5 Ways An Olivia Cruise Will Change Your Life

I’ve been on six Olivia cruises in the last decade. I am an acolyte at this point. But when I say Olivia has changed my life, I’m not exaggerating. Nearly every woman I have spoken to has also told me that going on an Olivia Cruise was, for them as well, a life changing experience they’ll never forget. But here’s the thing. It’s something that’s incredibly hard to explain to women who still think that cruises are for old, rich, white people. Since I’m not rich or white (although I’m pushing 40, I admit) I’ve tried to distill why Olivia so impacted my life into five simple reasons.

1. Olivia Takes Over an Entire Cruise Ship.

While some LGBT travel companies might reserve group space on an otherwise mainstream cruise, Olivia charters the entire ship. Think about that for a moment. That’s thousands of lesbians. There are queer women everywhere you look — at every meal, at every dance, at every activity; enough lesbians to populate the entire town I grew up in. I’ve been lucky enough to live in lesbian meccas much of my adult life and I was still stunned by the difference of being on an Olivia cruise ship.

An Olivia cruise is an all-women utopia. (And that includes trans women and sometimes queer-positive straight girls, too.) Lesbians aren’t just everywhere, we’re acknowledged at every turn and all the bathrooms are ladies rooms. The comedians’ jokes, the musicians’ songs, the on board activities all address us specifically and openly. There’s something remarkably empowering about becoming so visible and being so celebrated.  And it’s that feeling that keeps many lesbians—who come from all over the world—coming back cruise after cruise.

It’s not being tolerated. It’s being embraced. And it doesn’t just happen on the ship. It’s the entire adventure: all of the off-boat excursions are booked exclusively for Olivia guests. For example, at port in Curacao, the local lesbian group flung a large banner near the port that said Welcome Lesbians of Olivia! On our the Curacao Liqueur Distillery, our native Curacao guide talked about being lesbian on the island and gave directions to the lesbian bar; our bus driver to the Mayan temple addressed us as “Ladies of Olivia.”

This is the treatment Olivia cruisers have gotten from the early days of the decades-old travel business. On one of the earliest Mediterranean cruises, Olivia had already gained a reputation for spending a good chunk of cash in port. So when they arrived in Istanbul, Turkey, they were met not with antigay hostility but with genuine delight, with barkers welcoming the “wonderful women of Olivia.”

The thing is, this doesn’t just happen. There are many destinations in the world that simply aren’t safe for women, much less lesbians, to visit alone (and if you’re booked on a mainstream cruise, they may well dock there). The sheer numbers of Olivia travelers certainly help buffer you from any harassment and the money we collectively spend softens any animosity. But that’s not all: Olivia simply won’t visit intolerant locations; every stop, every excursion, every tour seems as thought it’s been carefully vetted by Olivia before the itinerary is established.

2. The Entertainment is Endless — Even When You’re Too Tired to See One More Show.

It shouldn’t be surprising that a company that started out as a women’s record label — with lesbian performers filling music festivals long before I was even in middle school —understands the power of quality entertainment. So, over the years they’ve booked musical superstars like Heart, Olivia Newton-John, Bonnie Raitt, Melissa Etheridge, k.d. lang, and Wynonna Judd. Not only do you avoid having to spend $150 on a concert ticket, you’ll get a unique and intimate performance in a venue much smaller than the stadiums these artists usually perform in. When I saw Heart I could see the wrinkles in Nancy Wilson’s jeans when she did those badass guitarist rock splits in the air (her legs looked like they went over her head!) and Ann’s voice filled the room. I kept thinking, Heart, the group we grew up listening to on the radio, is here performing for us, a group of lesbians, on a ship filled with lesbians, where my bedroom —it’s all about sleep with me — is a mere two minutes away. Amazing.

There is a show every night, which means that on a weeklong cruise you can do at least seven date nights (dinner and a show) and they include the best lesbian comedians in the world, many of them Emmy winners (Lily Tomlin and Whoopi Goldberg); former stars of Last Comic Standing (Michele Balan, Gina Yashere); the great and still hilarious lesbian pioneers —Kate Clinton, Marga Gomez, Karen Williams, and Suzanne Westenhoefer); and others who are so associated with Olivia that some women come back year after year to see them (Vicky Shaw, Elvira Kurt, and Julie Goldman, for example).  

After seven date nights, plenty of chicks will still do all the rest and some of us peter out midway or sleep in late. Bingo starts early, bikini-clad pool parties in the daylight, nightly dancing till all hours in the disco, the hilarious newlyweds game, movies playing in the theater all day, and educational seminars. On one day we saw a classical musician, a folk guitarist, a seminar on breast cancer in lesbians, and a show with four comedians after we came back in from snorkeling and eating fish tacos but before we hit the black and white dance. I mean, c’mon. If that’s not lesbian utopia, what is?

3.

The Women of Olivia are Everywhere On Board.

Cruise ships can be breathtaking—and intimidating. I never knew it until I first got close to Holland American’s MS Rotterdam and realized these boats — on average, cruise ships are 10 stories high — tower over your head like a skyscraper making you feel tiny and insignificant. But right at the door on every Olivia cruise, there are the women of Olivia —and usually the travel company’s founder, Judy Dlugacz — personally greeting you and welcoming you aboard. After TSA and Customs and the giant boat, seeing Dlugacz greet every single passenger is a refreshing reminder that we are lesbians and we relate to each other differently. (Also, even though by now hundreds of thousands of women have traveled on Olivia cruises, it seems from my experience that Dlugacz is likely to remember your name.)

The thing, though, is that Dlugacz may run this company but she doesn’t run the cruise; that show belongs to a bevy of women, some — like cruise director Tisha Floratos, Olivia’s vice president of travel — are virtual rock stars on the cruises. Floratos is up on stage each night, making the daily announcements over the ship’s intercom, and opens every event with the special “Women of Olivia” song.  In the contemporary world of cruising she’s way more popular than Julie on The Love Boat. The first day they hold orientation meetings for newbies, singles, women of color, and anyone with special needs (and trust me, there turn out to be a lot of those).  Coordinators for very popular Sisters at Sea, the group for women of color, connect cruisers to special events and to each other. The staff helps you figure out excursions (cave tubing and parasailing or snorkeling and “snuba” diving?), find a way to send your wife flowers and chocolate to the room, or where you’re most likely to get some damn coffee at 3 a.m. And the staff is the last thing you see when the adventure is over and the ship is docked in its home port, reminding you that you are returning to the real world—which can come as a shock the first time you find yourself surrounded by straight folks again. I suspect that’s why so many cruisers come back again and again.

4. Tons of Relationships Begin on Board

Among the thousands of women on board, you are going to make friends with a least one of them—even if you’re as socially inept as I am. We have now traveled on cruises with friends (double dates are the best), I’ve made a handful of besties from my time on Olivia, and one of our closest friends met her wife at one of the pool parties. Who knew tossing plastic rings on dildos could lead to lasting love? But it has.

There’s something really intense about relationships forged during these cruises, something about sharing these adventures, sharing this sense of empowerment and possibility, that makes them deeper than other friendships. I didn’t understand why, at first, so many women—most working class—told me they saved up all year for their annual Olivia vacation; I realize in part because they find family on the boat. I’m lucky to have lesbians around me on land, but for many women I met this is their one time a year they feel fully free to be themselves. There’s no shame, no hiding, no censoring when and where to hug or hold hands, no wondering if your boss knows or cares if you’re gay, no pretending fart jokes are the height of humor, no wondering if the woman you hookup with is actually married to your postman; it’s heady, romantic, and real and the boat lets all of us be 100 percent lesbian for a week. That’s rare.

5. Olivia cruises celebrate diversity

Admit it: sometimes lesbian events can seem a little monotone: they’ll be no women of color, no blue collar workers, no sisters with disabilities, no trans women, no fat girls or no femmes. That’s not Olivia. When you’re on an Olivia ship you’re in a sea of lesbian diversity. There are women of all body types, really a sea of difference that no one of us can find in our own communities. It’s super inclusive of differently-abled women so their excursions catalog indicates how strenuous each adventure is. I can attest, after cruising with a wheel chair sporting friend, that there’s always something accessible. Olivia also reserves a special needs section at every performance in the ballroom. These are not along the back or spread out around the room but the very front row. Signer language interpreters translate every night of entertainment for the hearing challenged and mobility challenged women get extra time to find their seats.

And despite my early vision of a boat filled with affluent, 60 year old women, the joy of Olivia is that there were women of all ages on board. There are hot young dykes in their 20s lounging by the pool or partying until dawn on the Lido deck; but there are also older women soaking in the hot tub, athletes in the gym, bookworms in the library, and women of all ages hooking up in their staterooms. (And, I’m assuming, on deck when the stars are out.) This last trip I noticed a number of double generations: two lesbian moms traveling with their 20 something daughter — and their girlfriends.

I’m sure by now this sounds like an advertisement but the truth is, Olivia changed me in profound ways, grounded me, too. I realized that Olivia isn’t just a business and this isn’t just a cruise. I couldn’t have had these experiences by popping on a Princess Cruise with 20 of my best lesbian friends. Olivia is an early adopter of the Millennials’ conviction that businesses can change the world. Olivia has changed the world by creating a space for lesbians—and showing the world our collective economic power at the same time. An Olivia cruise is a cultural experience, it’s a political action, an educational seminar, a comic stand-up and music festival, it’s a dating site and a dance party, an ocean voyage and land-based adventure. Bottom line, it’s a portal to another world. If you’re like most women on an Olivia cruise, starting the moment you disembark you’ll already be planning how to get yourself on the next one. (My advice? Check out their payment plans!)