THE CRUISE INSIDER

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