Why can’t I call my Cruiseship a boat?

A lot of people in the maritime world will react quite strange, even angrily if you refer to a ship as a boat. This actually happened to me the first time I was on a cruise ship and talking to one of the officers, woops, he wasn’t happy with me!

The situation isn’t helped by the fact that there is no set definition of the difference. So how can you tell the one from the other?

Well, the general rule of thumb is that a boat can fit into a ship, but a ship can’t fit into a boat. So in theory a ship is a large ocean going vessel whilst a boat will be much smaller.