Weirdest coincidence ever

I like to think I'm a rational man; I'm not religious, I'm not superstitious and I don't believe in fate. A coincidence to me has always just been a coincidence. Sometimes a coincidence is so big though it does just leave you thinking, "hmmmmm, that was weird!"

Can I wear a kilt on my cruise?

You can if you want to. People do.
I've seen loads of people on a formal night wearing their full tartan regalia proudly boasting how these have been their clan colours for the last four or five hundred years -
Except, sorry, they haven't.

Some fun cruise facts

Just came across a website this morning with some interesting cruise facts. Not sure I can believe all of them but if they are true then WOW! See what you think...................

Maritime superstitions

I've just finished watching Sky Ones new drama series Treasure Island, (I recorded it over the Christmas break on V+). I mention it as it was quite good and I recommend you all see it, (even if the ending is completely different to the book and nowhere near as good), but it's also the inspiration for todays post.
As you can imagine there was quite a lot of ships, sailing and sailors involved in the story and one of the sailors happened to mention some maritime superstitions he held.
It gave me the idea for todays post; I thought it might be fun if I put together a top ten list of some of the stranger maritime superstitions/customs that sailors/crew/passengers have held over the years.

Why is New Zealand called 'New' Zealand?

I was booking a cruise to New Zealand for someone yesterday when he made a bit of a joke saying"when are they going to start calling it Zealand, it's not really new anymore".After dutifully chuckling for a second I did start thinking to myself, where is Zealand?
York and New York I get, I know Orleans and New Orleans even, but I'd never heard of Zealand; so where is it?
Well as it turns out there's no such place!

Alaska - Top ten little known facts

I was researching a cruise for a client recently who wanted to add a land tour to his holiday in Alaska. I was reading about the different tours that were available to him and trying to match them up to his cruise when I stumbled over a website full of unusual facts about Alaska.
I'd always known that Alaska was a pretty special destination to cruise to but I hadn't realised how many unique features it had as well.
I've put together a top ten list of little known facts about Alaska below.............

Why are cruise ships always named after women?

Who's her you ask, the cats mother?
But it's a good point I think; why are cruise ships always named after women, or refereed to as a her? Off the top of my head, and I'm prepared to stand corrected here, I could only think of one cruise ship currently in service named after a man and that's the Paul Gauguin, named after the French impressionist of the same name. So why is this; how did this situation arise?
Well as always there's no easy answer to the question, however there are a couple of pretty good theories to explain it........

P&O Aurora..........Is she Haunted?

My regular readers may remember that I sailed onboard the P&O ship Aurora last November; you can read the review for it here. 

Well last night I was printing some pictures off my computer when I noticed the below photo I took in the theatre. 

A blur on the lens?

A reflection of the light ?

Or is the theatre haunted?

The dark side of cruise lines

I received a really interesting email today from a lady that writes an educational blog in America. She wrote a blog back in March about the darker side of the cruise industry and I thought I'd share it all with you.
For instance, did you know.....
Since 2006 Carnival corporation has made $11.3 billion in cumulative profits, but has only paid 1.1% of that out in taxes or that quite often ships are registered in foreign countries to deliberately avoid U.S and U.K labour laws?

For these and even more interesting facts feel free to click the link below.

Did you know........Inside secrets of the cruise lines. 

Happy cruising

Did you know...........?

Anyone that's been following my blog for awhile now will know that I love weird and wacky facts and figures. The more outlandish the better!
I was talking to a client yesterday, booking him a transatlantic cruise when he mentioned offhand a comment about New York and London. I wasn't sure how true it was but after a littler bit of research, (Yahoo answers I'm afraid), It turns out he was right.

How much fuel does a cruise ship use?

A client asked me the other day how much fuel a cruise ship uses on an average voyage compared to his car. I wasn’t sure what to tell him as it wasn’t a question I’d ever been asked before but I went away and did some rough, (very rough), maths work to try and calculate it for him.

You can check out the results below, (the maths is very rough so feel free to correct me if you can).

Who saved the Cruise Industry?

Did you know that the fledgling cruise industry nearly finished before it ever really got started?
Back in the 1930’s it was in some serious trouble with more and more people opting to fly, when help came from the most unlikely of sources.

Can you guess who?

Who'd of thought it - Part two

Got that Monday feeling? Take a read of this and see if it brings a smile to your face as well.
Carrying on from my post the other day, (click here to see it), about some of the surveys to be found in our new Complete Cruise Brochure 2011, I'll be talking today about the ships with the best child facilities onboard. This being a post written by me however you just know the results aren't going to be what you expected.

Why is P&O called P&O?

I thought I’d share a bit of pub trivia with you today, ready for your next cruise. Do you know what the initials P&O stand for and where the name comes from?

Only 9 days now!

Well its finally here, our Christmas countdown has finally reached single figures; there’s only 9 shopping days left till Christmas! Let's hope you're all ready, you don't want to be out shopping on Christmas eve like I always am.
As always click below for todays Christmas advent treat.

Just 11 days left….

Merry Christmas all. Nearly down to single digits now, are you all ‘feeling’ the Christmas spirit? Let’s see if todays advent treat will help.

16 days left till Xmas

Merry Christmas everyone. For todays advent treat read on to find out how we very nearly lost Christmas altogether.

How do you pronounce Caribbean?

I know it seems like a silly point, but do you say Kara-be-an or Car-ib-e-an?
Although the pronunciation most favoured in the UK is Kara-be-an if you’re in the islands the pronunciation the locals use sounds like Kar-ib-e-an.

The Future of Cruising

This is a subject that really does concern us all, but it’s been on my mind more and more with the approaching launch of Allure of the Seas.
Where’s it going to end?
 Are cruise ships going to keep getting bigger and bigger with even more people/mod cons/gadgets crammed into them? Or are people going to turn away from then and hark back to a more traditional age of cruising?

25 hour a day Cruising

Admit it, when you’re aboard your cruise ship it never seems like you have enough time to do everything you want. There just aren’t enough hours in the day.
Or is there?
Proving the old adage true, ‘you learn something new every day’, I found out something about cruising today that I'd never heard before.