An EPIC Cruise Review Channel With Ben And David

I will talk with Ben and David from the Cruise with Ben and David YouTube Channel. We will discuss how they grew their channel into the EPIC Cruise review channel it is today. We explore their EPIC destination recommendations, their bucket list, what it is like to cruise with their fans, and so much more.

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An EPIC Cruise Review Channel With Ben And David

I am joined by Ben and David of Cruise with Ben and David. I’m honored that they’re here. Welcome. Tell my audience about who each of you are.

Thanks for having us. We’re Ben and David. We have a YouTube channel called Cruise with Ben and David. We cruise around the world on cruise ships, visit lots of places, and take people who watch us along with us.

It’s not a bad job at all. We get to do this full-time now, which is brilliant. We get to travel all around the world to spectacular destinations on amazing ships. It’s a dream job.

Looking Back

I’ve enjoyed your channel for quite a while now and love all of your reviews. If I’m honest, you two helped Michelle and me choose a cruise ship and a cruise we did. We’re going to talk about that in a minute. I don’t want to let too much out. My first question is, what did you do before you were cruising full-time? How did you get into your YouTube channel?

I was a camera operator and editor working in television production. I’m doing something quite similar but for a company and TV stations. I brought that into the YouTube sphere with my experience of doing that. That’s what I did before.

I did web design. I’m a web developer. I still do that. I still work on that at the same time as the channel, which is the great thing about working nowadays. You can do that remotely. I can do that anywhere in the world. Thanks to the internet, it’s gotten a lot better these days, and it is easier to work from ships and anywhere in the world.

The whole thing started by accident. We hadn’t planned to set up a YouTube channel or pursue this. We got invited on our first cruise. It was our friend’s wedding. We had never cruised before. We had all of those old stereotypes in our heads that it was going to be awfully full of old people. The food was going to be sloppy. It was going to be regimented, traditional, and horrible. As soon as we stepped on the ship, it was a Disney ship, the Disney Magic. We were like, “This is not what we imagined it was going to be at all.” Within a few minutes, we were like, “We need to do this again.”

Ben turned around to me and said, “We’ll book another one.” We hadn’t even got to the cabin. We’d walked along the corridor on the cruise.

There was lots of YouTube content online about what it’s like to take a Disney cruise. On our second cruise, we took a less-known cruise line, and there was not much about it. We had a few sea days, and the weather was bad. We decided to make a quick video. It was a ship tour of a ship. We put that up on YouTube thinking, “It might help somebody we don’t know.”

We didn’t think anything about it. A few months later, we took a look, and it’s had 50,000 views. We thought, “We’ll do another video because people said they liked it.” We did another one. Nearly 600 videos later, it’s become a big YouTube channel. It wasn’t something we ever planned. It was something we did for fun. It is still fun, but it has turned into a job and a lifestyle.

It was organic in the way that it grew. We never sat down and said, “One day, we’re going to make YouTube videos.” We never set up the channel. I’ve been like, “This is what I’m going to do now for the rest of my life.” It was a fun thing that we did while still working on the weekends. We’d sit in our kitchen, have a couple of cheeky gin and tonics, talk about cruises, and give tips and advice. It grew organically from that to us vlogging on the ships and taking people along with us. That’s where we are now.

It’s enjoyable. Michelle, who’s my girlfriend, and I enjoyed your videos. As I had teased before, at the beginning of April 2024, we went to SeaDream Yacht Club. We have seen both of the videos that you did. We call you guys the boys. We’re like, “The boys have a new video.” She’s like, “I don’t want to cruise. I get seasick. I want to be able to see land.” We saw your review of SeaDream Yacht Club. She’s like, “I might do that.”

SeaDream

Coincidentally, in the mail, we got a little catalog thing. I was like, “Look at this.” She goes, “No, I might do this.” We got to go on a cruise. SeaDream is fabulous. It’s not even a cruise. It’s yachting. They would want me to say it. It is a small boutique ship. The service is phenomenal. The one we were down in the Caribbean, you spend all day in someplace. As you’re sleeping, you wake up in a new port. It was great. I did want to talk to you guys and get your opinion about SeaDream and what you liked about it. If you compared Sead, which I know is not fair, to some of the bigger lines, what differentiates it? One hundred ten passengers versus 6,000.

SeaDream is crazy. It is amazing. It feels like you are on a yacht without having to pay the price of hiring a yacht, which would be crazy money. It’s less expensive because it’s a luxury cruise line, but it’s superb. It’s different from normal cruising because the ship is small and tiny. It’s only a few decks. There are only three decks of cabins, which makes it easy to get around.

The service, food, and everything are spectacular. You’ve got a chef on there cooking for 100 people versus chefs cooking for 1,000 people. Ships are able to get into ports that the big cruise ships aren’t able to get into. You often go to much smaller ports, which are cool destinations in the Caribbean and around the world.

For us, it was the crew. The crew were amazing. They became friends. You got to know everybody’s name, which you sometimes do on normal cruises, but there was something special about SeaDream. We’re lucky to have done it twice. We got stuck there during COVID, which was the best place in the world to get stuck. It was incredible.

It was a completely different experience to the big ships. One of the things before we started the channel was we didn’t realize there was so much choice there. They are different. You can’t get any different between a SeaDream and a Royal Caribbean ship. On polar ends, they are in every single spectrum. You throw in river cruising. There are many choices and many different experiences you can do. It is lovely. SeaDream is one that is fabulous. We had a wonderful time on there.

When people think of Royal Caribbean ships, that’s all that’s available. These are massive ships with thousands of people on, loads of kids and children running around making noise. There are different cruise ships for everybody. One thing that we always say is that it is important to choose the right cruise line for you because one person might love the Royal Caribbean, Norwegian, or Princess, but another person might hate it and want to do something completely different. This is why we do this. It’s to give advice and show what it’s like on board compared to other ships. We loved our time on SeaDream. It was amazing. I hope we can go back one day because we’re best friends with some of the crew now. We still speak to them now. The food was amazing.

I know you guys talk about trying to eat well, but sadly, I had some bad spinach. I was having some GI issues. I thought I was going to have to get off the ship. We hadn’t even left. We weren’t leaving until 10:00 at night. It’s 6:00, I’m like, “This isn’t going well.” I called the ship doctor. He came in. He was like, “No problem. I’ll set you up.” He fixes me up. I was great. They tailored the food to what I needed. I needed some bland food for a couple of days. The bartender was like, “Mr. Sprague, I see that you’re drinking soda water. No problem.” I’m like, “No. Tomorrow, I’m having a cocktail. Trust me.”

They’re small boutique ships. You get that personalized service. They’ll do anything and everything they can to make you have a great time.

The excursions were so much fun. I can’t wait to take another one. It was funny you started off talking about how you thought about cruises. The only two other cruises I did were one with my mom and one with my dad on Holland America. I ended up going on the same exact chef. I was like, “I can’t even say there’s a difference.”

Epic Destinations

When I went with my dad, it wasn’t a holiday season. It was mainly adults. In the main dining room at dinner, it was like a valet scooter parking. There were many electric mobility scooters. I was like, “That was not a bad experience, but not what I was personally looking for. I have to say SeaDream was. What I talk about in my book and my work is all these epic things. One of my segments is about epic destinations. I want to talk to you, boys, about some of those epic destinations that you’ve been fortunate to go to that you’re like, “Must see.”

There have been many. In the time that we’ve been doing the channel, the first few that spring to mind are the more common ones, like Alaska. It’s an epic destination in itself and one that you have to see by cruising. The best way to see it is by ship. In a similar vein, Northern Europe and the Norwegian Fjords are incredible destinations.

The scenery is 360 degrees around you. The best way to see this is by cruising because it’s only accessible by water. In Alaska, we’d always thought it was going to be nice, but it’s going to be all cruises. We were blown away by how beautiful it was and everything that we saw. We saw so much wildlife. The scenery was mind-blowingly spectacular. We were lucky we had great weather, but we saw everything. We saw bears, three types of wheels, otters, and every type of bird. It was crazy. It was legitimately waking up every day and seeing this beautiful scenery.

Alaska and the fjords are sailing between these incredible mountains. You can’t get your head around it. The colors are incredible. Those are the two most epic destinations we’ve been to. I enjoyed Hawaii, which was amazing. We got to do four islands because we were cruising it without unpacking or having lengthy travel or flights between the islands. Hawaii was spectacular. It was beautiful.

I’m a massive Jurassic Park fan and movie fan. Many movies have been filmed there. To see it in real life was not disappointing at all. I was worried I was going to be disappointed by what I thought it was going to be. The scenery was spectacular. All of those beautiful green hills, the gorgeous water, and the people were amazing. That was a big thing about Hawaii. The people were lovely, friendly, and welcoming. It was amazing and spectacular. I’ll never forget it.

I desperately want to go back to Hawaii and Alaska because we did that. We were lucky. We did both on the same cruise. We went on a cruise in Hawaii. We sailed across the Pacific for a few days, which was cool. We arrived in Alaska. It was different in climate, scenery, and culture. It was such an amazing cruise. It was called the Fire and Ice Cruise. It was the most amazing cruise ever. It was sixteen days. The whole trip was an incredible trip. The trip was such a good experience. It was amazing scenery and food. Everything was beautiful about it. It was epic.

I’ve been fortunate to travel. I got back from Maui. I spent eight days in Maui. We did this spectacular helicopter tour over to Molokai, where they filmed the beginning of Jurassic Park, where they’re coming to the island. It is spectacularly beautiful. I have been to Alaska. I haven’t been on a cruise, but I was up in Alaska running a marathon. It’s breathtaking. Go to take a picture, and you’re almost like, “No, I can’t because this is in the picture, but there’s all of this everywhere.”

It almost looked fake, especially in Hawaii when we drove up in the national park on the mountains. We were looking down at where they filmed the waterfall scene from Jurassic Park. We could see that in the distance because of the colors and the mist that was in the air. It looked like a fake backdrop from a movie. It didn’t look real at all. I couldn’t get my mind around what I was seeing. It was so picturesque. The colors were incredible. The size of everything was awe-inspiring. It was incredible.

It’s far from home. It takes 24 hours nearly to get there. It was cool to be far from home and experience something completely different.

I haven’t seen any, but have you taken any cruises to Africa?

No, we haven’t.

We’ve been to Africa before in Johannesburg, Nigeria, Ghana, and a few other places. We haven’t taken a cruise there. We’d love to do that. That would be cool.

Where haven’t you gone yet that you want?

There are quite a few places.

We want to do the South Pacific.

There’s one-half of the globe we still haven’t explored.

We’ve got a big trip coming up. We’re finally going to New Zealand and Australia. We’re doing a few cruises around there, which we’ve always wanted to do. We can’t wait to do it. We want to go to South America. We’ve never been to South America before.

We’ve done a little bit of Southeast Asia. I’d love to do more of Asia. There is a big chunk of the globe we haven’t explored yet. Australia and New Zealand are on our bucket list trips. We can’t wait for that one.

Repositioning Cruises

I look forward to seeing those videos. You guys do lots of cruises. What are your feelings about the repositioning cruises where you’re going? You might go from the Caribbean over to Europe. You did Hawaii to Alaska. I’ve seen some mixed reviews of some transatlantic crossings. I’m not naming any.

We love repositioning cruises. The problems with the actual crossings are not because it’s a crossing. It’s down to the cruise lines. We love them because they’re exciting cruises to take. You’re going to somewhere completely different. It’s the other side of the world. They’re good value. They’re a lot cheaper than normal cruises. That’s a great way not to have to take a flight somewhere quite far. I love being away from land, especially transoceanic and cruising. It’s cool because you’re far from the land. It’s a cool feeling when you’re right in the middle of a big ocean.

There’s something relaxing about it. We love them because we can do some work and chill. You’re not rushing around the pots and doing anything like that. You can get into a routine. You touched on it there. You have to make sure you choose the right ship and cruise line for you because it is a long period of time.

You can’t get off usually.

Sometimes, it’s 5 or 7 days without a port. You need to make sure that you are on a ship that you love. That’s why we have had mixed experiences down to not choosing the right ship for us. We love repositioning cruises. We find the crew like them because they’re going somewhere new, and it’s a bit different. A lot of the big cruise lines out of state, for example, Miami, keep doing the same itinerary round and round. It is like a Groundhog Day for them. They’re repositioning cruises. The crew is going to something new. It is always quite special. It has a little bit of a feeling about it for the crew.

First Steps

I talked about epic begins with one step forward. Without necessarily intending, it sounds like you took that one step forward and look at where you are now. When you look back on those first few steps, were you nervous about doing it, or was it like, “This is what we’re doing?”

It was a huge decision to go full-time from working for a company to working for ourselves doing this as a living. That’s the step we took. It’s a big step. It wasn’t something we took lightly. It was something that we discussed for a long time. There were risks in it because it could go either way. It could work or die out in a few years. We had to take a big leap of faith and work hard to get where we wanted to be. Luckily, it all worked out well, but it was a big step to take it further because nothing’s ever been promised with YouTube. Things can change in a day. It was a big step but the best step we’ve ever taken. We’ve got to do many amazing stuff because of it.

At the time, the channel was a lot smaller than it is now. It was a big risk. It got to the point where it was fly or not. We’d got to a point where we’d done as much as we could so that we both could be working full time. Ben took an office job after doing TV production. He went to work in an office. That wasn’t for you. It was a step to get back into what you loved.

It’s the best step we’ve ever taken. It’s luckily worked out.

I get it being out on my own and out creating content myself. You don’t know. It’s always funny how it works with social media. The things you think might get likes, views, or comments don’t. The thing that you honestly slapped up. You’re like, “Let me put up this Instagram post.” I personally have not found that. What do people want? I guess it depends on the day.

It’s unpredictable. Certain things surprise us. We work hard on something. We think this is going to be amazing, but people don’t watch it. We didn’t put much effort into it. It explodes. It is crazy. It can be down to the day or the time the content is put up. It’s unpredictable.

It can get disheartening when you’ve put a lot of effort into seeing a video. I’ve seen Ben sweat while carrying the camera and putting a lot of effort into making this beautiful cinematography video. It doesn’t do as a fifteen-minute thing where we’re sat chatting. It can be disheartening, but that comes with what we do.

You always get nice comments from the people who appreciate it, which is nice. You always get one comment where you’re like, “That made it worthwhile that somebody enjoyed it.”

Cabin Tour And Food Reviews

Here’s something that Michelle and I have to know. When you guys do the cabin tour, I don’t want to reveal many secrets, but do you do it like right when you get in because the cabin always looks spectacular? I know that the cabins are not huge and you have to unpack your stuff.

It’s the first thing we do. We go straight into the cabin and film because otherwise, it’s going to be a mess because we’ve got so much equipment. We’ll put all of our personal stuff out. We’ll put our fans out and stuff in our gear. We want to do it while it’s empty to short off to get it done before we make a mess of it. We do it straight away.

In the suites, you only have so much room and have that stuff. I have to imagine that you both have it down to a science. You know how you’re packing and unpacking. You’re repacking all of it because that’s all you guys are doing.

We’ve got it down to a fine art now. We know what we want, need to take, and don’t need to take.

Even down to our local airport, we know the exact security gate to go through because it’s quicker than the others. We have a secret little waiting area that nobody knows about that. We go straight there, and we can be through in fifteen minutes. We know the routine,

The whole packing and unpacking are the most annoying things because you have to get everything washed and put it all back again. It feels like you’re constantly packed, which is quite funny. It comes with the norm, which is funny.

We have it down to a tee now. We’ve got our equipment down to what’s manageable. We used to carry a lot more equipment. The things we take now are a lot more manageable. We know what we do and don’t use. We’re not taking two suits or towels anymore.

Practice makes perfect.

The more we travel, the more we think, “All you need is a passport, some money, and your tickets.” Everything else doesn’t matter. You can get anything else anywhere else if you forget it.

The more you travel, the more you think about your passport, money, and tickets. Everything else does not matter. You can get them anywhere else if you forget them.

When we lost our luggage, the thing that we struggled to find most was socks. The one thing I missed the most was socks.

Ben, I love your food reviews. When you like something, every week, you seem to have some new saying to say that you like it. Are those off the cuff? Have you thought ahead of, “If something is good, I will say it this way?”

It’s a bit of a mix. |These people have started to send us things to say now, which is quite funny. I’ll always try to get those in if I can. It is mostly off the cuff. It’s crazy stuff that comes out of my mouth. I don’t know where it comes from. It might be a few minutes later when I think of something. I’m like, “Let me go back and say that because it was funny.” It’s got ridiculous now. It’s some of the stuff that I say. I can’t even believe I said it, which is funny. We’ve got to cut quite a lot out because it makes no sense. It’s becoming a thing now. Everybody sends things now, which is nice. We always get, “Can you say this in the next one?”

Cruising With Fans

Unfortunately, I haven’t gotten to watch it. You did put up a video where you went cruising with some of your fans. How was that?

We did a group cruise. Cruise. That was another epic experience. There were about 150 of us on the ship. It wasn’t us on the ship. We were nervous about it beforehand. It was almost like a wedding again. It was that experience of you hosting all these people, but everybody was lovely because we were worried that we would let people down and we’d disappoint. We wouldn’t have enough time with everybody. That was our biggest fear.

Everybody was lovely. We had a fantastic time. It was a mind-blowing experience for us because we’re seeing people in front of us. Most of the time, it’s us two and a camera. Occasionally, we’ll meet people when we’re out filming, which is nice. To see a group that size or watch our videos was crazy and emotional.

We’re hearing everybody’s stories about how they watched us or how we helped people through illnesses or when they were feeling down or in a bad place. It was lovely. It was nice to meet people who watch us and appreciate what we do. It was overwhelming. I couldn’t believe how nice everybody was. Everybody was lovely and kind. It was nuts. It was an experience like nothing else, but it felt a little bit like a wedding like David that said because you had all of these people.

You’re trying to figure out what to do and how to keep everybody occupied and happy. It was easy. Everybody was lovely. We were tired after those few days. I don’t think we’ve ever talked as much. My mouth hurt from talking and smiling because everybody was so nice and said lovely things, but it was a great experience.

You can get bogged down with, like, “This video hasn’t done very well.” You can get bogged down with the day-to-day creation of content. You’re like, “What am I going to do next? When I do this?” It was nice to have a moment to hear everyone’s feedback and meet people. To hear how you’ve touched people’s lives was heartwarming. It made me want to do the channel even more. We have a new perspective on everything after that.

We realized how lucky we were. It was brilliant. It was such a lovely experience to have.

I know not nearly on the scale you all are doing, but in some of the work, I run into people who will say, “I like this.” It’s nice. It’s validating for what you’re putting out there. I’ve done events and stuff like that where you’re like, “I put so much effort. I’m afraid people aren’t going to have a good time.” Everyone is having a blast. You are tired because everyone wants five minutes of your time, and you want to give them five minutes. That’s 500 minutes that you gave to your 100 people.

We did it overnight. It was a four-day trip. We did have four days with people. We broke everybody up into smaller groups. We had dinner every night. I hope that we did get enough time with every person.

That was our biggest worry.

We had some fantastic conversations with people. We found out about people’s lives. A lot of people had stuff in common.

It was diverse. There are people who have disarmed explosives in Afghanistan for several years.

Influencing People

I’m a big fan. I love what you guys are creating. One of the things that I hear people talk about is I’m an influencer. I’m hard-pressed to say what isn’t an influencer other than I want to create content that people find value in. If somehow my content influences something, yay. You guys, at this point, with your YouTube channel and some of the notoriety, could be deemed as influencers. Do you feel that you’re an influencer?

I don’t feel like we do because it’s a strange thing. I see influencers as more like journalists.

Anybody who can influence your decision to do something or purchase something is an influencer.

Anybody who can influence your decision to do or purchase is an influencer.

An influencer would be somebody who gets paid to say certain things to influence people. We pay for all of our cruises. We genuinely go on there to entertain and to be critics of the cruise line. The good and the bad. We will have some influential power through what we do and say because of what we do. I don’t like to see us as influencers because we don’t get paid by the cruise lines or the people who will do the videos that we’re creating. We get money from advertising as a secondary. I see it as more of a critique of helping people make a decision that will help them save money and have a good time.

It’s to educate and inform people. That’s what we’d like to do. Technically, yes, we are influencers. Journalists influence. It’s a word I don’t love.

It’s a word that’s been abused, and that has loads of negative connotations. People are paid to say nice things. We don’t like that. We’re happy with people wanting to do that. If they want to do that, that’s fine. It’s not the route we’ve taken. We want to make sure that people are bending their money, getting the most out of it, and having a great time. If we can entertain them on this side, that’s always fun.

It has become a negative word. We’ve met a lot of people, influencers, and journalists through doing this. We’ve seen a lot of them work extremely hard. Some of them don’t.

Sometimes, the negative comes because we get the news stories of someone insisting that they should get something for free because they’re an influencer. I honestly have looked and gone, “What exactly is that?” Any of us could call ourselves influencers because we make social media posts or have YouTube channels. That doesn’t make me an influencer. It’s a question that I have for both of you. Thank you for your answer.

Not Yets

One of the big things in my book that I talk about is that people are on epic journeys because we all have things that we dream of doing. There are two words that, for me, mean a lot, but they are not yet because there are things that I’m working on but haven’t got. For each of you, what is 1 or 2 of your not-yets?

We are a signposting point at the moment because we have moved home. We have been under a lot of disruption. I don’t know what our next thing would be.

We had a few not-yet moments before this because we’ve moved house. We’ve moved to the other side of the country. We had to put a lot of stuff off and say, “We’re not going to do that yet. We’re going to go back and do it.” We’re at the point where we’re figuring out what we want to do next. We move along with the times.

We do a lot of cruises. I’d love to do an RV trip one day.

We want to buy an RV for Europe, but we’re always saying not yet because this is going well at the moment. We don’t have time to do both and drop the ball on the crew stuff more. We’d love to do that at some point. That would be fun. Not yet, but we will get around to doing that at some point.

That is probably going to be the next one. We’re considering moving house for quite a few years. We took the plunge and did it.

It’s nice to finally be in the new house.

The next would be an RV. We’re impulsive. We do things through at the last minute and decide on the fly, which is a nice thing to do. We can write what we want to do and decide what’s going to create good content and where we’re going to have fun at the same time, which is nice. The New Zealand and Australia trip was a huge one because it’s far, a big expense, a big trip, and something that we’ve been wanting to do for ages. When it finally comes around to making that not yet a possibility, it’s cool. I can’t wait for that trip.

Episode Wrap-up

Ben and David, I want to thank you so much for taking the time. I know how busy you are. I appreciate you taking the time to come and talk with me and my audience.

Thank you so much for having us.

If people want to get ahold of you, how can they?

The best place to start is to find us on our YouTube channel. That’s where you can see all of our content and everything we’ve been talking about. We upload every single week. Every single Sunday, we upload a brand-new video. If you type into YouTube Cruise with Ben and David, it will go to YouTube.com/CruiseWith. You’ll find us there. We’re also on all the other platforms, such as Instagram and Facebook.

Ben and David, I want to thank you so much. I want to remind my audience that if you go to EpicBegins.com, you can find information about starting your epic journey. If you go there now and you want a free copy of my book, Epic Begins With 1 Step Forward, it will pop up, and you’ll get your copy of the book. I want to remind everyone that epic choices lead to the epic life that you want.

 

Important Links:

• Cruise with Ben and David
• YouTube – Cruise with Ben and David
• Instagram – Cruise with Ben and David
• Facebook – Cruise with Ben and David
• Epic Begins With 1 Step Forward

 

About Ben and David

Ben and David are a fun-loving British couple who have taken their love for cruising and turned it into a lively and entertaining YouTube channel, Cruise with Ben and David. It all kicked off when they attended a friend’s wedding on a cruise ship, and from that moment, they were hooked! They launched their YouTube channel, focusing on creating high-quality videos that showcased the joy of cruising, filling a gap they noticed in the online space.Their vlogs are all about having a good time while giving you the inside scoop on ships, destinations, and everything in between.