We’ve got several stories in our cruise news show this week.  Oceania celebrates their fourth birthday, Princess and Cunard both get new Commodores, and Queen Victoria gets ready to float out of dry dock.  Max Mayfield from the National Hurricane Center will be sailing on Regent Sven Seas this year, Celebrity announces the name of their third planned Solstice class ship, Costa Serena’s naming to be held in Marseilles, and NCL America introduces a new hula program on their ships.

This week’s Deal of The Week can better be described as a Deal for The Year because it’s good throughout 2007.  Check out the details here.

As always you can find the show up on iTunes, on Digg or click on one of the links below to play the show right in your browser window or to download it to your computer.

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 News for the Week of January 15 [28:31m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (104)

Celebrity Cruises is kicking off the new year by announcing the name of the third “celestial” ship in its 118,000 gross-registered-ton Solstice-class fleet. Celebrity Eclipse will make its maiden voyage in 2010, following sister ships Celebrity Solstice in 2008 and Celebrity Equinox in 2009, bringing the Celebrity fleet to 13 ships.

Like its sister ships, Celebrity Eclipse will have larger standard staterooms, 90 percent of which will be outside, and 85 percent will have verandas. The 2,850-guest ships will have an exceptional range of guest-inspired services and amenities, and will measure 1,033 feet in length and 121 feet in width. German shipbuilder Meyer Werft will build the new tonnage.

“Naming Celebrity Eclipse brings us that much closer to making this phenomenal new class a reality,” said Celebrity Cruises President Dan Hanrahan. “Our brand is in a period of significant growth and momentum, and our new Solstice class exemplifies that expansion in an incredibly exciting way.”

The announcement of Celebrity Eclipse comes just one month after the news of Celebrity Quest, the third ship in the line’s “Celebrity Expeditions” class of smaller ships designed to round out the brand with tailored-to-market products in exotic locations.

Back to our normal routine of two episodes a week.  First up is our traditional cruise news show, although the week was a bit slow.  This week we have some news from Crystal, Princess, Silversea, Cunard, Celebrity and Royal Caribbean.

Don’t forget to check on the Deal of the Week  featuring a fantastic sailing to the Eastern Mediterranean onboard Royal Caribbean’s Legend of The Seas.

As always you can find the show in iTunes and you can always download the show or play it right in your browser window by clicking on the links below.  Are you a fan of Digg?  We’re now listed in the podcast section on Digg, head over there and give us a Digg, plus feel free to Digg your favorite episodes too.

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 News For January 8, 2007 [31:33m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (97)

Celebrity Cruises today announced plans to evolve its fleetwide culinary program, ending its affiliation with Master Chef Michel Roux. The mutual agreement coincides with the end of Roux’s current contract with Celebrity.

“Chef Roux has offered valuable culinary consultation and direction since the Celebrity brand was founded, and played an integral role in helping our brand achieve the recognition it maintains today for offering fresh, gourmet cuisine,” said Celebrity’s President Dan Hanrahan. “We are very grateful to Chef Roux for the foundation he helped us establish, and are confident in our ability to continue to deliver an extraordinary dining experience for our guests across the fleet.”

Every Celebrity ship has a highly experienced Food and Beverage team, headed by executive chefs and food and beverage managers who honed their skills in some of Europe’s finest restaurants and hotels. They completed intensive training led by Chef Roux both during Chef Roux’s onboard visits totaling well over 100 during the 15-year partnership and also, in the case of a few of Celebrity’s most promising chefs, training at his Waterside Inn restaurant in England. Similarly, the Food and Beverage Operations team based at Celebrity’s headquarters bring extensive land-based and shipboard culinary experience enabling them to effectively direct and complement the shipboard colleagues.

“Chef Roux has offered, and we have accepted, to assist Celebrity during the transition, and will be available in the future to offer advice and guidance,” said Hanrahan. “Meanwhile, on behalf of all of us at Celebrity, I thank him for all his contributions, and wish him the very best.”

Celebrity Cruises has taken another significant step in its quest to expand the “Celebrity Expeditions” extension of the brand. Celebrity Quest will join Celebrity Expeditions in 2007, pairing new avenues for delivering the “Celebrity Treatment” with exotic new itineraries for the vessel and its sister ship, Celebrity Journey. The three-ship class includes Celebrity Xpedition, which has sailed in the Galapagos Islands since 2004.

“Rounding out the Celebrity brand has been a strong focus for our company, and the expansion of Celebrity Expeditions furthers that strategic objective,” said Celebrity’s President Dan Hanrahan. “Celebrity Quest, Celebrity Journey and Celebrity Xpedition combined represent a natural extension of the brand as we move into new markets with tailored-to-market products.”

We have additional information about Celebrity Quest and Celebrity Journey when you click on “more” or call us at 888-286-9827 for more information about all of the itineraries offered by Celebrity Expeditions.

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Not a whole lot of news again this week, so we just did one show.  The few things that did happen:

• Celebrity kicks off their Savor the Caribbean series onboard Millennium on January 7.
• Princess launches a scrapbooking program.
• Norwegian Gem sailings opening.

Since the traditional way most people observe Thanksgiving is to eat, this week we talking about onboard dining.  Everybody knows that lots of food is available on a cruise ship, that’s the easy part.  ;)  We talk some of the other things that you should know, like making arrangements for special meals, the differences between early seating and late seatings, and alternative dining options.

Since we’re talking about food, it only makes sense to have a Deal of the Week that’s food related.  We’ve got a great deal on one of the Savor the Caribbean sailings onboard Celebrity’s Millennium.  Check it out here.

As always you can find the show in iTunes or click below to download it or listen right in your browser window.

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 Dining Onboard [41:51m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (79)

Celebrity Cruises is serving up another sizzling “Savor the Caribbean” series featuring some of the nation’s hottest chefs. Celebrity’s fourth annual series will take place on Millennium’s seven-night Eastern Caribbean sailings from January 7 through March 4, 2007, with a host of celebrated chefs and restaurateurs.

So just who will be onboard?  Click on “more” below to find out, then call us at 888-286-9827 to book one of these fantastic sailings!

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It was a slow week this week, so we decided to do just one show. There just wasn’t a lot of news this past week and we decided to keep this week’s feature, cruise line loyalty programs short.

In the news this week:

• Celebrity partners with Lead Frog
• QM2 in Germany for repairs
• Carnival Triumph to sail seasonal Eastern Caribbean itinerary.
• Princess to hold simultaneous ship naming
• Trouble onboard Carnival Liberty
• Celebrity deals with some bad news

Once finished with the news we discussed the various loyalty programs offered by the crews lines. Some of the highlights of what’s offered:

• Princess’ Captain Circle which offers things like complementary internet access in their cyber-cafes.
• Celebrity’s Captain’s Club which is one of the richest programs available, not only can you get reciprocal benefits onboard Royal Caribbean, but there are also added benefits you can get if you’re a Captain’s Club member and enroll in the Crown and Anchor Society on Royal Caribbean.
• Holland America loves to recognize their Mariner Society members, check out the neat tiles that Mariner Society members get when they sail on Holland America by going here.

Don’t forget to check out this week’s Deal of the Week, and you can always find the show in iTunes. Click below to download the show right to your computer or play it in your browser.

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 Some Loyal News [42:49m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (67)

It’s been a difficult few days for Celebrity Cruise Lines.  First there was news that the line was fined $100,000 for discharging more than half a million gallons of untreated waste water into Puget Sound and the Straights of Juan de Fuca.  According to the Washington Department of Ecology, Celebrity’s Mercury discharged untreated wastewater 10 times over 9 days in September and October of 2005.  The discharges were mostly of untreated sink, shower, and laundry water with a small percentage of treated sewage.

Today comes word that Celebrity is canceling the Dec 10 sailing of Millennium in order to make repairs to the ship’s propulsion system.  Passengers booked on the canceled sailing will receive a refund and a free future cruise.  Repairs to the ship’s port thrust bearing is expected to be completed in time for the ship to re-enter service on December 17.

WE’RE BACK!!!!!  That’s right, the number 1 cruise news and cruise information podcast on the internet is back!  Ok, well I’m not 100% certain that this is the number 1 cruise news and cruise information podcast on the internet, but I do know that this is the number 1 cruise news and cruise information podcast on the web that we produce!

We’re run a little long with this, we’ve got a lot of news to cover, but since it’s been two weeks without a show we thought it would be ok if we ran a bit long.

The news from the last week or so:

• There’s a price on your head! (sorry you’re going to have to listen to find out what this is about! )
• Carnival brings year round cruising to San Diego
• Missing passenger on Century
• NCL confirms contract for new ships
• Blackout hits Europe, Norwegian Pearl partly responsible
• Carnival Conquest reports man overboard
• Holland American Line names first Signature Class ship
• Norwegian Gem announcements and Med itineraries
• Windstar offering luggage service
• Port of Miami terminal improvement plan
• Patricia gets her Princess certification

Don’t forget to check out the Deal of The Week too, I promise the Deal of The Week will be getting theme music soon.

As always you can find the show in iTunes or click below to download the show or play it right in your browser.

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 News for the Week of November 13 [46:17m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (73)