Spring Broken

Spring+Broken

Matheus Robinson, Cen10 News Reporter

Last year, while on a Spring Break cruise, I saw first-hand experience as to why you should never expect a family experience unless you’re on a Disney Cruise Line.

Norwegian Cruise Line, the third most popular cruise line in the world, had some unhappy customers last year, when faced with more college “Spring Breakers” than expected. I got to meet one of the unhappy people while in port in a small island in the Bahamas.

“They were crazy, drunk, and inconsiderate to the kids” I recall a father saying, while thinking back on the antics of the young adults that often ruined moments that families had, like dinners, and relaxing by the pool.

While cruises are a fun family experience, it’s a little unreasonable to get mad at college kids who go and get drunk, as cruising is popular to many people, specifically young adults who go for the cheap and often free alcohol. But according to the man, their anger is justified.

“We were advertised a family cruise line experience by them, but apparently those kids were advertised a classic ‘Spring Breaker’ experience. There are way too many of them, no wonder we are upset.” He told me on our way to the beach in a big taxi.

The way the dad described the vacation, it seemed like a hopeless war between families trying to have peaceful innocent fun, and drunk college students trying to recreate the movie “Project X” a movie where a party goes way out of control. It was not easy to tell whether or not he was being truthful, but one thing for sure, though, his anger was real.

“Man, we’re just trying to have fun!” A college junior told me on the way back to the ship. He confirmed that they came from a small college near the Gulf of Mexico, and that they were, in fact, advertised a “Spring Breaker” experience. He described their actions as rowdy, but nothing too crazy.

Should these students change how they act, or go on as usual? Who’s at fault? Whether or not Norwegian Cruise Line is at fault, or the anonymous College, goes deeper than I could get. Did the college know that it was a Family cruise, and disregard it? Did Norwegian advertise to different people, promising different experiences? I guess we’ll never know.

“I’m not going to let this ruin our vacation” was something that both the college Junior, and the father, both said. This shows that no matter what, both sides just wanted to have fun.

In the end, what matters is that despite the differences in cruisers causing some conflict, they are still enjoying themselves and trying to have a memorable vacation.

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