Cruise Entertainment

Readers who saw my earlier post, or who have been following on Twitter, will know that this week I am back in south-east Asia, and back on board Aegean Odyssey,on which I have enjoyed two cruises in the Mediterranean. I flew into Singapore on Friday and boarded the ship on Saturday afternoon. As we sailed through the evening towards Kuala Lumpur, dinner provided an opportunity to meet some of the fellow-passengers. I shared a table with former war correspondent and one-time MP Martin Bell, who seemed as keen to learn about my exploits at the Daily Mirror as I am [...]

One word darlings. Ah-MAY-zing. Acid-tongued Strictly Come Dancing judge Craig Revel Horwood will be joining seven (sorry, Len Goodman, SEH-VEN) P&O cruises next year along with a whole troupe of professional dancers from the hit BBC show. They will be strutting theitr stuff and showing passengers how to make an impression on the dance floor during voyages throughout the summer on five of the ships in P&O's fleet. Costumes from the show will be on display. Ian Waite and Natalie Lowe on a 13-night Canary Islands cruise on Azura departing May 11, 2013. Ports of call are Madeira, La Palma, [...]

After his success last Christmas with the Military Wives, Gareth Malone has again been showing TV viewers recently how he can take reluctant singers and turn them into competent choristers. National Symphony Orchestra conductor Anthony Inglis has a different problem when he takes to the sea aboard Cunard's Queen Mary 2 - accommodating all the passengers who want to join the scratch choir. On a recent Transatlantic crossing, more than 200 volunteered - enough to form two separate choirs who then took part in a Last Night of the Cunard Proms event on the final evening of the voyage. The [...]

My thanks to the people at CruiseCompare.co.uk for this piece of weekend fun - a collection of crazy complaints from cruise passengers. 1. No window in an inside cabin The clue is in the name but maybe this guest should read-up on the different cabin types before booking next time. They may even treat themselves to a balcony. 2.The engine is too loud One passenger overheard a man asking the captain to turn the engine off as it was too loud. Would he prefer to be stranded at sea? 3. Waiter is too quick There are always going to be [...]

The headquarters of Crystal Cruise Lines are in Century City, Los Angeles. The company is a subsidiary of the giant Japanese shipping conglomerate, Nippon Yusen Kaisha. Crystal Serenity, on which I have been travelling for the past week, was built in St Nazaire, France, and I have been mingling with passengers from all over the world. Since I embarked in Athens, I've met people from New York, Chicago, Florida and California. From Canada, South America, South Africa and Australia. Not to mention those from China, Japan and the Philippines. Plus the Israelis who joined us in Haifa for the remainder [...]

When cruise ship actor and dancer Danny Burns decided to propose to his girlfriend, he recruited the help of his fellow performers from Cunard's Queen Victoria and the glorious setting of Piazza San Marco in Venice to make sure she accepted. The trick worked, as this heart-warming video shows. No wonder Shonagh Daly looked shocked - she was the only one not in on the secret as the flashmob danced to Hall and Oates's You Make My Dreams Come True outside the Doges' Palace last month, after hours of secret rehearsal on the ship. Both Danny, 36, from Sheffield, and [...]