When my grandmother was a girl she took a cruise with her sisters. On the return cruise they gained enough weight to no longer fit in their dresses. The ship’s seamstress had to let out their gowns.  

I recalled this story last week on my recent cruise; there is too much food at sea.

There is nearly 24 hours access to food on a cruise. When the dining room is closed, there is some open buffet where you can get nearly anything. And there is always room service. At dinner, there are four courses (appetizer, soup, dinner and dessert) – and you can have two of each thing of you like. People often got did this.  I would love someone to explain to me the excitement over ‘midnight buffet’. This extravagant phenomenon happens ~ 2-4 hours after a full dinner. What puzzles me is people come early to photograph the food – there is a long line just to take pictures!  Small wonder people gain weight on a cruise.

Along with no limits on food, no one seems to have much willpower to stop eating. Perhaps there is an unspoken thought that the price of a cruise includes the food – so get your money’s worth.  

And the average cruise-goer doesn’t have ‘room to grow’. I have never seen so many overweight people as on a cruise. The men seem worse but that may be simply because I was checking them out more closely. Everybody looks short of a heart attack. No ‘eye candy’ on a cruise but there is inspiration to stay with the personal trainer!  

I took the opposite approach – I ate ‘better’, not worse, as fresh fruit and vegetables were so available. I like oatmeal; on board I had it every morning.   At night I mostly ate the vegetarian alternative dinner.  Mercifully, alcohol is ‘extra’ so you have to pay for any booze. And I was too cheap to imbibe too much.  
 

Between active days and prudent eating I lost a few pounds. How many others could say that?