video, which has been viewed 1.3 million times. So far, according to Harms, the cruise has experienced weather mishaps, port errand runs, and cliques that are forming on board. Those cliques include a group of younger TikTokers who are chronicling their adventures, two of whom have a podcast.
Royal Caribbean made waves when the cruise line announced its 9-Month Ultimate World Cruise near the end of 2021. The 274-night cruise, which set sail on board Serenade of the Seas on December 10, 2023, will visit all seven continents and call at 150 destinations across 65 countries when all is said and done. As TikTok has pointed out, the potential for drama is high, whether it prove to be interpersonal beef, frustration with accommodations, or plain-old cabin fever. The voyage has barely begun and, rest assured, TikTok will be there to document it all.
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