Get off a cruise and into custody: Passenger wrongly nailed as hooker

by Tom Johansmeyer on

What do you do when your mom is arrested for prostitution? Well, you probably claim that she didn’t do it. After all, she’s your mom, and nobody admits to guilt on these things anyway. If you were Paola Londono’s kid, you’d actually be right to proclaim her innocence.

Thanks to a clerical error in the Osceola County Sheriff’s office, Londono, from Orlando, was arrested when she stepped off a cruise ship for allegedly making a living in the world’s oldest profession. She spent more than 36 hours in the Broward County pokey, because she had the same name as the actual suspect, who is seven years younger … five inches taller and 40 pounds lighter. The younger Londono is going to face charge of heroin possession and possession of drug paraphernalia – in addition to prostitution.

[photo by indi.ca via Flickr]

G’day mate: Cruise lines head Down Under

by Ralph Grizzle on

Why would anyone choose to cruise Australia when there is so much to see in the interior? Two reasons: 1) Australia’s coast is spectacular, and some of the continent’s best-known cities — Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane Darwin and Perth — dot the coastline; and 2) cruise packages are designed to put passengers off the ship and into the Outback.

The latter packages feature so-called cruisetours, which are nothing more than a cruise and a tour combined. Cruise lines create these seamless excursions to allow passengers to have a full experience beyond the shoreline.

Both Celebrity Cruises and Holland America Line have developed a number of cruisetours to tie in with the deployment of their ships in the region next year.

Celebrity’s guests can select from four packages ranging from four to five nights. On the list of attractions: Ayers Rock, the world-famous giant red monolith, and the Great Barrier Reef.

Holland America Line also has Alice Springs as an alternative, the remote town in Australia’s Northern Territory. Among the experiences I had while in Alice Springs was ingesting witchetty grub, pictured above (for the delectable details, see Australian Outback Buffet: Garnish The Grubs, Pass The Maggots Please).Cruise lines are headed Down Under in record numbers. Remember, the seasons are reversed from the Northern Hemisphere, so itineraries get cranking in earnest around Christmastime.

Early next year, Silversea’s Silver Shadow departs Sydney on a 30-day circumnavigation voyage of Australia. It will be a first-ever for luxury cruise operator Silversea, which plans to visit Australia’s major cities as well as lesser-known ports.

Holland America Line will send not one, but two cruise ships to Australia in 2011. The Seattle-based cruise line will deploy its ships on itineraries that take in Australia and New Zealand.

Likewise, the two sister companies Royal Caribbean and Celebrity Cruises plan to put more emphasis on cruises around Australia and New Zealand. Following suit with Holland America Line, Royal Caribbean will deploy two ships instead of one in the region next year. Celebrity Cruises will return to the land Down Under after a two-year absence, when the Celebrity Century begins cruising the region late next year. Century also will offer a circumnavigation of Australia, divided into two combinable 18-night sailings.

In 2012, Cunard Line’s flagship Queen Mary 2 also will circumnavigate Australia, a first for Cunard.

Cruising Greenland: An inconvenient, but worthwhile trip

by Ralph Grizzle on

In 2007, it was possible to board a flight in Baltimore and set foot fewer than five hours later in Kangerlussuaq, Greenland’s largest commercial airport.

From Kangerlussuaq, it was a short hop to board Hurtigruten’s (a Norwegian cruise company) Fram to cruise Greenland’s dramatic coastline. But in 2008, Air Greenland ceased operations from North America, and today, a trip to Greenland is indeed an inconvenient one.

Getting there from the U.S. requires connecting through Reykjavik or points beyond in Europe, primarily Copenhagen, so that you board a plane in the U.S., fly over Greenland, disembark, board another plane, and fly back in the direction from which you came. Returning home requires the same travel in the wrong direction and flying once again over Greenland.

Despite the inconvenience, Greenland is well worth a visit, and one of the best ways to see the world’s largest island is by ship. While Fram operates the most extensive Greenland itineraries (ranging from 11 days to 14 days), other cruise lines typically include Greenland on repositioning cruises from Europe, across the North Atlantic, to North America. The Faroe Islands, Iceland and Newfoundland are often included on these itineraries as well. Among the cruise lines that call on Greenland: Crystal Cruises, Holland America Line, Princess Cruises and Silversea Cruises.During the summer months, glaciers disperse chunky icebergs that choke Greenland’s idyllic bays. Point a camera in any direction and snap to your battery blinks. With 80 percent of its surface covered in ice, Greenland is a spectacle to behold.

I cruised Greenland earlier this month on All Discovery Cruising’s mv Discovery. The ship itself was no-frills, as old as it was English. Anglophiles will no doubt enjoy the on-board ambience, where it’s possible to belly up to the bar for a pint of Bass Ale or shimmy up to the table for such British Isles favorites as Shepherd’s Pie, porridge, tea and scones.

The star of the show, of course, was Greenland itself, and though our feet were ashore fewer than 10 hours during the six full days we were on board, the trip was one that imprinted indelible images of icebergs and rugged coastal landscapes. Meeting native Greenlandic people and visiting their homes was a bonus in the ports of Nuuk and Qaqortoq, the only place name in the world, I am told, boasting three of the letter q.

We missed a full day in the UNESCO World Heritage region Disko Bay and the icefjord of Ilulissat. For an explanation and photos of icebergs, see Icebergs in Ilulissat, Greenland: A day in Disko Bay on my site, Avid Cruiser.

Greenland is also what National Geographic referred to in a recent issue of its magazine as “ground zero” for measuring the impact of global warming. If there is significant melting of the icecap, coastal dwellers worldwide should plan on moving to higher ground.

You can’t help but visit Greenland and be reminded of the premises that Al Gore laid out in “An Inconvenient Truth.” And though Greenland itself is “an inconvenient trip” for North Americans, it can be a life-changing one in small, but not insignificant, ways.

Lindblad Expeditions announces upcoming Global Luminaries

by Kraig Becker on

Lindblad Expeditions has earned itself a reputation as one of the top adventure travel companies on the planet, offering a wide variety of options for travelers to visit the far flung corners of the globe. The company is well known for having some of the best trained and most knowledgeable staff in the entire industry, offering clients great insights into the places that they visit. But their “Global Luminaries” program takes that reputation to a whole new level, with a line-up of very impressive specials guest that will enhance an already great trip even further.

These dignitaries come from a wide variety of fields, but are generally broken down into four categories; World Affairs, Broadcast Journalism, Exploration, and Research. Each of the Global Luminaries will be joining guests aboard the National Geographic Explorer, one of Lindblad’s luxury cruise ships, for a specifically selected journey through a region of the world that they know well and can offer unique perspectives on. For example, when the ship visits the historic waterways of the Baltic at the end of August and Early September of this year, and again in 2011, passengers will share that journey with former Soviet Premiere Mikhail Gorbachev as well as the former President of Poland, and Nobel Prize winner, Lech Walesa.

Other famous names on the list of luminaries include well-known naturalist and television personality Jim Fowler, former astronaut Rick Hauck, mountaineer and explorer Peter Hillary, son of Sir Edmund Hillary, Mary Robinson, the first female president of Ireland, and ocean rower Roz Savage. But those are just the beginning, as there are a number of other scientists, explorers, and writers scheduled to take part in the fun as well.

For the complete list of Global Luminaries, and the trips they’ll be taking part in for the rest of 2010 and 2011, click here.

[Photo credit: Lindblad Expeditions]

Moscow by cruise ship? Yes, it’s possible, but worth it?

by Ralph Grizzle on

Increasingly, cruise lines are developing shore excursions that serve up ultra-exclusive experiences, but are these “private access” experiences worth what they cost?

On Crystal Cruises, for example, cruise passengers can experience the same training that cosmonauts undergo at the world’s largest hydrolab, situated at Star City in Moscow.

Prepare to pay to play, however. The excursion, which goes by the name “Hydro-Space: The Final Challenge” goes for a stratospheric $32,995 per person, which would no doubt be the “final challenge” for flimsier wallets.

Still pricey, but certainly within the grasp of mere mortals, are day excursions to Moscow, which Silversea Cruises offers for $999 per person, from St. Petersburg.

The excursion, lasting 16.5 hours, includes flights to and from Moscow as well as private van transfers, guides, a visit to Red Square and The Kremlin, coffee at Puskin Cafe and dinner at the Writer’s Club, the watering hole of Russian (and Soviet) writers for more than 70 years now.

Cruise ships typically dock two or three days in St. Petersburg on Baltic cruise itineraries, and on three-day calls, you’ll certainly have enough time to visit Moscow. You could even go on your own for much less than $999 per person.

Flights between St. Petersburg and Moscow can be had for as little as $30 each way. Prefer rail? The fast train will take you from city center to city center in about four hours. But with either mode of transport, there is that pesky visa problem, meaning that most nationalities can’t just walk off the ship and into St. Petersburg, much less travel all the way to Moscow. Sauntering ashore requires a tourist visa, which takes time, paperwork and patience.Cruise line passengers skip the hassles of having to obtain visas. Transit visas do the job for those who purchase excursions sold on the ship. There are ways around paying the often-inflated fees that cruise lines charge for excursions in St. Petersburg (such as booking your shore excursion through Red October), but if you can afford to do so, booking your shore excursion on board is a convenient and easy option.

At $999 per person, it’s questionable whether diverting to Moscow is worth it. After all, there is quite a lot to see in St. Petersburg. But as one cruise passenger said during our excursion to Moscow last week, “When will I ever have the chance to do this again?” Perhaps never. So pony up and join the tour.