Mario Salcedo lives on a cruise ship. He has spent 6,900 nights cruising nonstop — that is almost 19 years.
“People come here for vacation, I don’t. I come here to live my life. Adopting a cruise ship life is basically escaping from reality,” Salcedo said to The New York Times, as seen in a new video. “You are basically exiting the world as you know it on land, and you are saying, ‘I don’t want to be a part of that anymore. I want to create my own little world.’”
Salcedo said how you create that reality is a very personal decision. He has all the time in the world to do what he likes to do, by eliminating all “non-value” activities, like laundry, cleaning or chores. He does not join the outings off the ship because he does not like groups.
“I am right now just living really happily. I am the happiest guy in the world! I am the happiest person in the world, being alone,” he said.
He has a spreadsheet of what ships he will be on when and told The New York Times that he has fallen in love many times on the ships, and have gotten married and divorced. Salcedo said he already has planned his death. If he gets really sick, he is going to go on one last scuba dive and just go down 400 feet, “instead of having to live my last years on land in a land hospital. To me, that would be pure hell.”
Before he, who has the nickname Super Mario, took up cruising as a lifestyle, he worked in the corporate world. He said he is out of goals, and the only thing he has to look forward to are new ships. “That’s okay, that’s okay,” he said.
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