Home for the holidays has a nice sound to it, until you actual get on the freeways, compete for precious parking space, and unwrap your presents for the nice airport security people so you can wait for four hours for your flight. As some heroic individuals do try to go home for the holidays, another travel is also heading out of town. But there’s no security checkpoint, no weather delay, and no gift-giving anxiety. These people are going on a holiday cruise. For the right people under the right circumstances, there is no better way to spend the holidays than on the sea.

Most cruise lines offer special packages that cruise over Christmas and New Year’s, typically with an upcharge that reflects some of the extra festivities that passengers will experience. Many holiday cruises offer special meals, decorations, and parties to commemorate Christmas and New Year’s Eve, and the fare reflects this.

Holiday cruises sell out early, so if you want to try this next year, make your decisions as early as you can. In fact, it might be good timing now to book for the 2008 Christmas cruise!

While the cruise lines do an outstanding job of making the voyage as festive as possible, the fact is that Christmas on a cruise ship is just not a traditional experience. Particularly in the Caribbean, the warm weather, palm trees, and pristine beaches just don’t seem to match the mood of the season. For that reason, cruise passengers for the holidays should make certain mental as well as physical preparations.

First, be flexible. If you have a Christmas card holiday in mind, a cruise vacation may make you feel like you’re missing Christmas. You need to have a sense of adventure and a desire to create new traditions and seek new experiences.

Second, take some Christmas with you. Whether you’re traveling with one person or a group, take along some gift-wrapped presents to exchange on the big day. If your family always had certain holiday traditions (such as a midnight snack on Christmas eve or chocolate candy on Christmas day or opening stockings stuffed with presents early in the morning) you might be able to figure out a way to “import” that to the cruise. This will help you merge the traditional Christmas with the cruise Christmas.

Third, you need to ponder for a moment the real meaning of the holidays for you. Whether it’s Christmas, Hanukkah, or New Year’s Eve, holidays are holidays for a reason. Think about what they mean to you and allow the cruise to complement that.

For example, New Year’s Eve may be a time when you enjoy getting dressed up for big parties and when you like to relax and reflect on the year gone by. Great, you can do that (and more) on a cruise ship.

Get in the party mood. The crew on your ship is working this holiday and that can be hard thing. Many crew members have long-term contracts and don’t see their families or native countries for months at a time. They are tasked with creating a festive mood for you; do them a favor, reciprocate. Be generous with your tips and your thank-yous.

Holiday cruises work out well in situations where you can cruise with your family (like a combination reunion-Christmas cruise) or in situations where you feel like you can’t face a traditional holiday. If you’re recently divorced or widowed or find yourself in a situation where you can get some time off but can’t (or don’t want to) go home, a cruise is a great solution.

Talk to your cruise line about what sorts of activities are planned and if you might need special attire. Many cruises offer formal or lavish holiday type events, so you may need to bring evening clothes (or perhaps more than one set of formal wear).

If you’ve grown up in a cold climate and plan on spending Christmas or New Year’s in the Carribean or other warm-water destinations, be prepared for a jolt. Even if you know it’s going to be warm, even if you think you’ll love the fact that it’s warm, even if you think you don’t care that it’s warm.

Even people who grow up in warm climates will tell you that it is an odd experience to watch an 80-degree breeze ripple the tinsel on the Christmas tree and how odd it feels to hum along to carols in your bathing suit. Sunbathing on Christmas Day may sound delightful, but you will get a sort of weird sensation if it actually happens.

Be prepared for this by making sure you do get some familiar holiday traditions worked into your cruise vacation.

While last-minute cruising is a bit of an art form (and can be a good way to save a few bucks on a great cruise), it hardly ever applies to holiday cruising. It really is a good time right now to plan a cruise for next year’s holiday.

Why so early? Well, for one thing, holiday cruises book up early. Some people have literally made a Christmas or New Year’s cruise a tradition. And cruises are getting increasingly popular in general, so holiday cruising is only going to see increasing demand.

The other reason is that you will save money but have lots of choices. Most cruise lines are willing to discount fares to two types of passengers: those who book early and those who book very, very late. The late-comers are really just filling up space that would have gone empty otherwise. Late-comers can get deals, but they never get a choice. You pretty much have to take what you can get.

On the other hand, most cruise lines are very generous to early birds. It’s good business. The theory is that if the cruise ship can sell out far in advance, the cruise company will not have to scramble to sell fares at the last minute … less advertising, less promotion, less last-minute discounting frenzy. It helps them to encourage passengers to book early, so they encourage you the best way they know. They offer discounts.

Don’t expect massive discounts by booking early. But you can probably land a pretty good deal. One thing that most cruise lines will do for people who book cruises months ahead of time–they will work in some upgrades. You may be able to upgrade your stateroom or get some on-board credits as well as a less-than-rack-rate passage.

Think it’s really too early to start planning next year’s holiday cruise? Go online and look at the cruise companies. They all have announced their schedules for 2008, some far beyond that.

Maybe next year you can get a suntan for Christmas!

If Christmas is not far away, you’re sure to be thinking of enjoying a white Christmas, filled with white, soft sand and a shiny, white cruise liner. If you want a restful and different kind of Christmas celebration, then perhaps a Christmas party cruise is a good bet.

But hurry, because holiday cruises are the first to be sold out, so if you’re sure you want this special holiday, get on to a good Sydney Christmas party cruise organizer and you’re your holiday.

Here, you can get into the spirit of Christmas by enjoying the festive decor in all the public rooms. Plus, the cruise liner will also have fun and games for the entire family, kids included, to set the tone of the holiday spirit.

For instance, holiday music is so essential for everyone to have a good time. You can enjoy it in all the cabins and in the live entertainment areas. Your Christmas party cruise might also have special programs for kids, with themed crafts and a Christmas show for all kids to participate in. Apart from singing, dancing is also a popular activity for kids. The Christmas programs ends with gifts from Santa and a photo session with him.

Perhaps the Christmas party cruise you choose places a gift for in the stateroom. They might also have fun parades for kids and a model gingerbread house. All adults will have themed parties to celebrate the event with champagne toasts and all the season’s trimmings.

Another feature some ships include is to have a Rabbi on board and to complete the picture, you will be served kosher wine and potato pancakes, while kids will enjoy themselves making Christmas decorations for the trees.

There are so many Christmas party cruise organizers that on some you might also be witness to the ship’s captain hosting a Christmas tree lighting ceremony and you might even partake in singing carols and eating cookies and drinking hot chocolate. Kids are given many gifts from Santa on some of the better liners and continue to enjoy the Christmas mood by celebrating Boxing Day too.

And on American liners, the Christmas party cruise begins at the terminal where you see Disney characters all dressed up for Christmas. They greet you as you board the ship. On these ships, you will find a tree, three decks high with magic snow falls on it during the tree lighting ceremony. And there’s a lot of caroling by the crew and activities ranging from decorating the many gingerbread houses to falling prey to Goofy’s surprise visits to the kids. Santa makes a special appearance too, much to everyone’s delight.

And if you just want to relax without doing too much, why not settle down to seeing a few movies, or enjoy a Christmas show put up by the crew on Christmas Eve or get yourself ready for Santa’s visit-who knows, he might even come to you parasailing!

However he may arrive, laden with gifts, this holiday is the season’s best gift you could give yourself-a Christmas party cruise.