When "Fully Obstructed" actually means a room with a view...

On Fred Olsen's Balmoral this December, I was lucky enough to be allocated an ocean view cabin on the Lido Deck (deck 8). I was in cabin 8043 - it was a great position on the ship that offered easy access to all the onboard facilities. It had a lifeboat outside the window - but so what?! Did it mean we didn't get any light in the cabin? No... Did it mean I couldn't see the sea? No... Was it a nice cabin? Yes...

Black Tie Fun with Cruise.co.uk

Even Cruise specialists seem to scrub up well. Here's a picture of all of us staged on the main stairwell of the Balmoral on our Christmas Party-Cruise.

Cruise.co.uk Christmas Cruise

What happens when a cruise agent organises a Christmas celebration for its staff aboard a ship sailing from the UK? Everything goes swimmingly and nothing goes wrong, right? Wrong...

Are you a Terrorist?!

When travelling to the United States, you've always had to declare to their immigration people that you're not involved in any terrorist activities, you're not an international drug trafficker and you're basically a normal, well adjusted human being - or they wouldn't let you in.

Well, ever since 9/11, security got even tighter - so it's nice to know that now, when you're travelling to the USA, the days of filling out a green piece of paper on a plane for entry into the US (the I-94, commonly known as the Visa Waiver form) have ended.

Shiver Me Timbers!

Everybody's talking about Pirates... But how much of a threat do they really pose to today's cruiser and what sort of safeguards are in place from the cruise-lines themselves?

Tales of the Unexpected

It might sound a little morbid, but what happens when a passenger dies at sea? It's unexpected, there's nowhere to bury the body on-board so the corpse is either off-loaded at the next port and repatriated back to their home country, or they're stored in the ship's morgue for the duration of the cruise.

Do Mermaids Really Exist?

 

Popular belief has it that the legend of mermaids comes from the Manatee. A mermaid (from the Middle English mere in the obsolete sense 'sea' (as in maritime, the Latin mare, "sea") + maid(en)) is a legendary aquatic creature with the head and torso of human female and the tail of a fish

Seven Godmothers Sail the Seven Seas

Royal Caribbean International officially named its newest cruise ship, Oasis of the Seas, on December the 6th 2009. As has been tradition for centuries, she was christened with a Godmother to look after her... or more specifically, SEVEN Godmothers! Gloria Estefan, Daisy Fuentes, Shawn Johnson, Keshia Knight Pulliam, Michelle Kwan, Jane Seymour and Dara Torres all took their places in history at the launch of this magnificent and revolutionary new ship.

My, That's a Big'un!

Oasis of the Seas - officially the largest passenger ship in the world
- but does it really feel that big onboard?

We had a healthy quota of senior management who were priveleged enough to get out to and get onboard the OotS for its pre-launch trade-partners introduction.

I've spoken to them to get their feedback - and it's all incredibly positive!

Cabin Fever

What happens when a ship gets a contagious virus onboard?!