THE CRUISE INSIDER

Friday, 2 May, 1952 At London Airport (as Heathrow was once called) it is a cool and drizzly afternoon, but by 3pm the rain has let up and a few rays of sunshine are piercing the grey cloud cover. A lone white-and-silver jetliner, call sign G-ALYP, is taxiing across the damp tarmac towards the runway. It is a de Havilland DH106 Comet from British Overseas Airways Corporation (B.O.A.C) - the world’s first commercial jetliner. With its mirrored aluminium fuselage, conical nose,

Tuesday 25 August, 1964 Off the coast of Copenhagen, Denmark: A sleek, snow-white cargoliner makes its way South down the Øresund – the narrow sound between Sweden and Denmark. Along both coastlines people are lined up with binoculars and cameras, hoping for a closer look at this amazing new ship. Ship savants and amateur futurists enthusiastically rattle off ship stats or smugly point out the significance of the non-existent smokestack to anyone who will listen. But even to

‘Hello? .. Yes, good evening! My name is Ted Arison and I’m calling from Miami, USA. We’ve never met but boy, do I have a great business proposal for you!’ I have no idea if those were the exact words but as cold calls go, this was one of the most consequential calls in cruise history, not for a single business, but for an entire fledgling industry. And within lies the rest of the answer to my original question; Why is the history of the contemporary Western cruise industry t

Look around the twentieth century Western cruisescape and what do you see? Norwegians, right?! Norwegians everywhere! You may not have noticed them because these crafty mountain folk look a lot like any other Tom, Dick and Harry but ask them a question in English and that exotic vowel use and playful accent that makes every statement sound like a question are dead giveaways. You probably think I’m kidding, but I’m not. The world’s third-largest cruise corporation is called No

Some pages in cruise history beg to be read not for their satisfying resolution or long-lasting contributions to the evolution of the concept, but for their dramatic spectacle and baffling circumstance. The wreck of the Costa Concordia did not teach the industry anything it did not already know: it is still a bad idea to captain on a cocktail of machismo, libido and Amaretto (paraphrasing the findings of the wreck inquiry)! There was no industry-wide reckoning with navigation

The British auxiliary steamer SS Ceylon made cruising history in 1881 by being the first ship in history to not only take on a full-time luxury cruising role but also to carry out the first world cruise under the banner of the Inter-Oceanic Steam Yachting Co. Ltd., but having read my previous article Following Fogg, you of course already know this. What you probably do not know, is that this was only the first half of her long and illustrious cruise career. After John Lockie

Hip hip Hooray! My blog has come of age! Only one year in and sixteen colorful stories from cruise history down already. That only goes to show what you can accomplish when you can’t go anywhere, can’t see anyone and have reached the end of your Netflix queue (for future reference: this was year 1 of the Covid-19 pandemic). At such an important / arbitrary juncture it is important to stop and smell the flowers, pat yourself on the back for beating that writer's block and to r

For more than 40 years a 'covert' cruise operation was running on the border of Europe and Asia Minor – a large one with a substantial fleet of ships taking thousands of people on leisure cruises, yet hidden from view by the Iron Curtain and Soviet isolationism. Yes, the Soviet Union operated a consolidated cruise industry long before the modern American version formed in the 1960’s, in fact they operated two distinct cruise fleets, which is why this is going to be part one o

Imagine a school where you learn French one day and the next you are in downtown Marseille putting your new skills to the test. Learn about Greek Antiquity one day and the next you are strolling around the Acropolis studying ancient history. Learn about religion one day, and the next you are touring the Vatican, seeing religion manifest in front of you. Many British school children of the pre- and post-WWII era did not have to imagine that – they had it and they had it on a v

In the 1930’s arose a cruise company – literally out of nowhere – that went on to dominate the European cruise market in terms of volume. They were innovative, progressive and squarely focused on the developing mainstream market. At the height of their success they operated a fleet of 10 ships (including some of the newest and biggest cruise ships in the world), carried almost 750.000 passengers throughout the thirties and operated everywhere between the North Cape and the Me

If you are a contemporary cruiser you probably think that ‘booze cruise’ describes that time you took the Fiesta party boat in Cozumel and ended up dancing the Macarena on a table before falling gracelessly overboard. Well, it does that too! But there have been other ‘booze cruises’ in history, some of whom have had much more influence on the development of the cruise concept than your drunken little escapade. On January 17, 1920 the National Prohibition Act (aka the Volstead

The yacht! – the word itself is elitist and exclusive. If you saw it in print for the first time, how would you even know to pronounce it [ˈyät] and not more like [Jącht] (as in the original Dutch). It requires a degree of connoisseurship (another elitist word) to get right. And demographically, who does the word make you think of? Millionaires, billionaires, kings and queens, of course! And geographically? Monaco, Bahamas, azure seas and island paradises! And semantically? L

In the sparsely documented realm of cruising history there is no shortage of ships claiming the title of world’s first cruise ship for one reason or another, but if we look for the first purpose-built luxury cruise ship, designed exclusively for cruising, there is only really one candidate: the Prinzessin Victoria Luise – the White Princess. Unfortunately, unlike many other princesses, she did not get to live happily ever after. Wednesday, 16 December, 1906 - 09:30pm Off King

The first real luxury cruise in history. The first leisure cruises in history were spartan affairs by today’s standards – the only parameter that even hinted at luxury was the price of the ticket. Ships were small and fragile, accommodation was basic, food and beverages were unsophisticated, and amenities and facilities very limited. It took significant advances in maritime engineering, ship design and experiential format before the cruise product matured to a point where you

Or How bananas pioneered Caribbean cruise tourism! The next time you eat a banana, take a moment to appreciate that you are likely enjoying a genuine cruise history artefact. From the turn of the twentieth century, reefer ships from a massive fruit trading company came to shape the Caribbean cruise market, appeal and logistics and pioneer the framework of the modern cruise industry, and here’s how. It started with a railway... …as these things do. In 1871 the government of Co

Or the birth of 'the Everyman Cruise'. When I announced I was going to work on cruise ships in 1999, the jovial response from friends was that I was going to be 'hobnobbing with the rich and famous' on board. I soon discovered that was not going to be the case, but the common stereotype that ‘Cruising is for millionaires’ has been around since the earliest days of cruising and is surprisingly enduring, even while no longer true. In reality, cruising has become a mainstream an

Ever been to Alaska? You should totally go! It is stunningly beautiful up there, the wildlife is amazing, locals are so hospitable and don’t even get me started on the delicious seafood. I met my wonderful wife up there so I may be biased but believe me, there are plenty reasons to go (beyond any prospects of matrimony). Unsurprisingly, it is a destination best explored by ship, particularly the Panhandle, as many small towns are sealocked and much of the most impressive scen

Or The (real) First World Cruise in History! Wikipedia and other select sources will have you believe that the first around-the-world cruise was the 130-day voyage of Cunard’s RMS Laconia in 1923. Today I will be setting that record straight. English ship broker John Lockie Clarke was 21 when Jules Verne's Around the world in 80 days was published and might very well have read it, as it fed right into his love of leisure travel, shipping and exotic destinations. Who is to say

Saturday, June 8, 1867 New Work, New York: a young(ish) American journalist with a magnificent moustache drags himself and his hangover up the rain-slicked gangway of the steamship SS Quaker City in South Street Seaport. The Quaker City is about to embark on a 5-month ‘grand pleasure excursion’ to the Holy Land (and assorted other Mediterranean destinations) and the journalist has persuaded his editor to book him passage so that he may report on this exciting new holiday vent

How old is cruising as a leisure travel product? – When did the first paying guests venture out to sea for no other reason than the pursuit of leisure and exploration?’ That is a question I frequently start out with when ‘talking cruise’. Many laymen answer ‘In the sixties’ which would be true if I had asked about the origins of the modern cruise industry, but to find the genesis of cruising as a commercial leisure travel phenomenon, you need to go further back … much further