Being watched

Queen Elizabeth's arrival in Southampton is a really big deal locally with a tremendous amount of civic support and public interest. A local excursion company is actually running excursion boats (for a price), shown above, around the ship just so people can get close. It's interesting that as tight as security is, there doesn't seem to be a security zone around the ship from the water.

Making Chefs at Sea

Beginning this fall, home cooking aficionados can brush up their skills and learn new ones in the galleys aboard Liberty of the Seas and Freedom of the Seas.

The new cooking programs are presented by Chefmakers Cooking Academy, and seem to be a step above the cooking demonstrations by the chef, even the ones on some lines, where they are presented in small groups, because Chefmakers' are actual hands-on experiences and in the ships' galleys. They do seem to be for slightly-above-novice cook, but not really for the already-accomplished.


Complete details were in the article in the October 8, 2010, edition of Cruise News Daily.

iCarly Stars to Join Nickelodeon Cruises

iCarly is one of Nickelodeon's top shows. It's therefore only natural that two of iCarly's stars are going to be showing up on Nick's All Access Cruises aboard NCL.

Jennette McCurdy (who plays Sam Puckett) will appear on the All Access Cruise aboard Norwegian Jewel on February 20 (from New York), and Nathan Kress (who plays Freddie
Benson) will be aboard Norwegian Epic's sailing on July 24 (from Barcelona) to meet his fans.


The complete article appeared in the October 8, 2010, edition of Cruise News Daily.

Swan Hellenic Owner Makes a Stink, Debit Cards on Cruise Ships, RCI Expands, Vancouver Confused

CND subscribers read about some stinky comments made by the head of Swan Hellenic Cruises ... some questionable debit cards being used aboard cruise ships ... Royal Caribbean expanding their call center ... the Port of Vancouver being confused about why their cruise business is down ... and some cool new MSC ads.


Details appeared in the "Other Things You'll Want to Know" column in the October 8, 2010, edition of Cruise News Daily.

MSC's Clever New Ad Campaign

When we sail aboard MSC, we often comment on the European styling of the furnishings. The difference is subtle, but distinctive. That difference is coming across in some new ads the line has produced which are beginning to appear around the world. The series of 14 scenes was shot aboard MSC Splendida and feature real MSC employees. The scenes each focus on one element of the cruise experience (such as dining, glamorous cocktails, wellness, fun for the kids, entertainment) where some part of the scene forms one of the letters of MSC and the others are superimposed on the screen. As part of the MSC “employee” family, having christened eight of the eleven ships, Sophia Loren provides the voiceover for the TV spots. A couple of examples are seen below: