Your guide to news from cruise destinations around the world

Your guide to the latest news and updates from cruise destinations and ports of call around the world. Mediterranean, Europe, Caribbean, Alaska, South America, south-east Asia, Australasia, Arctic, Antarctica, Middle East. Southampton, Barcelona, Rome, Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Barbados, Panama, Norway, Dubai, Bahamas, Abu Dhabi, Sydney, Auckland, Wellington, Baltic, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Oslo, Helsinki, St Petersburg, Marseille, Athens, Greece, Venice, Dubrovnik, Corfu, Malta, Sicily, Sardinia, Naples, Santorini, Mykonos, Le Havre, Amsterdam, Bruges, Dublin, Belfast, Edinburgh, Kirkwall, Bergen, Svalbard, Iceland, Reykjavik, Costa Rica, Dominica, Puerto Rico, New York, Vancouver, Seattle, Skagway, Juneau, China, Shanghai, Singapore, Myanmar, Thailand,

QM2 sails into Cape Town

Plans to move retired liner QE2 to Cape Town may have fallen through, but her big sister, Queen Mary 2, arrived in the port today for the first time. And on board for the maiden call was Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984 for his role in the anti-apartheid campaign. He has been a guest speaker for the past few days during the QM2's world cruise. He is pictured below with Captain Nick Bates and Cunard's president and managing director, Peter Shanks, who said: "Our guests were thrilled to have the opportunity to meet [...]

By John Honeywell| 2017-06-15T16:00:30+00:00 25 March 2010|Cruise Destinations, Cruise Ships|0 Comments

Record day for Port Everglades

Ruby Princess (left) and Independence of the Seas leaving Port Everglades The news that Port Everglades - the cruise ship port in Fort Lauderdale, Florida - had a record day yesterday in terms of passenger numbers is both a confirmation of the increasing popularity of cruising, and a footnote to my reports of potential overcrowding at sea. A total of 52,000 passengers passed through the port yesterday; half of them on their way home at the end of a cruise, the other half setting out on their holidays. The previous record day for business was on January 3 last year, [...]

By John Honeywell| 2017-06-15T16:00:30+00:00 21 March 2010|Cruise Destinations, Cruise News|1 Comment

Alaska deal in the pipeline

Anyone planning a cruise in Alaskan waters, as I am later this summer, will be pleased to see that the state's governor, Sean Parnell, was doing more than soaking up the spring sunshine during his trip to Florida this week. He was there, of course, for the Cruise Miami convention, and sat in the front row of the audience as Holland America CEO Stein Kruse - one of the biggest operators in the region - warned that the exodus of cruise ships from Alaska would continue in reaction to punitive taxes. Now the Anchorage Daily News is reporting that Parnell [...]

By John Honeywell| 2010-03-20T16:07:57+00:00 20 March 2010|Cruise Destinations, Cruise News|0 Comments

Room to manouevre as more cruise ships arrive in the Med?

My item yesterday about fears of cruise ships overcrowding the Mediterranean struck a few chords around the world. First to get in touch was a spokesperson for cruise.co.uk reminding me that the more ships there are sailing in Europe, the more chances there are for British passengers to grab a bargain. Which is true - provided the experience is not diminished by having to fight your way through the crowds to get to the sights or the shops. Another contact alerted me to the fact that there were five ships visiting Roseau, capital of the charming Caribbean island of Dominica [...]

By John Honeywell| 2017-06-15T16:00:30+00:00 19 March 2010|Cruise Destinations, Cruise News|1 Comment

It’s getting mighty crowded

This week's release of deployment details for the 11 Royal Caribbean cruise ships which will be sailing in European waters next year was just the latest in a flotilla of similar announcements. Carnival, Celebrity, Disney, Holland America, NCL, Princess . . . they'll all be flocking here next year to join our own P&O, Cunard, Fred Olsen and Thomson. Not to mention Italian giants Costa and MSC. More ships are being built, and the cruise lines are pulling out of Alaska because of excessive taxes and stringent regulations, so the vessels have to go somewhere, and they won't all squeeze [...]

By John Honeywell| 2017-06-15T16:00:30+00:00 18 March 2010|Cruise Destinations, Cruise News|0 Comments

There’s nothing austere about life on board the Via Australis

The first thing to realise about expedition ship Via Australis, on which I recently travelled to Cape Horn, is that the name has nothing to do with Australia, except both share the same etymology - from the Latin for "south." The second thing I discovered was just how well this little vessel - a mere 2,716 tons and carrying just 125 passengers - could handle itself in the wild waters of the south Atlantic. The seas of Drake Passage, between South America and Antarctica, are some of the roughest in the world, and have claimed hundreds of ships and thousands [...]

By John Honeywell| 2017-06-15T16:00:30+00:00 17 March 2010|Cruise Destinations, Cruise Ships|0 Comments

Cruising from Alaska to Zadar

There's more to the new 2011 cruise programmes from P&O and Cunard than fly-cruises to the Mediterranean and seven-day Transatlantic crossings. Here are some more highlights from their new brochures: Azura • Cruising to the Central and Western Mediterranean, Baltic, Norwegian Fjords, Iceland, Western Europe and Caribbean • Sailing 17 ex-UK cruises from April 2011 to October 2011 and 11 Caribbean fly cruises from October 2011 to March 2012 • Cruises range from a four night cruise break to Azura's inaugural 15 night Icelandic cruise • Overnight calls in Venice and St. Petersburg • Prices starting from £599 for a [...]

By John Honeywell| 2017-06-15T16:00:31+00:00 15 March 2010|Cruise Destinations, Cruise News, Cruise Ships|0 Comments

Fly-cruises in the Mediterranean on the menu for P&O and Cunard

The two pillars of cruising from the UK - P&O and Cunard - both introduce fly-cruises to the Mediterranean in their programmes for 2011-2012, announced today. Adults-only Adonia - a replacement for Artemis - will be based in the Mediterranean from October next year, offering six fly-cruises departing from Savona, Athens, Trieste and Naples. Cunard's Queen Victoria will operate eight Mediterranean fly-cruises visiting up to nine different ports over 12 nights, from Venice, Rome and Athens. Thanks to her smaller size, Adonia will be able to visit some smaller ports of call not available to larger ships in the company's [...]

By John Honeywell| 2010-03-15T07:34:26+00:00 15 March 2010|Cruise Destinations, Cruise News|0 Comments

Crikey! QM2 heads Down Under

Crikey, cobber! If you see any Cunard bosses walking around with corks dangling from their hats, and singing Waltzing Matilda, then don't be at all surprised - they have come over all Australian this week. A grand dinner in Melbourne for passengers on Queen Victoria's world voyage was followed by an announcement that the line's flagship Queen Mary 2 will spend an unprecedented 28 days in Australian waters in 2012, circumnavigating the continent in the process. The voyage will be the longest period Queen Mary 2 has been based in any country outside her northern hemisphere home ports of Southampton [...]

By John Honeywell| 2017-06-15T16:00:32+00:00 11 March 2010|Cruise Destinations, Cruise News|0 Comments

Breakfast with the penguins

The final morning on board Via Australis was a hectic affair. By 11.00 am we were due to dock in Punta Arenas at the end of our three-day adventure, but before then we had a date - with thousands of penguins. For many passengers, this was the highlight of the trip, so there were no complaints about setting alarm clocks for 6.00 am and rising before the sun as our ship sailed through the Strait of Magellan towards Magdalena Island. Togged out in lots of warming layers, and wearing the obligatory flourescent orange life jackets, we queued to board Zodiac [...]

By John Honeywell| 2017-06-15T16:00:32+00:00 9 March 2010|Cruise Destinations|0 Comments