Featured Image Credit: Royal Caribbean Blog
Topics: Health, Travel, Cruise Ship, Real Life, US News, World News
Rhiannon Ingle
Topics: Health, Travel, Cruise Ship, Real Life, US News, World News
OK guys, so I'm sure we know all about the effects of jet-lag and all the other ways air travel can take its toll on our body, but it's clear the impacts of travelling are not limited to just the skies.
Cruising is having a bit of a moment right now with many absolutely loving the carefree, varied and all-inclusive goodness it can offer, but it doesn't come without its hang-ups.
One particularly avid cruiser has proven exactly that, revealing his bizarre health issue after living on a cruise ship for 23 years.
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Mario Salcedo, who hails from Cuba, has been sailing the seas for over two straight decades now.
While Salcedo, who owns an investment management business, keeps a
a condo in South Florida, he's pretty much lived full-time on a cruise ship for nearly a quarter of a century - making him part of the elite permanent cruise ship passengers in the world.
However, with such a commitment to the cause, you may be shocked to know Mario didn't always intend to live that lifestyle.
"When I hit 45, I wanted to start a new chapter in my life traveling around the world—that was my vision," he told Condé Nast Traveller.
"But I didn’t know about the logistics, whether air, train, or sea."
He tried-and-tested different cruise lines before finally booking a spot on Royal Caribbean’s Voyager of the Seas.
"It was the biggest cruise ship in the world at the time, and so revolutionary—the first ice skating rink, the first rock climbing wall, so many elements that took cruising to another dimension," he recalled.
Since then, Mario has not stepped foot on another line and has been on around 900 individual cruises just with Royal Caribbean.
Talking about the Royal Caribbean, Mario - who has since been nicknamed 'Super Mario' on board - gushed: "Nothing could lure me away from them, because I get treated like royalty.
"The captains all know me."
So, how much does all this cruising cost?
Well, Mario budgets around $60-70,000 each year for his travels and is sure to pay for the trips using a credit card so that the miles earned will cover any flights in between sailings and, by 2016, he had forked out more than £1 million on his holiday-come-home habit.
However, even though it's clear the chap loves a good cruise, the peculiar lifestyle trend does come with a pretty odd side effect.
Discussing the bizarre consequence to all his cruising, Mario revealed: "I’ve lost my land legs, so when I’m swaying so much I can’t walk in a straight line.
"I’m so used to being on ships that it feels more comfortable to me than being on land."
Well, it's clear Mario definitely reckons losing his 'land legs' is worth it for a life of non-stop voyaging.