Anyone who knows me knows that I love a party on a gay cruise. Without fail, my friends and I will hit every party onboard, every single day. But what they don’t know is that I’m usually one of the earlier boys to leave the party, because the only thing I love more than a party, is SLEEP! God help anyone or anything that disturbs my sleep - just ask any of my previous roommates. 

As the place you’ll be sleeping, your literal home away from home, you need your cabin to be in a nice and quiet neighborhood. And as cruise ships get bigger and bigger, you want your cabin to be close to all the places onboard you wanna go.

The key is to pick a place on the ship that’s sufficiently far away from any sources of noise so that it’s quiet, that is also centrally located so that you’re not far away from the desirable amenities and venues you want to visit.

While every ship has a different layout, in general you can rely on the following locations to be the best:

Mid-level Decks

I’m probably abusing the term “mid-level” here as I’m not referring to the numerical median. Instead, I’m talking about the decks that are roughly halfway between the pool deck above and the nearest “amenities” deck where guest services, shops, restaurants, etc. are located. 

To use the Royal Caribbean’s Oasis class ships as an example, deck 15 is the pool deck, and the nearest deck below that has a significant amount of amenities is deck 8, so the midway between these are decks 10 and 11 (these ships do not have a deck 13).

Why are mid-level decks desirable?

When you’re on decks 10 and 11, you have at least two “buffer” decks between you and any deck that has some source of noise. For quieter places like restaurants, one buffer deck is enough, but for venues with loud music, you’ll want at least two, if not three, buffer decks.

From the mid-level decks you’re also equidistant from most of the amenities, so nearly anywhere you’d wanna go on the ship, it’s never too many decks away. Yes, there are elevators, but being mid-level means that the stairs are a feasible alternative when the elevators are busy, as is usually the case around dinnertime and when the main shows in the theater let out in the evening.

Midship Cabins

“Midship” means the middle between the bow (front) and stern (rear) of the ship. 

Like for mid-level decks, the midship location means you’re likely equidistant to various places on the ship. If you’re at the rear end of the ship and you want to get to the theatre at the front, that’s gonna be a pretty long trek, especially if you’re late for a show!

Most ships have two sets of elevators and stairs, one towards the front and the other towards the rear, and staging in a midship cabin means you have good access to both. From cabins at the very front or back of the ship, it’s usually a bit of a walk to the nearest set, especially on larger ships.

For those who are more sensitive to motion seasickness, you’ll feel the motions of the ship less at midship compared to being at the front or rear - the difference can be very pronounced in particularly rough seas.

Near-ish to Elevators and Stairs

So I might’ve lied a little bit in the previous section - being exactly midship isn’t always desirable, as on some larger ships, this could put you fairly far away from both sets of elevators and stairs. 

To fix that problem, let’s re-define midship as the section of the ship between the forward and aft set of elevators, then pick any cabin in this section that’s close to them. This will put you a bit in front of or behind the dead middle point without losing the benefits of being midship.

However, be careful about cabins that are RIGHT beside the elevators and stairs if you’re particularly sensitive to noise, in case an occasionally rowdy group of cruises happen to loiter for a while while waiting for an elevator to arrive. Layouts vary by ship and it’s hard to tell how close a cabin really is to an elevator just by looking at deck plans, so to be safe, pick a cabin that is a few or a small handful of rooms away.

Adjust to Your Personal Preferences

Do you plan on hitting the gym twice a day? Can you not stand to be more than a few steps away from the 24/7 pizza joint? Is your day not really starting unless you have a fresh latte in hand? 

If there’s something you want to be close to, then start your cabin location search with the main recommendations about, then tweak them. 

Using Royal Caribbean’s Oasis class ships as an example again, let’s say you want to be close to the two main hot tubs, which are on the pool deck near the front. This means you’ll want to look for a cabin on deck 11 near the forward set of elevators and stairs.