You can sleep with the balcony door open. Just be considerate about it. That’s the latest clarification from Carnival Cruise Line’s Brand Ambassador John Heald, who recently addressed a frequent point of confusion among cruise passengers. Some guests have written to Heald in complaint, saying that passengers sleeping with their balcony doors open are inconsiderate
Two Mexico destinations are getting a big boost in cruise arrivals thanks to Royal Caribbean’s first-time deployment of Ovation of the Seas to the Port of Los Angeles. The Quantum-class ship is the first in that class to seasonally homeport in the City of Angels. With capacity for 4,100 guests, Ovation of the Seas joins
Diana Ross, the “queen of Motown Records” whose talent as lead vocalist for The Supremes catapulted her to stardom in the 1960s, will serve as godmother to Royal Caribbean’s Star of the Seas, the second ship in the line’s pioneering Icon class. Royal Caribbean announced the selection of Ross to the honorary post on June
An Alaskan cruise can be a once-in-a-lifetime adventure for travelers and is certainly a bucket-list sailing even for experienced guests. Thousands of guests booked to visit the Last Frontier in 2026, however, are now learning that they won’t be going to one of the state’s most important and historically significant cities. Royal Caribbean guests booked
The very first Carnival cruise ship was the Mardi Gras. The ship started sailing for Carnival in 1972, and the “Fun Ships” have kept coming ever since! Mardi Gras was 27,200 gross tons, a huge difference from the new 183,521 gross ton Excel-class vessels we see today. As of December 4, 2023, the newest new-build
From embarkation check-in at the terminal to lunchtime at the buffet to waiting to enter a show before the evening’s entertainment, there are a lot of lines on any cruise vacation. But who wants to waste precious hours of a getaway standing in lines? Savvy cruisers have plenty of tricks to shorten those waits without
Virgin Voyages has just notified guests three days ahead of their upcoming cruise on Valiant Lady of some important itinerary changes that are taking place as a result of engine maintenance. “We have made an itinerary update to your Dominican Daze voyage, sailing on June 6, 2025,” the email notification read. This letter was sent
Cruisers Down Under planning to sail aboard Carnival Adventure in mid-2027 will need to make new plans. Carnival Cruise Line announced it is cancelling all voyages on the 108,865-gross-ton ship between May 17 and June 14, 2027. The cancellations affect six different itineraries from Sydney, including popular routes to the Great Barrier Reef, Vanuatu, and Moreton Island.
No traveler wants an emergency to interrupt their cruise vacation, and in fact, escaping from the realities of life on land can be a tremendous advantage to a cruise. Unfortunately, emergencies do sometimes happen, but how would someone at home reach out to a guest onboard a cruise ship to alert them to such a
A celebratory steel-cutting ceremony on June 4, 2025 marked the start of construction of Oceania Sonata, Oceania Cruises’ ninth ship and the first in a new class of vessel for the upmarket line. The event, at Fincantieri’s shipyard in Marghera, Italy, coincided with other big reveals by the cruise line — the names of its
It’s common knowledge that cruise lines have a legal obligation to render aid to refugees while at sea. Even if it wasn’t mandated, offering help is the moral and ethical thing to do – and could mean the difference between life and death. Under Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS), which is a set of
Every cruise traveler knows the spiel from the safety briefing, that fire is the most dangerous situation onboard a ship. Guests aboard MSC Cruises’ MSC Orchestra experienced that situation firsthand on Monday night and Tuesday, June 2-3, 2025. The ship first had a very brief electrical fire, reportedly in an electrical panel in the ship’s
