Man is suffering strange consequences of living on a cruise ship for 23 years
From the number of people who book repeat trips, it's clear that some people leave a cruise holiday immediately thinking about when their next one will be.
And one Cuban man took this idea to its logical conclusion almost a quarter of a century ago by deciding to live on cruises all year round.
Mario Salcedo has lived on cruise ships almost nonstop since 2000, with the only long break imposed by the coronavirus pandemic a couple of years ago.
Advert
This means he pretty much never leaves a ship, seeing the world and running his investment management business from the laptop.
He was apparently an international finance director at a US corporation in the 1990s when he decided that his lifestyle wasn't up to scratch, with way too much time spent in the office.
Salcedo quit his job and booked a whole heap of cruises, and never really looked back, deciding fairly quickly that he loved life aboard. Since then, he's honed in on a favorite vessel in particular, Royal Caribbean's Voyager of the Seas. As of 2022, he'd been on over 900 Royal Caribbean sailings.
Unsurprisingly, sticking to one provider has helped him surge up through Royal Caribbean's loyalty program, and that means he now gets some nice perks that cut down on his living expenses, including free Wi-Fi.
This would no doubt help with the hefty price of living on a cruise ship - back in 2016, Condé Nast Traveler reported that he budgeted around $60-70,000 per year for his travels.
Stick around on a ship for long enough and you become part of the furniture, so it's no surprise to learn that Salcedo has a nickname and a big reputation among the many crew members he's met over the years.
He's known as 'Super Mario' and seems pretty beloved. With all that said, there is apparently one big health drawback to the lifestyle that Salcedo has chosen, and it's surprisingly basic.
Salcedo now apparently has near-permanent sea legs, meaning he's so used to the constant motion of the ocean, even as subtle as it is on such a huge ship, that when he gets on dry land he can struggle to walk completely straight.
Salcedo told told Condé Nast Traveler: "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."
Whether that sounds like a worthwhile trade depends on who you speak to - half a lifetime of cruise living, for the low price of never walking straight again.