Going on first international trip - HELP! Terrified.

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First leg - Asheville, NC to Tampa, FL, 2nd leg cruise ship. Please offer ALL thoughts, dealing with security, crowds, packing, dining, potty breaks, Aspie awareness clothes, seasickness, anything at all. Scared, confused, thinking of cancelling - but excited too. Sound off please, nothing too stupid. THANKS in advance, and for all past help.

DEC

Security: For the flight and embarkation day, wear comfortable clothes, and carry as little metal as possible so that security is as painless as possible.

Crowds: There are two strategies with crowds--get out ahead of them, or hang back behind them. I find the latter much easier to deal with. Let the keeners line up to get on/off the boat at the first opportunity. Hang back an hour and you can walk off at your leisure. (Similarly return early). Lineups can be a fact of life on board,

Dining: Most cruise lines offer complementary room service. If the dining room is problematic, there is nothing wrong with eating in your cabin.

Packing: depends upon the cruise line. I sail with Holland America, which usually means I need a lot of clothing from gym wear all the way to kilt and evening jacket. But if dressing up is not your style, there is no need to take anymore clothes than you would need for any other week of vacation.

Seasickness: If you are prone to motion sickness, bring your meds. If you are not, you will likely find little problem Winter in the Carribean is usually pretty tame for seas, anyway. Candied ginger is an excellent seasickness preventative if you don't want to use drugs (which are readily available on board).

Don't be scared. Cruising is supposed to be a quiet, relaxing time. There is plenty of time to do everything, so just take it easy, relax and enjoy the ride!

I find airports very soothing. Everything looks the same, the signs are always the same, and the instructions on what you're meant to do are always very clear. I second Visa's advice about comfortable clothing and as little metal as possible.

I've never been on a cruise, but I'm thinking about doing one. The best part of cruises is everything is optional -- if you don't want to leave your room for the entire thing, you don't need to.

I don't know about anyone else, but I always feel more comfortable if I know exactly what's going on. Both flying and cruising are good like this, because you can research everything in excruciating detail beforehand. Your cruise company's website will be able to give you all their details, and I like seatguru.com for flying information.

Airport security pack things in plastic bags so that if they do randomly search or need to its easy to see and nothing gets touched by weird people. If you want to bring like water or food on, make sure its unopened then there's no problem, when going through detector take off your shoes theres sometimes metal eyelets that set off the alarm thing.

Cruises ship, been on a few cruises. The taking the food to your cabin is a doable and good tip, Some might even have the opportunity for 'room service'. For sea sickness I didn't notice it at a except when we were in the movie theatre. The boats are huge, the ocean doesn't affect them a much as little ships, ask your pharmacist for any that you can take with any other medications you might be on.

Crowds are tiring on me, I usually just zone out and focus on what I'm in line for or trying to get to, I'm not sure what to offer on that, sorry.

Don't cancel! Think of this as a overcoming something, and really this is a fun something focus on finding weird or fun tings to take pictures of etc. The more you do it the easier.

Never gone on a cruise, but for flying I advice:

-Make sure you know where you have anything metallic on you for airport security (like what pocket you're keeping coins in, etc). This way you're less likely to forget to take it off for security. I tend to put any metallic things in my hand luggage while waiting for my turn, both save time and hassle.
-Arrive with plenty of time. Even just psychologically it helps to know you have plenty of time to sort any problems that arise. Take a book or magazine, or buy the paper, to relieve boredom.
-Take as few pieces of luggage as possible - it's easier to keep track of your stuff if you have one big piece of luggage than if you have several small ones.
-Try to pack lightly - that leaves more space for souvenirs and makes it easier to move around.
-For short flights, window seats are best - nobody needs to get past you to go to the toilet.
-If you don't want the person in the seat next to you to talk to you, pretend you're sleeping.

Oh wow, what a coincidence, I just happened to run across this today.

Autist on travel