Using a Cruise Ship As a Home Office

JJAviator

Level 2 Member
Been on Royal Caribbean cruises with Mario onboard, although I have not introduced myself yet. The RCL internet is not ideal for the most part, although I must say there's been a better connection speed the last 6 months.
 

Gloobnib

Travel Burninator
Cruising is not just about total relaxation and hedonism. Here are two people who get a lot of work done on their cruises:

http://www.plane2port.com/using-cruise-ship-home-office/
I've given this (living on a cruise ship while still 'working') more than a passing thought. In the long run, it doesn't fit my current lifestyle, primarily the whole family commitments thing. But if you throw in "if I were single then I could...", there are several 'knowledge worker' jobs that could plausibly be done from literally anywhere in the world. Two such gigs that I could personally undertake:
  • Contract Programmer / Web Developer - The bulk of your work is done 'offline' and as long as you have someone else finding the gig for you (IE you become a permanent sub-contractor), there is no need for an always-on internet connection. You could schedule all required calls/meetings to occur while you were in port, where you would also presumably have access to solid internet connectivity through cellular data roaming.
  • Contract Information Security 'Penetration Testing'. The bulk of this gig revolves around using automated tools to do the heavy lifting for you; these can be setup within, and scheduled to run automatically from, web services such as AWS. You would only need to download the results from your automated tools and spend a good amount of time (offline) making sense of the data. You could then do the work that requires an internet connection (the actual penetrations and validations) while in-port with cellular internet access. The last (and most time consuming) task is to compile reports on your engagement results, which again can be done completely offline.
I'm sure there have got to be a lot of other similar gigs in other industries. Basically, you need to find a 'knowledge job' that depends on you working independently (self-supervised) most of the time, with maybe 8-12 hours of meetings/calls/web presentations per week, which can be scheduled to occur while you are 'in port'.

To be perfectly honest, I am seriously considering such a move to take place after my kids are out of the house in a few years. That is, assuming, that such gigs still exist in my field at that time!
 

plane2port

Level 2 Member
@Gloobnib -- I am tickled that you are thinking this through to the point that you are thinking of the jobs you could do on board. I think you could make it work if you find yourself in a situation where you're free of family commitments.

The situation I've found myself in in retirement has been just the opposite. I now have more family commitments that ever. After I retired, we traveled like maniacs for about 18 months, then the kids started having their own kids, and needed my help. I also have an elderly mother who lives nearby, and a disabled brother who lives in a nursing home. So it is ironic that in retirement, I actually have more responsibilities that I had when I had my own kids living at home.

I am not venting, and I appreciate all that I have. The reason I am bringing this up is to remind people to do the travel that they can NOW, because you don't know what your situation will be in the future.
 

volker

Level 2 Member
I've given this (living on a cruise ship while still 'working') more than a passing thought. In the long run, it doesn't fit my current lifestyle, primarily the whole family commitments thing. But if you throw in "if I were single then I could...", there are several 'knowledge worker' jobs that could plausibly be done from literally anywhere in the world. Two such gigs that I could personally undertake:
  • Contract Programmer / Web Developer - The bulk of your work is done 'offline' and as long as you have someone else finding the gig for you (IE you become a permanent sub-contractor), there is no need for an always-on internet connection. You could schedule all required calls/meetings to occur while you were in port, where you would also presumably have access to solid internet connectivity through cellular data roaming.
  • Contract Information Security 'Penetration Testing'. The bulk of this gig revolves around using automated tools to do the heavy lifting for you; these can be setup within, and scheduled to run automatically from, web services such as AWS. You would only need to download the results from your automated tools and spend a good amount of time (offline) making sense of the data. You could then do the work that requires an internet connection (the actual penetrations and validations) while in-port with cellular internet access. The last (and most time consuming) task is to compile reports on your engagement results, which again can be done completely offline.
I'm sure there have got to be a lot of other similar gigs in other industries. Basically, you need to find a 'knowledge job' that depends on you working independently (self-supervised) most of the time, with maybe 8-12 hours of meetings/calls/web presentations per week, which can be scheduled to occur while you are 'in port'.

To be perfectly honest, I am seriously considering such a move to take place after my kids are out of the house in a few years. That is, assuming, that such gigs still exist in my field at that time!
If I would do such a job I would like to have internet. You want to research things, especially in the pentesting area. The market is moving too quick. I can't see myself doing such a work without internet. Batch googling... ouch. Not even for a standard random programming language gig.
 

Gloobnib

Travel Burninator
If I would do such a job I would like to have internet. You want to research things, especially in the pentesting area. The market is moving too quick. I can't see myself doing such a work without internet. Batch googling... ouch. Not even for a standard random programming language gig.
Agree that internet access would be beneficial in both gigs. In compensation, you could look for cruises that offer internet as part of their package deals. Certainly not ideal, but it would be adequate for basic searching whatnot (but certainly not to do anything bandwidth intensive).

But I was more thinking that you would do your "work" while docked. After a few visits to each port, I'm sure it would get a little old and staying on the ship (while working from your balcony!) wouldn't seem like you were missing out. You'd leverage cellular data while docked which is significantly faster than ships internet. So you'd also want to pick itineraries with lots of shore days!

To be fair, I've never done anything remotely bandwidth intensive on a ship as I currently try to keep work/vacation 100% separate. That said, I've managed to do some emergency work on my last cruise (don't tell wife!) and didn't have any issues using the shore-based LTE network to connect to the corporate VPN using tethering on my iphone to send emails and upload/download a bunch of proposal documents.
 
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