In today's video I'm going tell you about my cruise packing list and things that I take with me when I go on a cruise.
About a year ago I did a video called "Weird Things I Bring With Me On A Cruise"...
And so I thought I would update that with kind of a new version because over the last year I've learned a few things and refined a few of my techniques.
So, when I talk about having a cruise packing list I really mean I've got a packing list!
A printed out list of things that I want to be sure to bring with me...
And I just check things off the list as I put them in my suitcase.
You can work on this list in the weeks and months in advance of your cruise as you're thinking of things that you want to bring with you.
And hopefully this video will give you some ideas of some things to add on to your list.
And the beauty of having a cruise packing list...
Is that this list gets better with every cruise I take.
I literally take this list with me...
It's in the cabin of the cruise ship and as I think of things I should have brought the (whatever)...
I add it on to the list.
So, with every cruise I take the list gets better and better.
These days I'm not adding that many new things on to the list...
But over the years, I definitely have expanded the list quite a bit as I've realized things that I should have brought with me!
So, the first thing I want to tell you about...
Is a trash bag. A very lightweight inexpensive plastic trash bag.
And the reason you want this with you on a cruise is this is gonna be your dirty clothes bag.
So, throughout the week, as you're amassing dirty clothes...
You just throw it into that bag...
And then at the end of the cruise throw that bag into your suitcase...
And that keeps your dirty clothes from mingling with the clothes that you don't really have to wash when you get back home.
And it's real easy when you get home to just dump that dirty clothes bag right into the washer.
The second thing is a Ziploc bag or actually several Ziploc bags.
And I'll tell you why you need this...
It's very useful for when you're packing liquids and gels for the cruise.
I try to be a considerate husband! I bring some Listerine with me on a cruise for the sake of my wife.
I put that in the Ziploc, zip it up...
Before I put it in my suitcase.
Because you know an airplane when it ascends to 40,000 feet and then cruises along and then descends back down to the ground...
There's a lot of air pressure changes and all that changing air pressure can wreak havoc on some of your sealed bottles with things in it...
And really, if there's going be a leak it's gonna happen during the flight on the way to your cruise.
So, if you have your liquid stuff in a Ziploc you've got an extra layer of protection...
To make sure that none of this leaks out onto the other stuff you've packed for the cruise.
Because you sure don't want to get there and find out that your favorite shirt has Listerine spilled all over it!
Another thing to bring with you on a cruise...
Is a little portable travel sized umbrella.
Because a lot of times especially in the Caribbean...
You'll go out on a shore excursion in the morning...
And it'll look beautiful and then six hours later afternoon thundershowers roll in and it's raining!
So, it's helpful to just have a little umbrella that'll protect you.
And you just pack that along with you when you go on a shore excursion or anytime you go off of the boat.
Another thing I like to bring with me because I bring a lot of electronic gear...
So there's usually not enough electrical plugs in the cabin of most cruise ships.
Some of the newer ships have more electrical plugs but if you get in anything that's more than about oh three or four years old...
There might be one or two electric plugs in the entire cabin.
So, a lot of times they'll have one or two 110 volt American-style plugs...
But they'll also have one or two 220 volt European-style plugs.
And if you take a little adapter with you you can adapt those 220 volt plugs...
To the American style and that gives you some extra power outlets in the cabin.
I also like to bring with me a pair of noise-cancelling headphones.
These are Bose headphones. These are fantastic on a cruise...
Because if I'm sitting out by the pool...
And they're playing music that is not really my favorite...
Or if the people around me are talking loudly...
Just put on the headphones...
I'm in my happy place!
This is a portable scale which is very handy for weighing your luggage both at home, and also on the cruise.
Most of the time I'm flying to get to a port where the cruise ship is going to be...
So, my luggage has to be under 50 pounds.
And this helps me to make sure that that really is the case.
And then also when you go on a cruise sometimes you buy things!
So, you're coming back with more things than you went with.
So, having the luggage scale with you on the ship you can ensure that if you bought any extra stuff...
You haven't exceeded the 50-pound limit for your luggage.
Now here's one of my favorite things And you might not think of this but it is really handy.
I've got an indoor/outdoor electronic thermometer.
So I take this remote thing and stick it out on the balcony of my cabin.
And I use a little 3M Command Strip which is kind of like double-sided tape...
And I attach that out on the balcony somewhere in the shade.
And then this goes inside the cabin. That's the thermometer itself...
And that'll give me a readout of both the temperature in the cabin and outside on the balcony.
It's really helpful to know whether it's 90 degrees out, or 70 degrees out, or whatever.
And then it's also really helpful to know what the temperature in the cabin is.
Because sometimes the person that you're cruising with may be a skinny little thing that gets cold easy...
And she wants to try to convince you to maybe adjust the air conditioner so that the room is a little warmer.
Well, if you can both look at the thermometer you can then see...
What the temperature is actually in the room.
And if it seems like 70 or 71 or 72...
That's a comfortable temperature.
Then maybe the person that's cold needs to throw on a sweatshirt or something like that!
I also bring with me a big plastic cup.
Because in the buffet have you ever noticed on a cruise the cups that they have in the buffet are really tiny?!?!
So, if I want to go to the buffet and bring a drink back to my cabin with me like some ice water or something like that...
Those little small cups are just not going to do it!
So a big cup like this is great for ice water or whatever drink I want to bring back with me.
Lawry's seasoned salt!
This is how I make the food, at breakfast time especially, taste a little bit better.
You put a little bit of Lawry's seasoned salt on the eggs and the hash browns and you've got yourself a really great breakfast!
Another thing I bring with me is paper Dixie cups for use in the bathroom of our cabin.
I don't like to use the glass that they leave in the cabin bathroom.
I worry that I'm going to spread germs to my wife.
And just as far as a germ spreading thing...
I feel more comfortable using these rather than reusing the glass and sharing that glass with my wife throughout the cruise.
What I've got here is a Ziploc full of Band-Aids of every size and shape and type!
Way more than I'm ever going to need on any one cruise, but...
I've had a number of occasions on shore excursions...
Where something's happened. I've stubbed my toe...
Or I've managed to cut myself on something.
Having this in a Ziploc and just being able to throw it in a bag that we take with us on a shore excursion is very handy.
And then, of course, having it in the cabin... You never know what's going to happen around a cruise ship.
And you don't really want to go down to the Medical Center for something silly that you could just fix yourself with Band-Aids.
I also bring... OK, this is a little weird, I know!
Just a partial roll of duct tape.
Because every now and then... I've only used this maybe two or three times in my 50 cruises.
But something will break.
My tripod will break, or...
One time there was a thing inside the cabin that was broken...
And I just was able to reattach it with duct tape.
You don't want to bring a full roll because that's kind of heavy...
So just like a little partial roll of duct tape...
Because you don't want to add a whole bunch of weight to your suitcase.
I've got quite a few more things to tell you about that I want to suggest that you bring with you on a cruise.
We have to do one quick break.
We'll be right back and get right back into it after this...
Now in that video I did about a year ago about things I bring with me on a cruise...
I told you about this custom beach bag that my wife made for me in her sewing and embroidery room.
It says "Best Beach Day Ever" on it.
And that thing has gone on a lot of cruises with us and has been very handy.
But over the last year I've come to realize...
That as nice as that beach bag is and as much as I appreciate that my wife made it for me...
There's actually a better way to go, because...
What I learned is...
In carrying that beach bag around by the handle...
It puts a lot of weight over time over a like a 6-hour shore excursion...
There's a lot of weight there that you're carrying around and it gets heavy.
Because I pack it with a lot of stuff when we go on a shore excursion!
And this does have a strap that can go over the shoulder, but...
Having all that weight just on one shoulder kind of puts me out of whack a little bit...
And it just gets really heavy over time.
You know, you can carry that around for an hour or whatever, but...
Over shore excursions over the course of a week...
I was finding occasionally that I was getting headaches and neck aches and I think it was from that beach bag being on my shoulder.
So, I've come up with a better way to go...
And it led me to find a company that's got some really great products for people like me and you that go on cruises.
The company is called SailPak.
And they've got a website: SailPak.com
And I discovered it and found all these really cool products including a really great backpack for shore excursions.
Now the backpack, because it's got two straps, and sits squarely on your back, it divides the weight over both of your shoulders...
And it's just... you can carry a lot more weight over a longer period of time...
And it's much more comfortable that way.
A few other items that SailPak.com has that I really like...
They have some really nice clips where you can clip your towel onto the lounger...
Either on your balcony or out by the pool or on a shore excursion at the beach.
These are very, very small and lightweight but they definitely do the job perfectly for clipping the towel on to the lounger.
The key when you're packing for a cruise is find all these products that are as light as possible.
For example, I like to bring a flashlight with me just in case I have to get up in the middle of the night and use the bathroom.
But it's like the world's smallest flashlight!
That's the key to successful cruise packing.
Everything small and lightweight.
So, at SailPak.com they have these magnetic hooks.
You know the cabins in a cruise ship... Those aren't made of wood! They're mostly made of metal.
So, if you have things that are magnetic it'll stick right to the ceiling or to the wall...
And having these little magnetic hooks is really handy on a cruise. You can hang your hat, or your beach bag.
You know, things like that that maybe you don't want to take up a shelf for.
And I know this looks like a really small hook...
But that's an incredibly powerful magnet. I was really, really surprised.
And that thing holds a lot more weight than you'd think.
Another great product from SailPak.com...
This is a holder for your cruise luggage tag.
So you know you print your luggage tag at home...
Then you attach it to your piece of luggage...
But it's just a piece of paper and that luggage is getting handled by a lot of different guys...
Between the time you hand it over to them at the cruise terminal and the time it ends up in your cabin.
And it's put on carts next to lots of other pieces of luggage...
And those luggage tags rub up against other pieces of luggage and...
They can get torn or ripped right off...
And then they don't know what cabin to deliver the luggage to.
So, a lot of experienced cruisers use luggage tag covers like this of one type or another.
But the ones that they sell at SailPak.com are really ingenious because of the mechanism that they use to attach this to your suitcase.
Because that's the weak link, right?
Now when you put your luggage tag into this, it's protected...
But the weak link is what connects this to your suitcase.
They use this metal cable that's got this really simple mechanism on the end...
To close the loop and make it very, very secure.
There is no way that that is getting ripped off of your piece of luggage when it's on the way to your cabin!
Then another thing from SailPak.com is this power strip.
Now I've been bringing power strips with me on cruises for a long time...
But this one is cool because it's smaller than the ones I've been bringing, and...
It's got USB charging built in to it.
So, that eliminates me having to bring a lot of USB adapters...
And tying up electric outlets with those to charge my USB devices.
So, I really like this power strip at SailPak.com because it's kind of like two products in one and it's small and lightweight.
Then probably my favorite line of products at SailPak.com...
Is that they've got t-shirts with clever cruise sayings!
And this one says "I like big boats and I cannot lie".
And I will definitely be wearing that on my next cruise!
The folks at SailPak.com were really excited that I'm excited about their products...
And so they offered a special deal that I'm passing on to you and that is...
That you can get 10% off your order at SailPak.com just by using the promo code Zim.
So, during the checkout process type in Zim for the promo code...
And that gets you 10% off your order.
Now, before I wrap this up I want to tell you about four things that I want you to write down right now.
These are things you absolutely cannot forget to bring on your cruise!
The first one is your wallet.
I actually did that one time...
Just in the rush of getting ready and getting in the car and going to a cruise...
My wallet was in a drawer back at home.
Now, thank goodness I had my passport...
And my wife had her wallet and credit cards.
We were able to get through that whole cruise without my wallet.
But you don't really want to make that mistake so make sure that you bring your wallet!
And then the other thing is your passport.
And the third thing is your boarding pass from the cruise line...
And all the cruise documents that you might need on the cruise.
And be sure that you do not pack your boarding pass and your documents and your passport in your luggage!
When you turn the luggage over to the guy at the cruise terminal you need your boarding pass...
And your passport with you in your pocket not packed away in your suitcase when you get on the ship.
And the fourth thing is...
Don't forget to bring the charger for your cell phone...
Because that thing is going to run out of juice pretty darn quick on a cruise!
So, don't forget your charger not just for your cell phone but for any important piece of electronics that you bring with you.
And one more tip that I've learned over the years and this has helped me out a lot of cruises...
Pack your swimsuit in your carry-on bag not in your suitcase.
Because your suitcase. is not going to get to your cabin 'til later on in the afternoon.
It might be four, five, six o'clock in the afternoon before your suitcase arrives.
So, you don't want your swimsuit there.
Put the swimsuit in your carry-on so that when you get on the ship...
And after you've had lunch you can go out to the pool which will still be fairly empty at that point...
And use the pool before it gets real crowded.
Most people have packed their swimsuit in their suitcase...
And they're not going to have that 'til later on in the day...
So, very few people will be using the pools during the first few hours of the first day of the cruise.
Be sure to have it with you in your carry-on.
If you're interested in booking a cruise...
Feel free to use the services of my travel agent, Caitlin Gallagher.
There is no charge for her services. Her fees are paid for by the cruise lines.
And she can keep you from making some of those rookie cruiser mistakes!
And she's really easy to talk to and very very helpful.
She books all my cruises for me now.
Before I go, I'm going to pop up on the screen links to a couple of other videos that you might be interested in.
I'm Jim Zim. Thank you for watching!