When I was a child, holidays were like a bag of sweets. You were excited about getting the packet and your joy increased with the discovery of yet another treasure wrapped inside.
There was no pressure, no stress, just sheer fun for days upon days.
As an adult, holidays are often as stressful as being at work, there's the planning, the budgeting - of time and money - the rush to get to where you're going and the rush to get back in time for work. When you've got kids, you can multiply all of that by a factor of five, if you're lucky.
The answer
There is an answer to all of that - and it's been under our noses all the time - take a cruise from Durban harbour. MSC shipping line, through its South African partner Starlight Cruises, offers almost six months of cruising from Durban.
Many people will remember the MSC Rhapsody, currently based in Cape Town till April, but it is the larger MSC Melody, on its final cruise before being decommissioned that is sailing out of Durban. Next year it will be replaced by the brand new MSC Synphonia, which carries 2 087 passengers as opposed to the Melody's 1 500.
There is a variety of journeys to choose from, starting with the most common, the cruise to nowhere, two nights on board straight into the middle of the Indian Ocean and back.
Adventure
The more adventurous can choose the three-night cruise to the Portuguese Island in the Maputo Bay, the four-night cruise to Maputo and Portuguese Island or to Maputo and Barra Lodge, the five-night cruise to Ponto D'Oro, Maputo and Portuguese Island, an 11-night cruise to Mauritius, a 14-day cruise to the Seychelles, up to the Comores and back to Maputo, or the big 21-day cruise back to the Melody's home port in Livorno in Italy.
It all depends on your budget and that's the secret of the whole cruise.
It's amazing the value for money you get, because your cruise price includes everything but your drinks.
For the uninitiated, that means buffet or sit down breakfasts every morning, five course buffet lunches, five course dinners, tea and cake twice a day with a midnight snack thrown in for good measure. You cannot do justice to any of it, and if you try you'll seriously damage yourself.
Much the same can be said for the onboard entertainment - everything from dancing girls and cabaret, to onboard discos, pub bands, movies in the fully equipped cinema and perennial activities on the back deck or Calypso deck of the ship where the Starlight Cruise team offer lessons on mixing cocktails to passenger beauty contests, bingo, golf chipping and table tennis.
The ship's entertainment staff type up a bulletin of all activities for the next day, which is slipped under the door of your cabin.
Don't overdo it
The trick is not to do it all at once, but to pick the activities you fancy or just sun tan, read a book or even watch the latest sport on the flat screen TVs in the air-conditioned lounges.
You will be overwhelmed by your first encounter with the Melody.
Nothing you read on the internet or on pamphlets you might have picked up beforehand will prepare for the sheer size of the ship or the luxury of its fittings.
After the sweltering bedlam of Durban harbour and cacophony of N Shed, where you will be processed by customs and the Melody's onboard admin staff, you enter the ship by its gangway to be met by hotel staff dressed in French maid outfits with white gloves, who will escort you through the carpeted cool either to the lift or the brass railinged staircase.
The cabin is a revelation; the same size as its equivalent on shore, it has a double bed, sofa, dressing table, cupboards, TV, toilet and bath/shower.
Before you unpack, you get on deck to watch the ship slip its moorings and make its way out of Durban harbour, dropping the pilot at the mouth of the harbour and steaming onwards up the coast to Mozambique.
After you have returned to your cabin to unpack, your first task will be to charge up your cruise card, a barcoded ID card with your name, cabin number and lifeboat allocation(!)
Cashless cruise
Life on board the Melody is cashless. With the exception of the casino, everything you buy onboard - mainly drinks, souvenirs and/or last minute essentials from the onboard shops - will be done by swiping your card.
The ship advises that the minimum deposit is $70 or R600. This might seem a bit steep until you realise that a beer or a cool drink will set your back the equivalent of R15, a cocktail (on special) a further R34, a normal bar of chocolate from the shops R140, while even the bottled water in your room will cost you R27 to replace.
Each person in the cabin will also be debited a mandatory $3 per day as a tip payable at the end of the cruise to be divided among all staff. When you add all this up, you might be excused for worrying if your R600 deposit will cover it, but in truth, it's no worse than the prices you pay at resort hotels like Sun City.
And, everything else is covered in the price of your fare, including your transfer by Zodiac to - in this case - Portuguese Island and your braai there.
Paradise
The island is fantastic. Full of marine life, the water is as warm as you would expect in the Maldives.
There are no waves, so you just gently float, swim or snorkel. Curio sellers from nearby Inhaca come across to Portuguese Island, selling everything from wooden models of the boat to carvings of wildlife and even surprisingly accurate renderings of Mozambique's best known beers 2M and Laurentina, along with the ubiquitous T-shirts, sarongs and ice cold drinks, beers and local brandy - all at marginally lower prices than you'd pay back on the ship.
If you're up for it, there are also other tours available at a price, including a trip to Inhaca island and its restaurants and curio village, a snorkelling excursion to the Coral Gardens, the only remaining living coral reef in Maputo Bay, home to the legendary Dugong, which is often mistaken for a mermaid.
All too soon you'll have to return to the ship, where you get a true impression of its size, towering eight storeys above you. Back on board, you shower and dress for the five-course dinner, before spending the rest of the evening dancing on the back deck, in one of the clubs, trying your luck in the casino or just browsing through the shops.
If you're still awake at midnight, the crew throw in a midnight feast.
Having docked 5km off Portuguese Island in Maputo Bay on Saturday morning, the Melody weighs anchor at noon on Sunday. As she gets underway again you might be lucky enough to see a giant turtle swimming alongside or a school of dolphins rushing kamikaze-like towards the bow and beyond into its wake, as you stand on the deck.
Rude awakening
But the reality is your cruising idyll is almost at an end. It's a rude shock. You have to pack on Sunday night, leave your bags outside your cabin and settle your account. Then there's just a few hours sleep before you vacate your cabin at 7.00am on Monday morning.
The ship docks at about 6.30 am and as you watch the intricacies of tying up and revictualling a 30 000-ton ship from the top decks, South African customs officials clear the ship to disembark the passengers.
You're back on shore by about 9 am, it's another 20 minutes or so to go through passport control and collect your bags and then it's all over. But, the bug will have bitten and you'll be planning your next cruise.
- Kevin Ritchie was a guest of Jacaranda 94.2 aboard the Love Boat 2009.