We Went on a Cruise
Sunset on St. Croix: March 8, 2022
After two years of pandemicry, the JoCo cruise sailed once more. And we were on it.
The JoCo cruise is a gathering of science fiction nerds, gaming geeks, music fans, and queer folk, who are all somehow in orbit around musician Jonathan Coulton. We were sad to miss this gathering last year, as the world crumbled around us and we cowered trembling in our caves.
My family joined this at-sea convention in 2015, when Cheapass Games was into its Kickstarter phase. We had finally shipped Pairs, I was pitching the rules for Tak (onboard!), and I even shot some at-the-beach video of a game called Cagway Bay (now Littlebeard). That video remains unfinished, as does the game.
In 2020 we sailed from Fort Lauderdale knowing that lockdowns were around the corner, and we knew there was a slight chance we would be quarantined onboard. That turned out to be the last normal sailing of the Nieuw Amsterdam until June of ‘22. We disembarked that Saturday morning, no one replaced us, and we sat at the airport dreading six weeks of isolation. Or perhaps even more.
Two years later, we were so very sick of being at home, but also anxious about crowds. This pandemic isn’t going away, but at least we know more about Covid. Cruising now requires testing: once before you leave home, and once more at the terminal. Nobody got bounced at the dock and, as far as we know, nobody got sick on board. Well at least, no more than usual.
The crowd this year was a little light, and more than a little shy. We were masked in all the public places, even “outdoors.” There were fewer folks in the gaming area, fewer in the dining room, fewer at the shows. Some big names bowed out. We went to fewer events, and we spent more time in our cabin watching cable. We are all learning to navigate the new normal.
But we were so glad to be there. For many of us, it was our first vacation since 2020, and it felt like the beginning of a new chapter. We drank two thousand wang-wangs, celebrated our fleeting time together, and tried not to notice how much older everyone looked. And then we pre-booked more than half of next year’s cabins.
It was wild and fun and over in a flash. I shot enough video that I can probably post a travelogue (here’s the one from 2017). That will probably happen as soon as I catch up from being away from my desk for ten days, and after I make sure I’m ready for my next thing in two weeks. Because conventions are starting up again, all over, all over again.
Are you interested in learning more about the JoCo cruise? Check it out, and maybe we’ll see you onboard.
Did I get any good playtesting or game design done on this cruise? No, not really. But I did go to four juggling classes, so that’s something to be proud of. And I captured this epic photo off the back of the ship, without dropping my iPhone into the Caribbean. So that’s something too.
So waves. Such blue.