The Avid Cruiser

1. In 1840, Cunard Line’s R.M.S. Britannia became the first ship to take passengers on regularly scheduled transatlantic crossings. Today, the Queen Mary 2 continues Cunard’s tradition of Atlantic crossings.
2. Holland America Line’s first ship crossed the Atlantic in 1873, sailing in 15 days from Holland to New York. The Rotterdam carried eight first-class passengers and 128 in steerage.
3. The first commercial jet aircraft crossing of the Atlantic in 1958 brought about the demise of the transatlantic ocean liner and in doing so, spawned the modern-day cruise industry. Out-of-work liners were scrapped or sold for a song. Those that survived sailed toward the sun, giving birth to Caribbean cruising.
4. Immigrants to America counted the number of ship funnels as an indication of safety. Companies like White Star began to add fake funnels to their ships, including the Titanic, which featured three working smokestacks and one fake one.
5. So the story goes: Cunard’s venerable Queen Mary, now docked and operating as a hotel in Long Beach, California, was originally to be named Queen Victoria, following Cunard’s tradition of ending ship names with an “ia.” Cunard Chairman Sir Thomas Royden was reported to have asked King George V if he would approve of naming the new ship after England’s greatest queen, by which Royden meant the king’s grandmother, Queen Victoria. The king replied that his wife, Queen Mary, would be honored. The Queen Mary was retired in 1967, after completing 1,001 crossings of the Atlantic. - Ralph Grizzle

Cruising America’s ‘Great Land’ could just be one of your life’s greatest journeys. It was for me. Continue Reading »

One way to fight that sinking feeling when it’s time to disembark your cruise: Stay on board.

Valletta, Malta – As I stood talking to fellow passengers at the end of a weeklong Mediterranean sailing on Windstar Cruises, it soon became clear that I was a mere babe when it came to the number of times I had sailed on Windstar. My only other cruise on the line had been five years ago, a seven-day jaunt along the Italian Coast. Sure, two cruises made me an alumnus, but certainly not what you would call a frequent Windstar cruiser. Continue Reading »

Australia’s Outback is wild and rugged, and you can get there on a cruisetour before or after your Australia/New Zealand cruise.

Beneath the starry skies of Alice Springs, billy tea boils over a blazing campfire, kangaroo stew simmers on smoldering coals, and Rod Steinert, a rugged outback bushman, allows a three-inch witchetty grub to dangle from his lips.

‘The witchetty grub,’ Steinert explains while attempting to keep the writhing creature from escaping his lips, ‘was a major source of food for Aborigines who traveled Australia’s outback.’ Continue Reading »

I had traveled the world before traveling to Quebec, and if my foot could reach my behind, I would kick myself for doing so. Of all the places I have visited, Quebec surely ranks in my top ten. The irony is that I traveled halfway around the world to visit less-inspiring places when Quebec was (and is) fewer than three hours by air from my home. The French-speaking Canadian province is practically in my own backyard, and yet it took a cruise (from Boston) and 49 years to get me there. Continue Reading »

It’s a 2.5-hour drive from Quebec City to the Saguenay region. We pointed our car toward La Baie, where we checked in to L’ Auberge des 21. Located on the shore of the Saguenay Fjord, the warm family inn also features fine regional (read: French) cuisine at a shockingly good restaurant for such a small inn. Continue Reading »