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Cruise Destinations

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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,

Take a river ride through Europe

Not all cruises take to the high seas. There are some fascinating river cruises in Europe, none more intriguing than a 14-night voyage from Budapest to Amsterdam along the Danube and the Main rivers, which are linked by canal. The journey, on the 90-cabin MS Johann Strauss (above), travels through vineyards, past the medieval villages and cities of middle Europe, and through the spectacular Rhine Gorge. Departs September 17. All-inclusive fare is £2,395 per person and there is no single supplement. Details from www.noble-caledonia.co.uk, or call 020 7752 0000, quoting ref: NC090807. For a cruise from the UK to some [...]

By | 2017-06-15T16:00:40+00:00 15 August 2009|Cruise Deals, Cruise Destinations|0 Comments
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Preview of Pearl’s maiden cruises

The brochure for Saga's 2010 cruises will be arriving through thousands of letterboxes this week, just days after the company had finally acquired a new ship to replace the much-loved Saga Rose. No surprise then that the cover is a picture of Saga Pearl II, formerly the Astoria, in her new livery, and of course there are full details of the voyages planned for the ship's inaugural season. The maiden voyage, leaving Southampton on March 15, will be to Norway and the Arctic Circle. Earlier in the year than most ships visit the fjords, many familiar excursions will not be [...]

By | 2017-06-15T16:00:40+00:00 10 August 2009|Cruise Destinations, Cruise News, Cruise Ships|0 Comments
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All aboard for the Games

If QE2, the world's most famous ocean liner, ends up in Cape Town providing hotel accommodation for next year's World Cup, it looks like she will be facing competition. I hear that Holland America Line has chartered three ships to provide rooms for visiting football fans, officials and dignitaries during the four weeks of the event from June 11 to July 11. It's not a new trend. Norwegian Cruise Lines will be providing a ship to be berthed in Vancouver to add 10 per cent to the city's hotel capacity during the Winter Olympics in February next year. Norwegian Star [...]

By | 2017-06-15T16:00:41+00:00 29 July 2009|Cruise Destinations, Cruise News, Cruise Ships|0 Comments
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Viking gods shine on Mrs Brown

A week after my return from a cruise to Iceland and Norway on board Cunard’s Queen Victoria, and it’s time to look back at what was an unqualified success in almost every way. Freyr, the Viking god of weather, was kind to Captain and Mrs Greybeard, providing T-shirt weather even in the north of Iceland, and only soaking us with persistent rain at our last port call, Stavanger. At two ports in Iceland we booked Cunard excursions. A fascinating $99 (£62) tour of the western Snaefellsnes Peninsula from Grundafjordor brought us almost within touching distance of nesting kittiwakes on the [...]

By | 2017-06-15T16:00:41+00:00 28 July 2009|Cruise Destinations, Cruise Ships|0 Comments
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One giant leap – on the ice

Not many people can claim they flew to the Moon with Neil Armstrong. Just two, in fact - Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins. And only one of those got dust on his boots. But intrepid cruise passengers now have the opportunity to sail to Antarctica with Armstrong on board Lindblad Expeditions' vessel, the National Geographic Explorer. The three-week voyage leaves Santiago, Chile, and after five days on the White Continent, also calls at South Georgia and Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands before returning to Ushuaia in Argentina. The journey, which was announced as Armstrong celebrated the 40th anniversary of [...]

By | 2017-06-15T16:00:41+00:00 21 July 2009|Cruise Destinations, Cruise News, Cruise Ships|0 Comments
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Taxi for the mountaineer !

Sailing out of Flam to head down Aurlandsfjord and into Sognefjord would have been spectacular enough, with sheer cliffs on either side rising to snow-topped peaks, from which meltwater streams led to precipitous waterfalls. To make it even better, we made the first part of the journey on the bridge of Queen Victoria, thanks to an invitation from Captain Paul Wright. The calm of the operation, overseen by two Norwegian pilots, was broken only by a moment of cruel humour when a late-returning crew member turned up on the quayside just as the last rope had been cast and the [...]

By | 2009-07-18T14:36:35+00:00 18 July 2009|Cruise Destinations|0 Comments
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Trains and boats and planes

Well we've been doing the boat bit for a week and a half now. Or rather ocean liner, as Cunard prefer to describe the Queen Victoria. We did the plane over Geirangerfjord, in the shape of a thrilling helicopter ride. On Friday it was time to take a train, with apologies to Bacharach and David for not travelling on their favourite modes of transport in the right order. Queen Victoria berthed in the early morning at Flam, at the end of an arm of Sognefjord, which at 128 miles from the North Sea to its furthest tip, is the longest [...]

By | 2009-07-18T14:26:34+00:00 18 July 2009|Cruise Destinations|0 Comments
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Flying the fjords without wings

There must be an affinity between sailing on cruise ships and flying in helicopters. While cruising in Alaska on board Radiance of the Seas I flew from Skagway to land on a glacier. In Barcelona a couple of years ago I stepped off P&O's Oriana and into a chopper to swoop over the Sagrada Familia and the Nou Camp stadium. Yesterday in Geiranger, Norway, I left Cunard's Queen Victoria to board a shiny new Eurocopter EC 130 for a 20-minute flight over the fjords. From an improvised landing site high up on the Eagles Bends road, the seven-seater craft dropped [...]

By | 2009-07-16T08:20:28+00:00 16 July 2009|Cruise Destinations|0 Comments
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Cold comfort in Iceland’s north

It was a busy Sunday for the northern Icelandic town of Akureyri. Not only was Cunard's Queen Victoria in the harbour, but in the morning there was also the Costa Magica, which was replaced in the afternoon by the much smaller MV Astor. Thousands of visiting passengers were drawn to the pedestrianised Hafnarstraeti shopping street determined to spend the last of their kroner before heading for Norway. Although, with a population of just 17,000, this is the second largest town in Iceland, and the so-called capital of the north, there were only about a half-dozen souvenir shops open, and people [...]

By | 2009-07-13T17:05:11+00:00 13 July 2009|Cruise Destinations, Cruise Entertainment|2 Comments
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