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Mr Ocean Liner

Latest Press Release from Oceania Cruises

Oceania cruises Launches first-ever theme cruises for 2012

 

Oceania Cruises will offer theme cruises for the first time. The new "Signature Sailings" are comprised of 10 voyages exploring culinary, wine, music and health & wellness themes. Guests will enjoy seminars, hands-on classes, concerts, wine tastings and more. Depending on the voyage, Chef Jacques Pépin, up-and-coming jazz

 musicians, and noted editors will be special guests.

 

"We are delighted to introduce theme cruises for 2012," said Bruce J. Himelstein, the line's president. "While groups that share the same interests have regularly sailed with Oceania Cruises in the past, our new 'Signature Sailings' create a special opportunity for guests to experience the cruise in the company of fellow travelers who share their passion for the theme."

 

Food and Wine Feature Prominently on 2012 Signature Sailings

 

Jacques Pépin Cruise

Master Chef Jacques Pépin has served as Oceania Cruises' executive culinary director for eight years. On this sailing, he'll be sure to hold court in Jacques - his first namesake restaurant - as well as in the Bon AppétitCulinary Center leading Q&A sessions, cooking demonstrations and signing books.

 

Marina "Tuscan Artistry" - May 12, 2012; 10 days, Barcelona-Rome

 

Spring Music Fest

A broad range of jazz styles will be featured. Six guest musicians, including four headliners, will perform individual main stage shows in addition to more casual jam sessions. There will also be special dance sets and dance instructors.

 

Nautica "Mediterranean Tapestry" - May 14, 2012; 10 days, Athens-Barcelona

 

Oceania Club Reunion Cruise - two sailings

Oceania Cruises loyal past passengers are the guests of honor for two special reunion cruises, which include memorable surprises both onboard and ashore.

 

Riviera "Iberian Odyssey" - June 17, 2012; 10 days,   Lisbon-Rome

 

Regatta "Radiant Rhythms" - March 6, 2013; 12 days, Buenos Aires-Rio de Janeiro

 

Italian Wine Immersion Cruise

Highlights include lectures, tastings and special Wine Bars, where guest experts and special musical performers will create the perfect vibe to explore and experience great wines.

 

Regatta "Italian Interludes" - July 27, 2012; 12 days, Rome-Venice

 

Vitality & Wellness Cruise - two sailings

In addition to healthy eating and fitness tips, guests will gain insights on enhancing their mental wellness to live life to the fullest. Spinning, yoga and Pilates classes are also offered at the Canyon Ranch SpaClub and gourmet Canyon Ranch spa cuisine is available.

 

Regatta "Pearls of the Aegean" - August 8, 2012; 10 days, Venice-Athens

 

Riviera "Accent on Italy" - October 24, 2012; 10 days, Rome-Venice

 

Bon AppétitWine & Food Festival - two sailings

Epicureans rejoice! The experts at Bon Appétit magazine are assembling culinary stars and wine experts or editors for a palate-pleasing voyage.

Riviera "Enchanted Grandeur" - October 14, 2012; 10 days, Athens-Rome

 

Marina "Temples & Palaces" - October 22, 2012; 10 days, Athens-Istanbul

 

President's Cruise

Oceania Cruises President Bruce Himelstein and his wife Brigitte will host a 10-day voyage through Southern Europe. Special highlights are in store, both aboard ship and ashore.

 

Nautica "Mediterranean Tapestry" - October 26, 2012; 10 days, Barcelona-Athens

 

Discover the World in Comfort and Style with Oceania Cruises

 

Oceania Cruises' 684-guest Regatta and Nautica are intimate ships acclaimed for their open-seating gourmet dining (no surcharges), luxurious public rooms and accommodations, and warm, attentive service. Facilities include four open-seating, gourmet restaurants, casino and Canyon Ranch SpaClub.

 

The 1,250-guest Marina and new Riviera were purpose-built for epicureans with six open-seating, gourmet restaurants - including a French bistro by Master Chef Jacques Pépin. Facilities also include a Bon Appétit Culinary Center and Artist Loft enrichment center. Interior design highlights include a Lalique-designed grand staircase, elegant public rooms, spacious accommodations and Owner's Suites furnished exclusively in Ralph Lauren Home.

 

For more information on the above Signature Sailings, see a professional travel agent, visit OceaniaCruises.com or call 800-531-5658.

 

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Cruise Critic

 

Hartford Holidays

 

Maritime Matters

 

Mr. Ocean Liner

 

South Street Seaport

E NEWS SUPPLEMENT...by Bill Miller

 

October 24, 2011


Greetings!

 

     In an effort to serve our members better we have changed our phone number to a toll-free number.

 

     Please make note of this number. While there is supposed to be a message on the old number for some reason the phone company is struggling with this request. Our new number is (866) 631-0611.

 

Sincerely!
  
Tom Cassidy 
 
P.S. There is still space available to join us aboard Celebrity Cruises' Silhouette on January 29th at great rates! Please contact our cruise coordinator Beth Schmidt at (800) 828 4813 ext 1009 if you would like to join us. We would love to see you!

Australia - Big winners! Australian Flag
 

A recent major travel survey posted Sydney as the most popular international city & Charleston, South Carolina as the best city in the USA.

Celebrity LogoNew start!

 

With 6 of their 11 liners in seasonal European cruising in 2012 (including the brand new Celebrity Reflection), Celebrity is modifying many of their itineraries for those who love wine as well as the wine regions.

Changing faces! Costa Logo
 

Undergoing a $124 million redesign both inside & out, the 1993-built Costa Romantica will even get a new name:   Costa NeoRomantica.   Her capacity will be increased as well, to 1,808 maximum passengers, through the addition of 111 new cabins. ... Meanwhile, as the 25,500-grt Costa Marina leaves the fleet, a similar ship, the 24,300-grt Costa Voyager, is coming on line to replace her.   The latter, 804-berth ship is the the former Olympic Voyager of Greece's Royal Olympic Cruises & later sailed for the Spanish as the Grand Voyager.
Delphin VoyagerChanging hands!
 
Once popular in the German cruise market, Delphin Cruises has collapsed recently & the 650-bed Delphin Voyager (on charter from Greek owners) has been sold to Chinese buyers, Hainan Cruises, and been renamed Hainan Empress.   Built in 1990, the Dephin Voyager is the former Japanese cruise ship Orient Venus.

Glory days of the 1950's!  FrenchLines

 

If you have anecdotes, materials, photos, etc & which you might share, I am penning yet another new book called Classic Liners:   The Ile de France & Liberte.

 

Israel FlagIsrael -On the block!  

 

The 16,700-grt Rio, used by Israeli-based Rio Cruises in recent times, is now laid-up at Piraeus in Greece & is for sale.   The asking price for the 790-passenger ship is just under $5 million.   She dates from 1971, having been Norwegian Cruise Lines' Southward & then later sailed as the Seawing, Perla & Aegean Pearl.  

Italy - End of the Line! Italian Flag
 

It seems that long idle Pacific, the 20,000-grt cruise ship dating from 1971 and which sailed as the Sea Venture & later as the very popular Pacific Princess, will soon go to the scrapheap.   The 550-ft long ship is currently lying at Genoa.

Ocean Liner Collectibles - India bound!

  

A large poster promoting the Bombay calls of the American President Lines passenger & cargo ships recently fetched $450 at a Manhattan auction.

Ocean Liner history - Summer in Europe!

 

In June 1963, the 600-passenger Riviera Prima, on charter to the Caribbean Cruise Lines, departed from Charleston, South Carolina & then New York on a 34-night cruise to the sunny Mediterranean, visiting Madeira, Tangiers, Palma de Majorca, Malta, Crete, Rhodes, Piraeus, Naples, Cannes & Gibraltar. Return to New York included the choice of air or a 6-night crossing on Cunard's Mauretania.

 Oman FlagOman - Booming business!
 
Oman & the Gulf are preparing for a record winter cruise season.

Turbulent waters! RCI Logo
 

The huge, 154,400-grt Freedom of the Seas was rocked by surprise in seas just off Fort Lauderdale on Oct 10th. Departing on a 7-night Caribbean cruise, some public rooms & staterooms aboard the 4,200-bed ship were damaged.
Sea Cloud Cruises LogoRepairs complete!
 
The damages caused by a shipyard fire to the 1931-built Sea Cloud have been repaired.  
Added tonnage! Voyage of Discovery
 
The recently refitted Alexander von Humbolt has been renamed Discovery II to operate alongside the Discovery (ex-Island Venture, ex-Island Princess). 
Ocean & Cruise News

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About Bill Miller  Bill Miller "Mr. Ocean Liner"  

Bill Miller is an international authority on the subject of ocean liners & cruise ships. This includes those great ships of the past, those "floating palaces," as well as the current generation of cruise ships, the "floating resorts".  Called "Mr. Ocean Liner," he has written over 75 books on the subject:  from early steamers, immigrant ships and liners at war to other titles on their fabulous interiors, in post card form and about the highly collectible artifacts from them.   He has done specific histories of such celebrated passenger ships as the United States, Queen Mary, Rotterdam, France, Queen Elizabeth 2, Costa Victoria, Super Star Leo and Crystal Serenity.

 

In all, he has also written over 1,000 articles for newspapers, magazines and nautical journals & newsletters.   He even had his very own ocean liner quarterly, the Millergram.  He has made nearly 350 voyages to date:   Atlantic crossings, tropical cruises, coastal runs and even trips on container cargo ships and exotic banana boats.  He has appeared in some three dozen video & television series, both in the USA, Britain, Europe and Australia, including Castles of the Sea, The Floating Palaces, The Superliners, Inside the World of a Cruise Ship, Disasters at Sea, Deco: Age of Glamour, and Lady in Waiting: The Story of the SS United States.   He has also appeared on The Today Show, CBS Evening News, CBS Sunday Morning, Good Morning America, NBC Evening News and many other news broadcasts. He has been guest lecturer aboard over 50 different liners, sailing with the likes of Crystal Cruises, Cunard, Carnival, Holland Americ

a, Princess, Radisson-Seven Seas, Saga Cruises and others.  Miller was a public school teacher, in middle school and for social studies, for 32 years.  He was named "Teacher of the Year" in 2002.  

 

A native of Hoboken, New Jersey, the once busy port just across the Hudson River from New York City, Miller was named Outstanding American Maritime Scholar in 1994, received the United States Maritime Preservation Award  and also  the Ocean Liner Council's  Silver Riband Award, both  in 2004.   Also, he has been chairman of the Port of New York Branch of the World Ship Society, serves on the selection committee for the American Maritime Hall of Fame, created the passenger ship database for the Ellis Island Museum and currently serves as Curator of 20th Century Maritime History at Manhattan's South Street Seaport Museum.  He has also organized a 14-week college course on liners, and helped to create & then served as historian at  the US Merchant Marine Museum. His private collection includes 4,000 books on ships, over 15,000 photos and some 1,000 miniature ship models, most of them being passenger ships. 

 

By 2010, Miller had 10 new books in the works, was curator to Decodence (an exhibit at the South St Seaport on the design & décor of the grand French liner Normandie) and himself was the subject of a one-hour film documentary aptly titled Mr Ocean Liner.   (Updated 8/10).

 

 

Follow Bill's look back at ship's of yesteryear..

Heard Along the Boat Deck

 

And his current and past cruise experiences...

Scribblings  

William Miller Books!

 

In the works! The presses are rolling over in England, at the History Press.   I've penned a short, 10,000-word overview of passenger ships entitled The Great Liners.   It should be out soon.   It will be followed, at the same publishing house, by Great Passenger Ships 1910-20 and then Great American Passenger Ships. Happily, my finger keeps on typing ... and happily, there are still photos and anecdotes and maybe something new to be shared.

 

Another new book project!   Happily, I have been signed to do another edition of the Classic Liners series for the History Press over in the UK. In the wake of our book on the Caronia, Cunard's "Green Goddess," this project will deal with two of the most popular, most beloved post-Second World War French liners, the Ile de France & Liberte.   The Ile was built for the French but back in 1927;   the larger Liberte came to them as post-war reparations, having been the German Europa of 1930.  The Ile sailed the Atlantic between 1949 and 1958;   the Liberte ran between 1950 and 1961. They transported thousands on the regular run between New York, Southampton or Plymouth and Le Havre, and even had occasional cruises. They were of course predecessors to the much larger, faster France, commissioned in 1962. If any of our readers has anecdotes, reflections, comments and shared materials on these great liners, please contact me through Ocean & Cruise News.

 

On the horizon!   Brian Hawley is penning a new book, filled with lots of photos, about the Olympic, the White Star liner completed in 1911 and sister to the infamous Titanic

 

Ocean liners in words & pictures!  An updated list of my published ocean liner books ... and available thru bmce48@yahoo.com.

 

 

The Last Atlantic Liners

 

 

 

Last Atlantic Liners:  Getting There is Half the Fun  (Amberley Publishing, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, 2011

 

  

 

 

 

Rms Caronia Book

 

 

RMS Caronia:   Cunard's Green Goddess 

(co-authored with Brian Hawley)  The History Press Ltd, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, 2011

  

 

 

 

 

Floating Palaces

 

 

Floating Palaces:   The Great Atlantic Liners(Amberley Publishing, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, 2011

  

 

 

 

 

 

Great British Passenger Ships

 

 

 

 

Great  British Passenger Ships  (The History Press Ltd, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, 2010)

  

 

 

 

 

ss Nieuw Amsterdam

 

 

 

 

 

SS Nieuw Amsterdam:   The Darling of the Dutch  (Amberley Publishing, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, 2010)

  

 

 

Cunard's Three Queens

 

 

 

Cunard's Three Queens:   A Celebration  (Amberley Publishing, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, 2009)

  

 

 

 

 

Under The Red Ensign

 

 

 

Under the Red Ensign:   British Passenger Liners of the '50s & '60s  (The History Press, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, 2009)

 

 

 

 

 

ss United States Speed Queen

 

 

 

SS United States:   Speed Queen of the Seas  (Amberley  Publishing, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, 2009)

 

 

 

 

And yet to come.....

 

Great Passenger Ships 1910-20  (The History Press Ltd, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, due Sep 2011)

 

I Was Born in Hoboken:  Memories of the 1950s & '60s  (Hoboken Historical Museum, Hoboken, NJ, due fall 2011)

 

Along the Hudson:   Great Passenger Ships at New York in Photos  (Amberley Publishing, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, due 2012)

 

The Last Great Dynasty:  The Royal House of Windsor  (Amberley Publishing, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, due 2012)

 

Great Atlantic Liners of the 20th Century in Color (co-authored with Anton Logvinenko;  Amberley Publishing, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, due 2012)

 

Great American Passenger Ships  (The History Press Ltd, Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK, due 2012)

 

The Cunard Yanks (co-authored with Ian Wright;   pending but due 2012)

 

 

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One of the great things about being a World Ocean & Cruise Liner Society member is joining us aboard one of our "Hosted" member cruises. Each cruise features low group rates, special amenities plus onboard lectures and events
     

 

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