Cruise Lines

I love cruiseship naming ceremonies so this month is like manna from heaven for me, but I’ll have my eye on one new ship in particular.

Ventura, P&O Cruises’ new offering, promises to be nothing like the P&O we have come to know and love. Old and stuffy? Forget it. If all the hype is to be believed, this is young and funky; dare I say even glitzy in places (or so it would seem from the website) and all about having fun.

The traditionalist we-love-P&O brigade I cruised with on Aurora recently, who disliked foreign food and wanted everything to be like it was 20 years ago, would be horrified.

Personally I can’t wait to see if the ship lives up to the promise of lively evenings, good food (hopefully not just in Marco Pierre White's restaurant), contemporary tableware and designer kettles in the cabins - yes, really – and great activities for kids, including a circus school (never mind kids, I rather fancy that!) and giant Scalextric track.

And I am so looking forward to seeing Noddy fly by in his little yellow-and-red plane. What do you mean there is no such person as Father Christmas?

Am I glad I’m not clearing up after yesterday evening’s ceremony in which MSC Cruises took official delivery of new ship MSC Poesia from the ship yard in St Nazaire, France.

As the bottle of bubbly smashed, pink and white balloons were loosed from their netting and cannons shot pink and white paper circles into the air. Not just a few, but hundreds, coating the ground and all who sat there.

Environmentalists would no doubt moan about it, but hey. This was a great ceremony – it actually started and ended on time, which must be a first for MSC – with a marching band to keep our spirits up in the cold wind, the customary switching of flags and lots of speeches in French and Italian (I gathered that the shipyard is honoured to have MSC’s business, which is good because it has another three MSC ships on its order book, and MSC’s boss rather likes his new toy).

Let’s just hope this new-found punctuality lasts until Sunday morning.

Globetrotting Tahitian Princess is to be renamed Ocean Princess when it goes for routine maintenance in Singapore in November 2009, Princess Cruises has announced.

It is a bit odd to have a Tahitian Princess sailing around the Med, Alaska and Asia, I agree, but it's such a wonderfully exotic name - conjuring up images of white-sand beaches and gently lapping blue seas, and so perfect for this small ship (it holds just 670 passengers).

In comparison Ocean sounds so big and just a little forbidding. Not at all what passengers can expect.

With free-flowing booze, Italian diva Sophia Loren to cut the ribbon and the likes of Andrea Bocelli and KT Tunstall to keep the troops entertained, it was always a dead cert that the naming of MSC Poesia in Dover would be a successful event.

But will it achieve the ultimate aim of increasing business from the UK for MSC Cruises? And at what cost?

An oft-repeated conversation between fellow scribes at these events revolves around the question, can the cruiseline ever get back what it has spent? How many passengers do agents need to book and over what time frame to make this - literally - worthwhile?

If anyone has some answers, I would love to know. Not only would I sound intelligent, but I could move the conversation on next time around.

Until I am enlightened, I will continue to wonder at the massive sales job UK agents now have on their hands if they are ever to repay MSC for a great evening. The few I spoke to were certainly excited and enthusiastic about the whole experience.

For MSC's sake, I hope that enthusiasm infected the many and can be translated into sales.

What a coup for Cunard.

The Queen is journeying down to Southampton on June 2 to bid farewell to the QE2, the ship she named at Clydebank on September 20 1967.

Since then the vessel, which has to be the best known ship in the world, has sailed into the record books by travelling more than 5.6 million nautical miles. It has carried 2.5 million guests, completed 25 world cruises and crossed the Atlantic 802 times.

QE2 leaves Cunard and the UK forever in November, when it sets sail from Southampton for Dubai to take up its new duty as a luxury floating hotel.

If I had a stall selling handkerchiefs, I know where I would be that day...

At last, only four months after I was due to get a first glimpse of Balmoral, Fred Olsen Cruise Lines' new ship, I am on board.

Formerly Norwegian Crown, the vessel was acquired from Norwegian Cruise Line last year and has been stretched - literally it was cut in half and a new bit inserted - so it takes around 400 more passengers.

It was due to set out on its maiden voyage under Fred Olsen colours in January but the work overran and the first cruise was delayed until February.

Is it Fred still? Actually yes. Despite being bigger, it does have that oh so British Fred feel that ageing Olsen groupies know and love. Not quite so intimate though, and there are more lost souls aged over 60 wandering around, still not sure where everything is.

More interesting still... yes, you can see the join.

Aren't people ungrateful? The guys at Fred Olsen went to all the trouble to put an art gallery on the newly-stretched Balmoral - actually it's a corridor that has pictures on each wall, but no matter. It's a lovely space and there are some really eyecatching paintings as opposed to the ghastly stuff the cruiselines dress up as art and try to flog at auction at hugely-inflated prices.

 In my column in the Telegraph this week I wrote:

Since emerging from the shipyard as Balmoral, the vessel also has a smart new top-deck swimming pool where there was none before, and an art gallery with some striking paintings. As it doubles up as the corridor to the main restaurant, I suspect many passengers won't notice the pictures as they race for their food.

But the reality was even worse. Just after writing that, a couple was walking towards me. He turned to her and said: "This is a complete waste of space, isn't it?"

According to a new survey, we Brits are totally ignorant of the continent just across the water. You know, the one they call Europe. Seems we are also a sad bunch of philistines.

Passengers on Azamara Cruises, the better-than-Celebrity brand from the Royal Caribbean stable, had a real treat as their ship popped into London this week on the way from Barcelona to Copenhagen - namely what passes for a port in one of Europe's leading capital cities.

Port? Actually, it's a pontoon just down river from Tower Bridge that has been covered with portacabins that you weave through in order to get to the ship - and that's after enduring a tortuous tender transfer from the other side of the bridge.

No matter. There was a fabulous view of Tower Bridge from the aft end of the ship and it must have been fun squeezing through the Thames Barrier - for passengers at least. Captain Carl admitted he pulled his stomach in as he manoevered through with just 15 metres to spare on either side.

Thames boatmen notwithstanding, I finally managed to get on board with some of the top people from Royal Caribbean for what was a first glimpse of an Azamara ship for all.

Except it was a bit like deja-vu for anyone who has been on Princess Cruises' Royal Princess (Swan Hellenic's Minerva II as was) or any of the Oceania Cruises' ships.

Obviously Azamara Journey been tweaked here and there - actually there have been $19 million of tweaks to add 32 bigger suites, a cafe, bar and change the carpets. Sadly the money didn't stretch to real teak on the pool deck so there's a plastic faux alternative but the wooden sun loungers with comfy mattresses helps to make up for that.

They have also put in new alternative restaurants, which come with no charge (that's one of the better-than-Celebrity bits) and look lovely. But so does the eat-when-you-like main dining room. Again, so much more advanced than its X-rated big sister with its fixed dining.

And at the moment, as the brand is not yet well known, it doesn't cost any more, and sometimes even less. That's got to be well worth a second look.

Have one too many on the new Carnival Splendor and you'll start to see pink spots in front of your eyes. No wait. That's what you see if you are stone-cold sober.

Carnival's new baby is a real vision in pink - another creation from Joe Farcus, the man behind all the over-the-top designs on Carnival ships, and lately the Costa ones too.

I must admit I am a bit of a Farcus fan, if only because I am intrigued how he comes up with his ideas and because the attention to detail is quite incredible.

Pink spots notwithstanding, Splendor is a very muted Farcus. I'd say he was considering the sensibilities of the British market, but suspect we are really not that important to Carnival, even if the number of Brits booking has doubled in the past year, as president and CEO Gerry Cahill said during his naming speech.

In fact, apart from the spots, which I really rather like, and the garish lions above the thermal pool in the otherwise very lovely, and very large, Cloud 9 spa, I really haven't seen anything very worthy of note.

Surely that can't be right?

My heart went out to the Royal Navy's Christian Rumming, the man chosen to shin 60 feet up the side of Carnival Splendor during Thursday's naming ceremony in Dover. In a pair of flippers.

And all because the lady loved, well, English sparkling wine.

In honour of the fact the ship was being named in the UK, Carnival shunned smashing the usual bottle of good-luck bubbly and chose instead a home-grown sparkling wine, cruise director John Heald explained during the ceremony.

Nothing to do with the the fact the thinner glass made it easier for Christian to smash when he finally got to the top of his rope, of course, although the event organisers didn't want a repeat of the naming of P&O Cruises' Ventura, when two Royal Marines went over the side of the ship (yes, it does sound very similar doesn't it?) to smash the bubbly and reports came back that one bottle didn't break.

The lady in question, by the way, was Splendor's godmother Myleene Klass, singer, classical pianist, model and I'm a Celebrity star (oh dear, and she was starting to sound really talented), who managed to do the naming honours while holding down her skimpy red dress, which was flapping nicely in the wind.

"That only worked for Marilyn," she quipped as she shouldered her responsibilities well and promised to send Splendor a birthday card every year.

As my regular blog readers will have seen, I was at Tilbury last week to see Marco Polo, now sailing under charter to Transocean Tours and sub-charter to Cruise and Maritime Services through the summer. Click on the video, created courtesy of Travel Weekly, to see and hear more.

The International Herald Tribune reports that Royal Caribbean International president and chief executive Adam Goldstein was in Singapore to announce plans to base a ship in Singapore starting autumn 2009.

The line dipped a toe into Asian waters this year, so I guess this decision is proof that the experiment was successful. Either that or they just can't think what to do with all the cruise ships they keep building.

Let's face it, the Caribbean might be popular, but when the giant Oasis of the Seas hits the region in December 2009, it's going to soak up an awful lot of passengers - 5,400 on each cruise if all goes according to plan - so Royal's other ships have to fill somewhere else.

And why not Asia? Star Cruises is there year-round, Costa Cruises bases a ship there for part of the year and Princess Cruises has a big selection of exotic cruises there in winter, but generally it's somewhere the big lines only dip in and out of on their way around the world.

On Carnival Splendor last weekend, I heard Carnival Cruise Lines president and chief executive Gerry Cahill rule Asia out as an option, so seems Royal might have it all it's own way - for a while at least. Smart move.

I thought it had to be Balmoral, but no. This "giant" is Fred Olsen's new Braemar, fresh out of the shipyard where they cut it in half and added a 31-metre mid-section. It now takes more than 200 more passengers - 950 in all - has more cabins and an extra restaurant.

But it was still dwarfed by P&O Cruises' Ventura, on which I'm sailing, which was towering over all in Civitavecchia today.

Interesting comments this week on cruise.co.uk about the benefits or otherwise of dine-when-you-want options on cruise ships.

Is it working well? Tsang didn't think so after her experiences on P&O Cruises' Ventura and I have to agree, after a week on board, that the staff are struggling with the concept.

So many people are booking that half the dining room is blocked out for the evening, which means if you do get a table the room is often half empty. But passengers are still turning up at the door and being turned away. "I guess we should book as well, but it kind-of loses the point of being Freedom," one man on a neighbouring table told me a couple of nights ago.

One of the problems is that the ship is packed with families who want Freedom dining, but two out of the three dining rooms are set aside for fixed dining. It wasn't always like that. When the ship launched, two out of three were set aside for Freedom dining, but the older - I'm guessing - passengers on the maiden voyages wanted fixed, so it was switched around.

And no one thought to change again when the passenger profile changed.

One evening my partner and I eventually ended up sharing a table for 10 with, um, two other people. We did look very lonely, especially with empty tables around us. They said one couple they met had asked for Freedom dining and been told they couldn't have it; another couple requested fixed and, yes, you've guessed it. They were told they couldn't have it.

The dual system works for Princess Cruises so guess it's just early days for Ventura. Im sure they'll get it right - but sooner would be better if they want to stem the moans I've heard.

Thanks to Sean Halliday for getting in touch about his website featuring true stories about his life on a cruise ship. Have a look. It'll cheer up the day.

Science was never my strong subject at school so imagine my glee when I was able to answer the question "what is ice?" posed by Steffen Biersack, the geologist and lecturer onboard this Fram cruise in Greenland.

No trick. The answer is frozen water - and I did get it right! - but I have to admit some of the rest of his lecture on ice went straight over my head. Still fascinating though.

And it's what this Hurtigruten expedition cruising is all about. No shows with didn't-quite-make-it dancers and singers, no napkin-folding or wine-tasting classes; just a nice ship - Fram holds 318 passengers and was launched last year - with big windows so you can always see the view, which at the moment happens to be icebergs. In fact it has been icebergs of varying sizes for the past two days.

There are all sorts on board, young and old, mainly Danish and Norwegian but also a smattering of Brits, Americans and Australians, all here for the excitement of seeing somewhere really different rather than wanting a luxury cruise with crew racing around to cater for their every wish and whim.

No one dresses for dinner and you are expected to clear away your plates and cups if you have tea and cakes in the little self-service.

I can't see cruise traditionalists enjoying this, but I I've never seen so many happy, excited faces, and certainly not on a cruise. Just proves what they always say. There is a cruise for everyone. Get it right and you have one satisfied customer.

My cruise column on the Telegraph website this week touches on how expensive it is on board Fram. I compared it with Ventura, where you could get a 33cl bottle for £1.95, while here 40cl draft beer is more than £3.50. Not the end of the world but worth bearing in mind.

But the one thing that is really cheap is the internet - six hours for £20. And it works - as anyone reading my blogs will have realised.

I paid a hefty £40 for four hours on Ventura, which was all the more galling when ashore in Rome, Florence, et al, you could have an hour for one euro (about 80p). If you wanted longer the price came down!

Here in Greenland I haven't seen an internet café and if there was one I dread to think how much it would cost. Yesterday, ashore at our first big town (with tarmac roads, a supermarket and a pub), a bottle of beer was £6.

I hastened back to Fram!

So this is it. The day Royal Caribbean, travel agents and hopefully the British public have all been waiting for. Oasis of the Seas, the largest cruise ship ever built goes on sale at 1pm UK time.

This ship is longer than four football pitches, higher than Nelson's Column - 220,000 tons and with room for 5,400 passengers.

Royal is moving staff from other areas into reservations to cope with an expected 50% more bookings than on its previous busiest sales day. Senior managers have been drafted in to deal with booking inquiries and Jo Rzymowska, associate vice-president and general manager, has promised to make the tea.

Some £1 million has been set aside to make sure this behemoth sells. It's going to be a long day.

Either I've not been paying attention or this is new. Passengers who book one of the 99 suites in the VIP Yacht Club on MSC Cruises' new MSC Fantasia, launching December, have soft and alcoholic drinks included in the price.

Suddenly it becomes a lot more attractive!

Yacht Club people also have 24-hour butler service, a VIP swimming pool, hydro-massage pool, solarium, lounge and direct access to the spa.

The ship holds a massive 3,959 passengers and takes pride of place in MSC's new 2008/09 brochure. It will be sailing the Med - the maiden voyage is an eight-night Christmas cruise, then there's a New Year sailing and 12-night itineraries out of Genoa.

How much extra does it cost for the Yacht Club? Unfortunately my press release skips over the money bit and as I'm away and it's now 7am in the morning UK time, I can't find out.

If anyone can enlighten me, I'd love to know.

US-based Travel Trade reports that MSC Cruises is selling off the MSC Rhapsody, the oldest and smallest ship in the fleet.

No surprise really. In an interview for Travel Weekly earlier this year, MSC's chief executive officer Pierfrancesco Vago told me that the clock was ticking for the 780-passenger MSC Rhapsody and 1,064-passenger MSC Melody - another of MSC's smaller ships.

There are passengers who like Rhapsody and Melody because they are smaller and more intimate, but more and more people want balconies so they will go in the end - I would guess over the next couple of years.

Travel Trade reports that Israeli-based Mano Maritime is interested in buying the Rhapsody. Ironic really, given that MSC Cruises started life when Gianlucci Aponte, owner of cargo giant Mediterranean Shipping Company, acquired the Achille Lauro, the cruiseship hijacked by Palestinian terrorists in 1985, resulting in the death of an Jewish American passenger.

But irony or not, the fact is that with two new ships with room for close to 4,000 passengers close to launch, MSC has less and less room for small, elderly ships such as the Rhapsody. Much as Carnival Corporation had no room for Swan Hellenic and Norwegian Cruise Line had no room for Orient Lines, which are both starting new lives under new owners.

Meet Mahir, my butler on Crystal Cruises' ship Crystal Serenity. He comes with the Penthouse I'm in on a short but sweet cruise in the Med - made all the sweeter by reports coming back from home of cold and rain as temperatures here hit 30 degrees.

As I explored the ship yesterday I also came across Raymond, who goes around the sun deck every hour with cold towels for those who need to cool off.

You don't have to pay, it's not an extra. Just part of the service. Now that's what I call luxury.

Which I was.

The Penthouse on Crystal Serenity is lovely. There's a walk-in wardrobe, large bathroom with two sinks, jacuzzi bath and separate shower, equipped with a flat-screen TV, DVD and CD. And of course there is Mahir, my butler.

But interestingly the Penthouse I had on Princess Cruises' Crown Princess last week was bigger.

It had a long balcony with two balcony doors, two TVs, a DVD, a walk-in wardrobe and the bathroom was spilt into two. A toilet and sink in one room, a jacuzzi bath and shower in another.

We didn't have a butler, but we did have the lovely Elmar, who greeted us each day with a chirpy good morning and managed to keep the room tidy despite the best efforts of my 14-year-old daughter to do otherwise.

"Have you noticed they have the name of our suite [Aruba] instead of the number on the signs in the corridor?" she asked excitedly the first day we were on board. I had to admit I hadn't, but it did explain why I spend ages looking at the sign trying to work out which direction to walk to get to 412.

It wasn't there. And then I realised I was standing almost right in front of the room.

Sometimes you can feel really stupid.

Celebrity chef Marco Pierre White has opened two more restaurants at sea. The Cafe Jardin on Oceana and Cafe Bordeaux on Aurora have both been given the Marco makeover and are now serving dishes that he has created.

As with The White Room on Ventura, which is also a Marco production, the supplement to eat at both restaurants varies depending on the length of the cruise - £4.99 per person for eight days or more, £6.50 for three to seven days and £7.75 for two-day mini-breaks.

You can't really complain about (although I bet some will) - and there's even a reduction for anyone who eats there between 6pm and 6.45pm. Bit early for me, but many do dine at that time. And how much better if you can eat early and save money!

QE2 might have left Southampton for the last time, but the old girl is not going to disappear from the headlines.

Dubai is planning to match last week's fond farewell at the south coast port with an equally big welcome when the ship arrives in the emirate on November 26.

QE2 will be met at The World islands by a flotilla of local yachts, boats and leisure craft led by a Royal Navy frigate, and there's an open invitation to anyone with a boat to register and be part of the welcome.

QE2 is to be transformed into a luxury floating hotel off the trunk of Palm Jumeirah by new Nakheel, which is also planning to open a heritage museum displaying artefacts from the ship and of local maritime history.

Great for anyone who happens to be in Dubai, but what about past passengers left without their favourite ship to cruise on? I offered some QE2 alternatives in a piece in the Telegraph. Let me know if you have any other suggestions.

After several seasons in Antarctica, Voyages of Discovery is leaving the White Continent and cruising to South East Asia and the Far East in winter 2009/10.

I wrote a little on this for the next TW Cruise, due out soon, but since then the brochure has come out bearing more information and some magnificent itineraries that will take you around India, Vietnam, Thailand, the Philippines and South Africa.

VoD's ship Discovery takes its time as it cruises through all these places so there's lots of time ashore. Anyone with the time and money could put some of these itineraries back to back and have an ultimate round-the-world trip.

OK, you won't make it to Australia so it's not quite RTW, but at least you would see the world as you went instead of spending endless days at sea, as is the norm on a standard world cruise.

There is no single supplement on a number of cabins and guaranteed no fuel surcharge on all bookings. All the cruises will have guest lecturers on board to add some insights into the places being visited.

VoD says it has switched to Asia to give passengers who have done Antarctica something new for winter 09/10. Makes sense. I cruised Antarctica with Voyages and much as I loved it, it's not something I would do twice with the same cruise line as I'd like to see how others cope with the harsh environment down there.

On my cruise, most of the passengers agreed they had done Antarctica and would not go back. After all, it's not cheap and makes more sense for them to spend their money seeing new places and cultures.

Travelmole reports P&O Cruises is to make some changes to Ventura after admitting to facing "challenges" in the first summer season.

In a letter to travel agents, managing director Nigel Esdale says they will stop taking bookings for the Freedom dining restaurant so diners really do have freedom to turn up and dine when they want - hopefully getting a table straight away - the Beach House self-service will become an informal dining venue with waiter service and sunloungers will be placed on deck 19, in an area previously devoted only to the bungee trampolines and Cirque Ventura.

"We will retain the bungee trampolines which have been a real hit with passengers aged from 8 to 84. And we will continue to offer the Cirque Ventura circus skills school teaching the art of juggling, tightrope and stilt walking."

In addition, new furniture, including a reclining chair, will be put on cabin balconies, to help alleviate demand for loungers on the open deck.

I reported in my cruise column in the Telegraph on the problems of Freedom dining I encountered when I was on board and spoke to people who were fed up with the morning rush to grab a sunlounger so it's good news that all these things are now being addressed.

MSC Cruises says it took 47% more calls in October than in the same month in 2007, while bookings for the month were up 84%.

Managing director Giulio Libutti attributed the bookings surge to the fact the call centre is open longer and also on Sundays for the first time.

Apparently a lot of bookings are coming in for MSC Lirica, which is sailing the Baltic from Dover next summer, and the giant MSC Fantasia, which is being named in Naples on December 18.

This is the ship with the much-anticipated VIP Yacht Club - a separate area of the ship where top-paying passengers will enjoy butler service in their cabins, have a private swimming pool and observation lounge with bar. 

Silversea has pulled the South Pacific cruises planned for exploration ship Prince Albert II in summer 2009 and instead will be bringing the ship back to the Arctic, cruising around Greenland and Spitsbergen.

Reading between the comments from Silversea president and chief executive officer Amerigo PerassoIt, the South Pacific cruises were not selling, mainly because of the cost of getting there, but also because people didn't connect with a ship built for polar waters sailing around sun-kissed islands.

Operating our vessel in close reach of our three leading markets (United States, United Kingdom and Continental Europe) is all the more justified in the present economic conjuncture. With its ice-strengthened hull, Prince Albert II is quite naturally associated with polar sea ice regions, rather than other attractive, exotic destinations.

Prince Albert II will sail nine Arctic cruises between June and August before heading back to the Antarctic for winter 2009/10.

Is this the first casualty of the credit crunch?

Seatrade Insider reports that the "new" Orient Lines president and CEO Wayne Heller has cancelled the resurrected cruise line's first European season due to the current econimic climate.

"We are exploring possible options to relaunch our cruise program at a more favourable time in the near future."

The maiden voyage on Maxim Gorky, which has been renamed Marco Polo II, was supposed to be on April 15 from Barcelona.

Booked customers will receive a full and prompt refund.

Royal Caribbean International's giant Oasis of the Seas has to be seen to be believed ... and I was lucky enough to see it on Friday, at STX Europe's shipyard in Turku, Finland, where it was about to be floated out.

The Caribbean it wasn't, with snow and ice on the ground and freezing temperatures, but we were kitted out with big coats, steel toe-cap shoes, gloves and hard hats for a walkabout in the dry dock and on board - the first groups to get a glimpse of what this levathon will be like.

After a lightening tour of some of the key places on the ship, we were taken dockside, a cannon was fired - so loudly the ground shook! - and the sluice gates were opened, allowing water to touch the hull for the first time.

The gates were opened at about 5pm and the dry dock was expected to be filled by midnight so the ship could be sailed out to a new berth where the interior will be fitted out. They have just under a year to transform it from looking like a mass of steel and scaffolding, as below, into a luxurious cruise ship.

This is the Royal Promenade - the very same feature you'll find on the Voyager and Freedom-class cruise ship, except this one will be more than twice as wide as the "street" on those vessels. When finished, there will be a pub, shops, cafes and the amazing Rising Tide Bar.

Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines chairman and chief executive officer Richard Fain, who was guiding my group, said they decided they needed a lift to get passengers from the Royal Promenade to Central Park above and those little box things most of us manage with to get up and down floors was just too boring. So they are putting in a bar. Of course.

The idea is that it acts as a lift, but I can see passengers grabbing a stool for the evening and staying put.

Unless of course they are tempted away by the antics in the Aquatheatre at the back of the ship.

There is a pool, 17.9 feet deep (this one pool will hold more water than all the pools on the Freedom-class ships) surrounded by amphitheatre-style seating and with a bridge 10 metres above from which performers will be diving into the water. Sort of Cirque de Oasis, I guess. Apparently one show will have a row of divers going off the bridge all at once, which would be quite spectacular

When the pool is not needed for swimming, the bottom can be raised so it also becomes a dance floor.

First stop on the way to the shipyard to see Royal Caribbean International's Oasis of the Seas was a bike shop in Turku where, in one corner, we were able to tramp through a mock-up of a standard version of one of the 28 new loft suites that will be on the ship.

Was this to keep it away from the prying eyes of the competition, I wondered? Who would think of looking in a bike shop? But no. We were told it was actually only because the factory happened to have a bit of space available. Sometimes fiction is so much better.

These loft suites are spectacular, two decks high and with a floor-to-ceiling glass window which looks out over the balcony and out to sea.

Downstairs there is a bathroom, dining table that slides out of the way after use and a sitting area with a flat-screen TV and sofa bed. It then opens out to the balcony.

Upstairs is a mezzanine with another bathroom, this one with a shower with his and hers shower heads - RCCL chairman and chief executive officer Richard Fain was amazed I'd never seen such a thing and then revealed he has a his and hers shower at his home and that it is very handy when him and her are different heights because you don't have to keep moving the heads up and down - and a double bed with a flat-screen TV that opens out of the ceiling.

Oasis of the Seas has such a lot of new things on board to thrill and excite passengers that the ship had to be the size it is just to hold them all, explains Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines chairman and chief executive officer Richard Fain.

Speaking at the float out of the ship, in a snow-covered shipyard in Turku, Finland, he said Oasis is one-third traditional Royal Caribbean, one-third evolutionary and one-third revolutionary.

The traditional is, for instance the Schooner Bar, which can be found on other Royal Caribbean ships. The evolution is the Royal Promenade, which is twice the width of the promenades on other ships, and will twist and turn instead of running in a straight line. The revolution is Central Park, a huge open area in the middle of the ship that will have real trees and shrubs, the loft suites, the Aquatheatre, zipwire and more.

"I know size is what everyone focuses on, but we didn't set out to build the world's biggest ship. Oasis is big because we decide what we want to put in and than wrap a ship around it. We don't just take rooms from other ships and make them bigger, but we add more, to give passengers the opportunity to do things they never would have thought of doing on a ship."

Fain revealed that he initially thought putting a rock-climbing wall on the Voyager-class ships was a really stupid idea, but went along with it because it was the least stupid idea he was presented with at the time. He now jokes that it was one of the best ideas he ever had ("that's one of the benefits of being chairman!").

Oasis of the Seas is now 65% ready. Its first sea trial is scheduled for June, with a second one in September.

It will weigh 225,000 tons (this is the shipyard's figure, which keen readers will notice is another 5,000 on the tonnage previously quoted), which makes it more than twice as heavy as an aircraft carrier, and carry 5,400 passengers.

Inside, there will be 5,000km of electric cable, 250km of pipes, 100,000 electric points, 90,000 square metres of carpet, 8,000 square metres of windows and there will be 2,300 metric tons of water in the pools. In all, it will be made up of about 500,000 individual parts.

Now Oasis of the Seas is out of the dry dock, the yard can start work on sister ship Allure of the Seas. The keel-laying is on December 2, with delivery slated for late autumn 2010.

Hot on the heels of Silversea's decision to bring Prince Albert II back to the Arctic for summer 2009, Hurtigruten has added capacity in Spitsbergen for June, July and August for 2009.

The additional cruises are on the 120-passenger Expedition, which is owned by Gap Adventures and has been chartered on a crew basis for four years by Spitsbergen Travel, which is a subsidiary of Hurtigruten.

Expedition will be sailing 13 nine-day Kingdom of the Polar Bear cruises for Hurtigruten from Longyearbyen, circumnavigating Spitsbergen, weather permitting.

Hurtigruten's head of commercial Kathryn Beadle said demand has outstripped capacity on the line's two other ships in Spitsbergen.

"Our main nine-day Spitsbergen voyage is already close to being sold out for 2009 and we still have more than six months' selling time."

Expedition, which has an ice-strengthened hull, was built in 1972 and is currently undergoing modernisation. When it enters service it will have a panorama lounge, expedition lounge, restaurant, library, bar, fitness room and sauna.

Cold is clearly the new hot for British cruisers. Just a month ago Titan HiTours announced it had signed an alliance with National Geographic which enables Brits to travel on the company's expedition ships, operated by Lindblad Expeditions, to Antarctica, the Arctic, Alaska, the Galapagos and other such exciting places.

Hebridean International Cruises is going back to the Caribbean and Central America for winter 2009/10 - and this time it is taking people on the transatlantic.

The cruiseline's 98-passenger Hebridean Spirit made its debut in the region in winter 07/08 and that time went over the Pond empty, thinking that no one would want to be making that journey in a 4,200-ton ship. It seem they were wrong.

"The brochure's only been out a couple of weeks but we already have some bookings for the crossing," managing director Mike Deegan told me on the even smaller Hebridean Princess - just 2,112 tons and yes, the one the Queen chartered - when it was in Tilbury this week.

The night before I was there, it had been hosting Hebridean's top-selling agents for an awards evening and overnight. It is a lovely little ship, with quaint but beautifully-appointed cabins, but at that size I can understand why they run for cover at the first sign of bad weather.

News of those intrepid transatlanticers is interesting, but the real point here is that they have actually been able to book because the brochure is already out - part of a strategic move by Hebridean to stop lagging behind when it comes to getting its cruises out on agents' shelves.

There are some great cruises in there, more Caribbean than before, and taking Spirit though the Panama Canal and into ports in Cuba that most people will never have heard of.

The 2010 summer programme will be out in March, and one brochure will feature cruises on both ships, which is also a first for the cruiseline - usually there are two brochures for each ship each year.

I am told Princess will be doing its usual Scotland stuff, but dropping its Norway visits as Spirit is going north for the summer, covering off Norway and the Arctic areas.

Italian line Costa Cruises has been named "Best Cruise Company" at the annual Virgin Holidays awards. Runners up were Carnival and Ocean Village.

Naturally managing director Marco Rosa is pleased - in fact almost as thrilled as when I saw him last week, racing high-performance cars at a fantastic day out at Thurleigh Airfield near Bedford with some of his top-selling agents and fellow scribes.

He now has to come back down to earth and get ready for 2009, when Costa has two new ships launching - the Costa Luminosa and Costa Pacifica - so close to each other they are sharing a naming ceremony.

I'll be on a Windstar cruise in the Caribbean next week, finding out how the cruiseline is performing since it was sold to Ambassador International in February 2007. I'll be posting information and pictures, so keep an eye on Cruise Lines to find out more.

I've never had a suite with portholes before.

Thing is, when Windstar's  Wind Surf launched in 1990 - it started life as Club Med I - my room was just an ordinary cabin. Or rather two ordinary cabins. Because my suite is two rooms that have been knocked together.

The result is a lovely big room with two doors, two full-size bathrooms, two work desks, two flat-screen TVs, a big sitting area and the bedroom, and a big curtain across the opening between the sitting area and bedroom that is closed at night. 

I've also got a DVD player - you can borrow DVDs free from the library - and an iPod speaker. And yes. You can even borrow an iPod - again for free.

Yesterday, moored off Bequia, in the Grenadines, the marina on Windstar's Wind Surf was lowered for anyone who wanted to have a go at sailing, windsurfing or the like.

It's a great facility. Bjay (pictured below), one of three sport co-odinators, showed me around - six kayaks (three doubles, three singles), two sailing boats, three windsurfs and enough snorkelling equipment for everyone to get masked up and into the water. You can even go waterskiing if the water is calm enough.

You need to be able to sail or windsurf to borrow the equipment, which is all free, but kayaking and snorkelling virgins are fine.

"We also have a rescue boat, but we don't have to use it very often," Bjay reassured me.

The weather has been doing a grand job trying to make the Brits on Wind Star feel at home. It was raining when I landed in Barbados on Sunday and was pouring down on and off while we were moored off Bequia. But two days on, the Caribbean is back to its hot and sunny best.

I expected mine to be the only English accent on the ship. In fact, there are loads of us. Well relatively speaking. There are actually only 69 passengers anyway, on a ship that holds 315 (15 are British passport holders and there are other Brits from other places around the world), so it feels a lot like the Marie Celeste, especially in the evenings.

On the first evening, the ship was deserted by the time I left the dining room just before 10pm. Things have picked up though. Last night, in the Compass Rose, my favourite bar (pictured), there were eight of us. A busy night for the barman!

Craig and Nicola, who together make up the band Rain and have been singing their socks off to an empty room, looked thrilled.

The upside of having so few passengers is that we are all loving having our own private yacht and the top service that comes with it. There are 188 crew. That's more than two for each passenger - a ratio the luxury lines can only dream of!

I'm even greeted by name as I get in and out of the tender and the barman remembered my cabin number before me.

For those not in the know, Wind Surf is a sailing ship, with five masts and seven big sails. They switch off the engines if there is enough wind - apparently they saved 30 tonnes of fuel on the transatlantic crossing a couple of weeks back by using wind power - but today, the third evening of my cruise, is the first time I have seen them billowing in the wind, and then only four sails are up.

Sadly there weren't any muscle men heaving and straining to hoist the canvas either, as everything is done at the push of a button.

Ah. The romance of technology.

I'm pleased to report that this cannon, trained on Windstar's ship Wind Surf, is British.

This is the view from Fort Rodney on Pigeon Island in St Lucia. Behind where I'm standing, clearly visible (but not in this picture - here you are looking at St Lucia), is French Martinique. So back in 1778, our man Rodney realised this hill was a perfect vantage point for keeping an eye on the marauding French so he had this fort built.

But how did they get the cannons up there?

One of the highlights of my Windstar cruise was the barbecue on the beach at Pigeon Island in St Lucia - burgers, hot dogs, salads .... and the ubiquitous steel band.

It was all going very well, and then they started playing Christmas carols. December 3, on a beach in the Caribbean, with the sun blazing down.

Too early. Out of place. Bah humbug. I went for a walk.

Far better was the discovery that a woman playing a steel drum is called a pimp. At least that's what one of the other band members told me. I just hope he wasn't joking!

One of the problems of being on a ship with so few passengers (I'm on Windstar Cruises' ship Wind Surf in the Caribbean with another 68 people instead of the full complement of 315) is that most of the shore excursions have been cancelled because they haven't reached the minimum numbers.

It has been very disappointing, so full marks to Leia, the shore excursions manager, for finding out that we would be in Grenada alongside Princess Cruises' Emerald Princess on Friday - and for getting in touch with the ship to see if they happened to do the river tubing trip I wanted to do.

They did - and so full marks to Princess also, for allowing me to infiltrate the group.

It was great fun - you sit in a big tube and float down river, through rapids, bouncing off boulders, going backwards, forwards, spinning; really just as the water and tube takes you because you don't have any control.

I felt rather like a human pinball. But a lot wetter. Especially after the guys from the company running the trip - Adventure River Tubing - got us all corralled at one of the ropes strung across the river where they collect everyone every so often, surrounded us and let loose a barrage of splashing.

Until then I had just been wet; after that I was drowned!

These guys - there were lots of them - did a fantastic job making sure we were all absolutely safe, and rescuing us when we got beached, which happened to several of us a few times. As I said, you have no control on these tubes.

Jude, the guy on the right here, said ours was the second group of the day; sometimes they have four.

All too soon it was over and we were back on dry land for a rum punch (it is the Caribbean after all). "Was it good?" the guy with the bottle asked. I said I had only one complaint. It was over too soon.

By the look on his face I got the impression that was not very original.

Rather than pit passengers against pirates, Cruise Critic says Hapag-Lloyd is going to disembark all those on the first sector of Columbus' world cruise at an undisclosed point before they reach the Gulf of Aden and fly them to Dubai, where they will wait in five-star luxury for the ship to catch up. There will be no extra cost to passengers.

The ship will be manned by a skeleton crew as most of the staff will also be taken off and flown to Dubai.

Hapag-Lloyd managing director Sebastian Ahrens says as long as the situation in the Gulf of Aden is uncertain they will not cruise through the region with passengers on board.

Just over a week ago, there was a failed pirate attack on Oceania Cruises' Nautica.

Oceania Cruises president Bob Binder is not running scared after Nautica was fired on by pirates at the end of last month.

In an interview in Travel Weekly US, he says they will evaluate itineraries in the area in the interest of the safety of passengers, crew and safety - no surprise there - but adds the pirates are "not a great concern".

I imagine the incident was frightening for passengers - that's if they noticed it was happening. Binder says they were asked to leave the open decks twice (standard procedure in such an incident), but the whole thing was over in just a few moments.

But if we're going to let pirates frighten us out of the Gulf of Aden, cruiseships should also stop sailing into Santorini in case they hit an inaccurately chartered reef and avoid the Arctic and Antarctica as they might hit an iceberg. They should also stay out of the English Channel in case they come across the waterborne equivalent of a boy racer.

Life would be so safe. But oh so boring.

I am not a great fan of that great cruise ship tradition of fixed dining, so I was not looking forward to dinner time on my Costa Cruises' voyage around the Arabian Gulf on Costa Victoria.

In fact I was dreading it so much that even before leaving home, I planned to avoid it by paying to eat to the speciality restaurant every night.

My dread was heightened because it was a Costa cruise, packed with Italians, Germans, French and countless other nationalities. Imagine sharing a table for a whole week with people who do not speak any English.

But here we are, four nights into the cruise, and my daughter Ilana and I have yet to set foot in the speciality restaurant.

Food and the service has been good - and full marks to our assistant waiter Yang Li, from China, who on discovering I like iced-water makes sure there is a jug waiting at the table when we arrive for dinner - but best of all, my daugher Ilana and I have a table for two, by the window, so I don't have to make pathetic attempts to converse in French or German. Italian, I'm afraid, floors me completely.

This is actually our second table. The first was allocated for second sitting, on my request before I know that on Costa that means 9.15pm or 9.30pm, which is too late to eat for me. First sitting is 7pm, which is OK. Certainly not so appalingly early as the 6pm first sitting on other cruise ships.

The change was organised by Fausi, from Tunisia, to whom I explained we needed a table for two because of the language problem. He smiled - somehow I got the idea I was not the first Brit with such a request - shook his head several times and came up trumps. What a star!

Incidentally, the Dutch couple - more correctly he's Dutch, she's English and they live in Holland - we met on our excursion in Oman were allocated a table sharing with others from the Netherlands.

Costa's maitre d's clearly put a lot of thought into this sharing table business. I'm impressed.

Cruising on Costa Victoria is a bit like being in the film Cabaret, with every announcement in at least four language and usually many more.

You have to take your hat off to the crew for their ability to switch languages at the drop of a hat. At dinner, our waiter Jose Sanchez, from Peru, speaks English to Ilana and I, Italian to the people on the next table. His native language is Spanish and he also speaks Portuguese. All fluently, without even an "um" or "err".

Captain Mario Moretta was great at his welcome cocktail evening, switching so casually between English, German, Italian, Dutch and French that in the end I really didn't know which language he was speaking. But even he had to use his notes to read a welcome in Japanese and Russian. That got an applause.

Unlike the boat drill, when we had to endure an explanation of what to do when the alarm sounded in eight languages, including Japanese and Russian, then stand by the lifeboats in our lifejackets while more instructions were read. Again in eight languages.

"I wonder what would happen in a real emergency," someone near me commented. "We'd have sunk by the time they got through that lot."

I think it took about two minutes in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates and third stop on our Costa Victoria cruise from Dubai around Arabia, before I decided I loved this place.

Was it the stunning skyscraper skyline - they call it the Manhattan of Arabia - the blue sea, the sandy beaches, far more trees and grass than you'd ever expect to see in the desert, being driven in style through the city in a silver Mercedes by Nile, our driver for the day, kindly provided by the Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority.

All these things, I guess.

First stop was the huge Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Mosque, where I had to join other women and put on an abaya (gown) and shayla (head cover) before going in (entry and robes are free, by the way).

Then it was on to the Emirates Palace Hotel, which has a central accommodation area with one floor for rulers from the emirates and another for visiting VIPs. There are two helipads (popular with visiting sheikhs), while VIP suites have a private drive and entrance so they don't have to mix with the riff-raff.

Not that your average riff-raff could afford to stay here. The hotel, opened 2005, cost $3 billion to build and is quite stunning. It's done out in colours that reflect the desert. Carpets come from Iran, flowers from Holland, there are 13 types of marble and showers big enough to fit two or three couples - at once! None of that comes cheap.

"All the suites have a dining room," Mirjam, from guest relations, explained as she showed me the the top places to stay. "That glass cost 750 dirham." That's about £150. For one small glass. I inched away from the table..

After a facile welcome meeting on day one of our Costa Victoria cruise, when English-speaking hostess Suzanne showed us how to read the Today daily newsletter - yes, really - there was no way I was going to go to her disembarkation meeting on the penultimate day of our cruise.

So I guess it was my own fault when, at 6am on the day I was disembarking, I went to the Concorde Plaza to collect our passports, armed with photocopies of the picture page of said documents - I guessed they would need these to confirm who we were - only to be sent away to get my end-of-cruise bill.

The Concorde Plaza is at the front of the ship; our cabin was near the back. Just what I needed at the time in the morning. I did as I was asked and returned armed with my bill.

The receptionist took one look at it, said "But you have paid by credit card" and passed it back to me. She looked at me as if I were a bit strange and called over the person waiting behind me. I didn't follow any of this - why was I sent back to get it if she didn't want to see it - but I did notice a lot of people were settling in cash, in which case the bill was stamped.

This procedure is one of several clumsy ways of doing things on Costa Victoria. Like having to carry around photocopies of your passport when you go ashore because the machine that swipes you on and off the ship doesn't flash up with a picture.

On other cruiselines, that same machine also emits a loud "ee-ahh" to tell the guys on security - and everyone around - that you haven't paid your bill. No need to queue early in the morning to show your bill before you can have your passport.

There are no internet packages to help sweeten the 50 cents a minute charge, and credit cards or cash payments have to be registered the day after you come on board instead of at check-in, which was another good way of creating queues.

Costa Victoria is a cosy ship and does have some notable features - I particularly liked the colour-coded cabin layout and the fact you never had to fight for a sunbed - but it is looking worn here and there, even though it's not that old (it was built in 1996). The layout is odd by today's standards and it lacks any mod-cons other than balconies (added in 2004).

Put it another way. It's easy to see why Costa has decided to put the glittery new Costa Luminosa there next winter in response to Royal Caribbean International's decision to try their luck in the Arabian Gulf with Brilliance of the Seas.

Poor P&O. Stories claiming that Ventura descended to the levels of Benidorm on a recent Caribbean cruise is just the sort of publicity it doesn't want.

I don't know how much of the story was truth and how much exaggeration on the part of aggrieved P&O regulars.

But it was an incident waiting to happen once cruiselines decided to open up cruising to all by cutting prices and lowering standards to cater for the lowest common denominator.

Don't get me wrong. The "formal, fixed, fluff and feathers" cruising of old doesn't do anything for me, but it does help to maintain standards and turn off the chavs and tattoo brigade. Almost as successfully as high prices.

But maintaining prices in a recession is hard, especially when you have big ships to fill. Ventura holds more than 3,000 passengers.

Ultra-luxury cruiselines love to use the expression "likeminded people". It's designed to reassure potential passengers with deep pockets they will be cruising with their own sort, not some riff-raff who have picked up a cheap holiday.

It's not a particularly nice turn of phrase, but what a selling point it's going to be from now on.

Am I the only person sad to hear of the refurbishments on Regent Seven Seas two all-balcony ships?

Not the general sprucing up, but the fact Seven Seas Voyager and Seven Seas Mariner have emerged from a $40 million facelift sporting Prime 7 - a new steakhouse where Latitudes speciality restaurant used to be.

I enjoy a good steak, and I am sure the ones in Prime 7 will be first class, but I remember a couple of really lovely Asian meals in Latitudes. It was nice to have a restaurant that served something different, especially as it was done so well.

Now I can have a steak, just as I can on almost every other US cruise ship.

It's another example of creeping standardisation - "he's got a water park/big screen/adults-only area so I want one" - but I suspect the money men have also been at work here. By bringing Regent into synch with sister line Oceania Cruises, which already has the Polo Grill steakhouse, they can probably make use of those wonderful "economies of scale" when it comes to buying beef.

Oh well. At least there's still no charge to dine there. I'll have the Ribeye please.

Full marks to Regent Seven Seas Cruises for coming up with what has to be one of the most innovative "get 'em booking" initiatives. Free shore excursions.

The cost of shorex is a major bugbear for many cruisers, me included. If you're taking one now and then the cost is not so bad maybe, but if there's a couple of you doing one a day (and I have met plenty who do that because they want to see as much as possible) you can easily clock up £500 per person. Ouch.

But not with Regent. You have to book by March 31 to get the free excursions and they only apply to certain cruises but I've had a quick look on the website and there seems to be plenty of variety in terms of where to cruise and departure dates.

Regent's UK office is also freezing dollar-pound exchange rates for a while. Until June 30 you can get $1.95 for your £ instead of the miserable $1.45 you'd get in the markets. That's got to be worth a few bob in the pocket as well.

"It's such a big suite for one person," Barbara, my room stewardess, from Hungary, laughs as I returned from breakfast this morning. I guess a single traveller in an Owner's Suite is a little unusual, but I love having so much space.

This suite was the spa until Silversea's Silver Wind went into dry dock in October/November last year and is apparently a mirror image of the Owner's Suite that was already on the vessel. It's one of several big changes they made on the ship during the upgrade.

There are four new Millennium Suites by the bridge on deck eight, where the officers' accommodation used to be, the spa has moved to the top of the ship, deck nine, where once there were sun loungers and there is a new Medallion Suite.

Apparently it's bigger than my room, but has no balcony so it's popular with passengers because the price is nice! I'm hoping to get a look sometime but as it's occupied I'll have to bide my time.

But let me take you on a quick tour of the Owner's Suite: As you come in the door, there is a guest toilet on the left. It's my Mount Everest. I feel must use it because it is there.

You enter into the spacious sitting-cum-dining room. There's a Espresso coffee-maker, a bar stocked with various spirits (all free as this is an all-inclusive ship), an exit to the balcony and a huge flat-screen TV and DVD player.

There's a DVD library downstairs so I plan to treat myself to an evening in at the flicks at least one night; not quite so sure about the Piano by Candlelight 10 CD collection they've provided. Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole, the music of Burt Bacharach. Not quite me, I'm afraid.

There's also an atlas, which is great as I love to keep an eye on where I'm going - and like to feel I can step in if the Captain needs a hand!

From the sitting area, you go onto a small corridor. The bathroom is to the left, with a bath and shower (took me a while to find the latter as it somes out of the ceiling and drains into the floor), the bedroom to the right, with another door onto the balcony and another big flat-screen TV. Straight ahead and you're into the big walk-in wardrobe.

And then there is Suren, my wonderful butler, who comes from India. He appears every now and again bearing gifts such as this bowl of fruit, tidies my clothes and generally keeps me in order. How did I ever manage without him?

Chronicles, the daily "what's on" book (I kid you not, it has to be the biggest newsletter I've seen on a cruise ship) delivered each day to my suite on Silversea's Silver Wind bills Visakhapatnam "the Jewel of the East Coast".

Hmmm. Can't help thinking that was written by someone who had never been there. By the time my friend Steve and I made it into the city just before 12 noon, every other passenger seemed to be coming back, greeting us with grimaces and the words "good luck".

They were harsh. It's true the city doesn't have a great deal going for it in the looks department, we had a lovely few hours there, enjoying a real slice of Indian life.

We had fun watching the chaos as the buses and tuk-tuks honked and hooted their way through the streets, swerving around pedestrians who had no intention of moving out of the way. Even our Italian captain Ignazio Tatulli had to admit the Italians were mere novices behind a wheel compared to the Indians.

Somehow a policeman was almost managing to control the chaos - and as we returned to the shuttle bus he even held up the traffic for us to cross.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. We wandered down the street, wondering if there was anything to see other than this phone - wired into the telegraph pole you'll notice....

...when we chanced upon this market. It was fabulous. Fruits and veg, some of which I didn't recognise, sacks of chillis, packs of leaves that are used as plates, coloured powder which they throw into the air when worshipping. And the people were so friendly despite a bit of a language barrier. These young lads just loved having their picture taken.

Getting off the Silver Wind was not such a lark, mind. It took more than two hours for the Indian authorities to clear the ship - and there are only 213 of us on board, incidentally being looked after by 219 crew so I've struck gold again in the brilliant service stakes.

The shuttle bus into the city arrived just as our feet touched terra firma, but took 15 minutes to get going as there was much debate between the driver and the crowds of port workers who had clustered around the ship. I'm told they get two cruise ships a year so it's a bit of a novelty. I've no idea what they were debating but eventually the driver gave up and drove off.

But then we had to get out of the gate. Official-looking people came on, got off, more official people came on. We brandished the immigration forms we'd been given but no one was remotely interested. They got off and more people came on - and got off. The bus moved - but only to let a lorry around us. But finally we were on the way.

This was a maiden visit for Silversea and I'm pretty sure they won't be back. The long time for clearance was tough for the officers and crew, and I reckon most passengers stayed in town only long enough to decide they wanted to get back to the ship.

I'm left pondering why people would spend a lot of money coming on a luxury cruise ship around India if they don't want to see it.

Next time you moan about forking out $20 or $25 to eat in a cruise ship's speciality restaurant, spare a thought for the poor souls on Silversea vessels.

On Silversea's Silver Wind (and actually all the ships in the Silversea fleet except Prince Albert II), a night out in the speciality restaurant will set you back $200 a head. Yes really. But boy, do you get a night to remember for your $200!

As you sit down you are presented with a menu bearing your name (a copy is waiting for you later in your suite) and Bharati, the excellent maitre d' and sommelier - and also a bit of a dab hand when it comes to taking photos - and Raj, the waiter in Le Champagne, start to work their magic. Between them can't do enough to make the evening really special.

And then there is the wonderful food, all carefully prepared by Ryan, chef of Le Champagne, and the excellent wines. After a welcome glass of Champagne, you launch into the food and Bharati serves a specially-picked wine to go with each course. Pouring only after explaining its finer qualities, of course.

As you can see, by the end of the evening I was disappearing behind the glasses - there were another two wines to come after this picture was taken!

I was there for the Burgundy night, but there is also a Bordeaux one, an Italian one, a North American one and a Spanish one. Menus change every two days.

Whichever you choose, Bharati won't book more than 16 people per evening, spread out over a maximum five tables, so the experience is very special. In fact, when I dined there it was just me and two friends. Brilliant.

If the $200 price tag sounds just a little too high (actually it doesn't even cover the cost of the wine), you can pay just $30 per person to enjoy the food, but with this option you also have to pay for the wine (whereas it's free everywhere else on the ship). "We have wine for $1,800 a bottle," Bharati tells me.

Makes the degustation menu sound a bargain.

Silversea's Silver Wind is a lovely ship, but by the third sea day after leaving Visakhapatnam, I was starting to dream of containers (you know, those big boxes that any port worth its salt has in spades) and silos.

So I was thrilled and relieved in equal measure to arrive in Cochin, where we have been for the past two days.

I had booked a tour to the Kerala Backwaters for the second day, so decided to go exploring in Cochin on day one. What an experience. First you have to run the gauntlet of the taxi drivers who are allowed in the port. A second tier of taxi and tuk-tuk drivers is waiting as you get out of the port gates; past another barrier, it's the third rank tuk-tuk guys.

I began to get an idea of what honey pots must feel like as drivers swarmed around, followed me, and drove past me, waiting until I got near so they could pounce again. It sounds awful, but they were not at all threatening, just a bit of a pain.

By walking quite a distance from the port, I not only got a good price for a ride into the city and back, but also travelled in style - in this air-conditioned Ferrari (that's what he said it was anyway) driven by Wahab.

He took me around some of the highlights - these fishing nets, the spice shops - waiting for me at each and then delivered me safely back to the ship.

Day two was a trip to the Backwaters. The first time I did this, the excursion was a transfer to Alleppey and a two-hour cruise on a tourist boat before returning to our cruise ship, and I loved it so much - so beautiful and peaceful - I decided to go again despite the rather scary (at current exchange rates) $199 price tag.

But boy, was this different. The 90-minute drive to Alleppey was in a mini bus with just eight people (there were more people in other buses) and we cruised for two hours on one of these houseboats. Just us eight. How exclusive is that!

These have anything from one to five bedrooms, and tourists come on usually for a night, but longer if they wish. There are around 500 of them plying the Backwaters.

Then it was off to the Marari Hotel for a lunch - a curry at last! - and paddle in the sea before returning to the ship. Two hours later the ropes were cast and we're now off again. Next stop New Mangalore.

"There are three things you need when driving in Goa", Mario, our guide for the day, informs us as our rickety old bus puffs and wheezes its out of the port of Mormugao on the temples and spices tour. "A good horn, good brakes and good luck."

This is the fifth port in India that Silver Wind has visited on this Silversea around India and I reckon I have seen it all when it comes to driving in this country.

Drivers who fit their vehicles through gaps as long as there is a paper width of space on either side, overtake in the face of oncoming traffic, hoot horns in the hope it will save them from meeting their maker, and motorbikes that weave in and out of cars and tuk-tuks, often coming to a sudden stop when there is no more space.

Yet it all seems to work.

Mario was full of interesting information about Goa, which was Portuguese rather than British, and only got its independence in 1961 - 14 years after the rest of India.

Part one of the tour was a Hindu temple, which was interesting, but the highlight for me was the spice farm. I've been there before and knew that after a walk through the spice plants they serve a proper spicy curry - something I have been dying for every since joining the ship.

This poor man has to shin up and down a beetle nut tree every time tourists walk by to show how it's done...

...and this is Sandhip, our guide at the plantation, with a cashew nut flower. It's soft and smells of peaches. The skin is used to make the local fire water, which was not bad. but it smelt vile.

The food on Silver Wind has been really very good, but why oh why, on a cruise around India, is there not at least one curry option on the menu each evening?

I had a curry on the galley lunch day (this is an amazing event on all Silversea ships where they open the galley as a self-service restaurant) and another a couple of evenings ago, which French executive chef Laurent Austrui squeezed in among the veal and duck due to popular demand.

I have always thought cruise ship menus should better reflect the places they visit - spicy jerk chicken in Jamaica, tapas dinners in Spain, crispy duck in China, and so on.

Seems a lot of passengers might just agree with me.

Did I say I have seen it all when it comes to driving in India? That was before Mumbai, formerly Bombay, which makes everywhere else I've been on this Silversea cruise around India on Silver Wind look amateurish when it comes to bad driving.

Not that the driving was my problem on my day in the city. I left that to my taxi driver Gurcharan Singh, who I promised to recommend if anyone is visiting the city. His car is clean and in good nick, he speaks English well and he'll make sure you see all the must-see sights (you can call him on 9821375607 but be prepared to bargain a bit!)

No. My problem was crossing the road to get from the cab to see the colourful fruit, veg and spices at Crawford Market. Going one way I sheltered behind a local who was making the death-defying trip; on the way back I was on my own. Thing is, they don't stop, but weave around you, leaving you an island amid all the cars.

In desperation I resorted to holding my hand up as a stop sign, hoping they would take pity on me. They didn't exactly stop, but as you see I lived to tell the tale.

Mumbai is an amazing place. If you visit be sure to go to the Dhobi Ghat, or laundry (below), where 4,500 people live and work keeping the 16 million citizens of the city clean. Gurcharan explained that smaller laundries, acting as agents, collect the washing and bring it to one like this. He claims they never lose anything.

You also have to see the Gateway of India, built 1911 to commemorate a visit by King George V and Queen Mary; the last British troops left India from here in 1948.

In the days of empire, this is where important people - governors and the like - disembarked after sailing from the UK with P&O; these days it's full of hawkers trying to sell you stuff or spin a bad-luck story so you'll hand over wads of cash. It's irritating but the way of the world here so grin and bear it - and hang on to your money!

The Taj hotel so badly damaged during the terrorist attack in November is just to one side of the gateway. They've done a great job fixing it up and it's good to see life going on as normal all around.

My tour took me into the red light district, past some of the famous Mumbai slums, now even more famous thanks to Slumdog Millionaire, and to the Victoria Terminus.

Like so much in India, the station has been renamed. It's now called Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vaastu Sanghralaya. Don't panic, though, because like so much in India, the locals still call it by its original name. Can't think why.

And yes, they do still call Mumbai Bombay. "It's much easier to say," Gurcharan explained.

I'm delighted to read MSC Cruises is to recognise the bravery of the four crew members who dived in to rescue the passenger ditched into the sea when MSC Fantasia's gangway collapsed last week.

It all happened in Palma, when high winds caused Fantasia's bow mooring bollards to come loose. The ship moved away from the dock and the gangway went down. The local port authorities have admitted responsibility of the incident.

The Fantasia four - Caso Salvatore, chief crew steward, from Italy; Naim Samsudin, able fireman, from Indonesia; Andrian O Williams, housekeeping cleaner, from Madagascar; and Faamoe Lalopua, Able Sailor, from Samoa - went immediately to the rescue and had the 80-year-old passenger out of the water in minutes. He is said to be recovering well in hospital.

That has to be service beyond the call of duty. I hope they are well rewarded. They certainly deserve it.

Nakheel, the Dubai company that now owns QE2, says it is considering opening the ship to tours in its current state in response to popular demand. Probably also because it is rather expensive having a ship moored up with engines running, especially in these tough economic times.

The company is clearly smarting over rumours that money is so tight it has droppped plans to spend millions transforming QE2 into a luxury floating hotel and might now sell it for scrap.

A very long statement says, in a nutshell, that it takes time to work out how best to do all the work. It explains an engine is running to provide power and light and keep the air circulating.

"Irrespective of short-term plans, the ultimate goal is to renovate and refurbish QE2, and for her to be the focal point of a luxury precinct, dedicated to her, that will recreate an authentic luxury ocean liner ambience and lifestyle. There is no question of QE2 being operated as a cruise liner or of her being sold to any third party whatsoever."
 

First reports on the future design are expected at the end of the summer, at which point they will issue a timeline for the refurbishment (well, almost total rebuild really).

I can't wait.

Oh to be crossing the Atlantic on Cunard's Queen Mary 2 on June 19, when James Taylor will be playing two gigs (actually they're "command performances" on the QM2).

I admit I am not the world's greatest James Taylor fan - far from it (if he walked past me in Sainsbury's I would never know) - but how I have longed to see some real singing talent on cruise ships. And here it is.

He'll be on a eastbound crossing from New York to Southampton and is using it as a way to get his band, crew, gear and family to Europe - minus jetlag -  for a summer tour.

I, meanwhile, will be at the Association of Cruise Experts' Cruise Convention in Dover.

By the way, there is still room on the June 19 crossing if, like me, you would like a break from the traditional belt-em-out singers they so love on cruise ships.

It was always such an easy equation. SeaDream Yacht Club ships had 55 cabins - sorry, suites - and held 110 passengers. I could do that even without O level maths.

But things are changing over at the diminutive luxury specialist. SeaDream II is now sporting a new suite, and sister ship SeaDream I - because the company is very fair - is going to get one too.

On both, the new Admiral's Suite is where the boutique used to be. I'm told the folk at SeaDream who did pass O level maths did a few calculations and decided they could make more monely selling the space as a suite than they did from it as a shop where passengers bought the odd tube of toothpaste or branded shirt.

You can still buy that stuff, but it's all at reception now.

SeaDream I is going into a shipyard in Lisbon for its new suite refit. Work starts in June, so the accommodation will be ready for the start of the Mediterranean season.

"It's a bit smaller than the Owners' Suite, so it's a bit cheaper," SeaDream's head of UK business Ian Buckeridge says. If size means anything, it's 375 square feet, while the Owners' Suite is 450 square feet.

The new suite has a separate living/dining area - the latter with a dining table that seats four - a master bedroom and one-and-a-half bathrooms. There is an entertainment center with wall-mounted flat-screen TV, refreshment centre - I assume that's what we ordinary mortals call a minibar - and writing desk.

The master bedroom features a queen-sized bed with flat-screen TV and a master bathroom with marble walls and floor, multi-jet shower massage, tub and vanity area. There is no balcony - none of the SeaDream rooms have balconies - but the suite has three panorama windows looking out to sea.

The suite is a great addition, but the timing is lousy as SeaDream is having to discount to fill existing capacity - just 110 passengers (112 with the new room) don't forget."It's a tough environment," Buckeridge admits.

Regular readers will have been following my recent travels around India; now, almost two weeks after my return - where does the time go? -  it's time for a few thoughts on my ship, Silversea's Silver Wind.

I last cruised with Silversea in 2008 and visited some drop-dead gorgeous places in the Mediterranean, but felt Silversea's six stars need to be taken out and given a polish; other ultra-luxury lines were not just snapping at the heels but overtaking.

Not any more. Money is being invested across the fleet to modernise the ships. Silver Wind only emerged from drydock in November, a couple of months before I was on, and is sporting a lot of new features.

All the suites on Silver Wind now have flat-screen TV - that might sound trivial but clunky old TVs make a room look very outdated.

There is also a new category of large Medallion suites on deck eight forward (pictured) and a new Owners' Suite - that was my room! - where the spa used to be. The spa is now on deck nine, where there was once open deck space.

When I was on board, I was one of the lucky ones to have a butler, the lovely Suren, but Silversea has just announced that butler service is being rolled out across all suite categories on all ships this year. As every cabin is a suite in Silversea's world, that means everyone gets a butler. Polishing those six stars again, you see.

Like most of the top-ranking luxury lines, Silversea is all inclusive so there's nothing to pay for drinks, whether soft or alcoholic. It does mean Silversea costs more, I know, but it's so nice not to have drinks waiters hovering awkwardly while you try to find your cruise card - and you never hear anyone moan about the 15% gratuity other lines slap on the drinks bill!

Included drinks also helps the onboard ambience no end. You can sit and enjoy a drink with someone you've just met without worrying who is going to pay. As one woman pointed out, that is especially nice if you're cruising alone.

My evenings were spent in The Bar - yes, that's really its name and it was above The Restaurant (functional but not too imaginative) - where we were looked after like royalty by Oliver and Covi. It was always packed before dinner, a bit busy after and empty by 11.30pm. There is a nice Panorama Lounge on deck eight (always busy for the cute sandwiches and cakes they serve for afternoon tea) and a cosy library if you want a quiet read or to borrow a DVD.

The service on Silver Wind was faultless. Not just efficient, but genuinely friendly. These guys never stopped smiling. They were even smiling when three of us turned up at the 11th hour for dinner one night, just when they might have been hoping for an early night. Nothing was ever too much trouble.

The food was also consistently good - even the hotdogs and burgers around the pool. Dinner in the main dining room (The Restaurant - pictured here) is open seating so you can eat when you want and sit with whom you want. I like that. And that food was almost always delivered hot, which was another plus point for me.

For a change, you can eat in La Terrazza, which is the buffet by day and a speciality Italian restaurant by night. There's no extra charge to dine there, but you do need to book and numbers are limited so as not to spoil the ambience.

There is another alternative - the paid-for Le Champagne, which I have already written about.

While on the subject of food I must mention the galley lunch. I have never seen anything like this. On a sea day, on every cruise where possible, the galley is turned into a self-service and you just go in and help yourself to the salads, cold meats, stir-fries, fish, roast beef, fiery curry (well it was by the time I had added a good dollup of chilli) and other dishes on offer.

It was brilliant - not only because the food was so tasty but because this was so very different. The crew had worked so hard getting the galley dressed up for the occasion and I think I can safely say that everyone appreciated it.

Silversea has some unheard of deals at the moment - not just great discounts, but you'll also get spending money to use in Le Champagne or put towards shore excursions. It's a cliche I know, but luxury really has never been so affordable. Why not give it a go?

Princess Cruises is back in the Med in force in 2010 and offering a new selection of seven-night cruises, which are great for anyone desperate to cruise but short on time and money.

These week-long "Interludes" are on Ocean Princess (that's currently the Tahitian Princess but the ship is being renamed Ocean Princess in November 2009). The ship holds just under 700 pasengers and the Interludes will be around the Greek Isles, Scandinavia, Norway, Ireland, Scotland and the Western Med.

There are also more overnight options. The ships will be staying two days in Israel, Egypt and St Petersburg (a regular two-nighter) so there's more time to explore these fascinating places. Pyramids in Cairo anyone? Or a day floating in the Dead Sea?

There are also some interesting new ports lined up - Cephalonia (made famous by Captain Corelli), the Greek island of Khios, Koper in Slovenia, for days out in Ljublijana, and Constanta in Romania to name but a few.

Princess will have six ships in Europe next year. Itineraries include the signature Grand Mediterranean Voyage - a brilliant cruise for ticking off some of Europe's most iconic cities. Athens, Istanbul, Rome, Florence, Naples. I'll be doing it in August on their newest ship, Ruby Princess, pictured here at the very red naming ceremony last November, and can't wait.

Sixties band The Merseybeats have signed up to be on Black Prince's farewell cruise from Liverpool on September 9.

The Fred Olsen ship is retiring in October after more than 40 years of sterling service because it's too expensive to do all the work needed for the vessel to meet new SOLAS (Safety of Life at Sea) regulations coming in 2010.

The Merseybeats were in the charts when Black Prince set sail, which means its members must be at least as old as Fred passengers (average 60-plus) - unless of course this is the Merseybeats mark 2 (or 3, 4, 5).

That was the case on P&O Cruises' Aurora last year. We had the Batchelors. Well, actually one Batchelor. The other two were imitations, but still no spring chickens.

If the Merseybeats have also plucked some ageing singers from obscurity to make up numbers, I guess Black Prince will sail gracefully, rather than rock, into retirement. But that's just perfect for dedicated followers of Fred.

Prices start from £1,045 for the 10-night cruise, which visits Belfast, the Hebrides, Chatham, St Peter Port in Guernsey, Falmouth and Dublin.

Nobuyuki "Nobu" Matsuhisa, the man generally credited with having introduced the western world to sushi, is joining Crystal Serenity's Venice to Athens cruise departing July 28.

Nobu already has restaurants on both Crystal Cruises' ships - Serenity and Symphony. There's the Silk Road for his famous Japanese-with-a-Peruvian-twist-style dining and the Sushi Bar for those who fancy a finger-sized bite of raw fish.

While on board, he will be preparing meals for the Silk Road, signing books and hosting cooking demonstrations.

The 12-night cruise costs from £4,285 per person including flights, transfers, soft drinks and all the sushi you can eat (there is some other food too). You'll also get $2,000 per couple shipboard credit through the promotion called "As you wish". You can spend it on drinks, shore excursions, in the spa. Basically as you wish.

News that The World - that's the cruise ship that sells apartments but also carries "ordinary" passengers - will be cruising the Sea of Cortez in May had me scurrying for a map.

It transpires the Sea of Cortez is actually the Gulf of California and is the area of water that separates the Baja California Peninsula from the Mexico mainland.

The sea is just 868 miles long and 130 miles wide; The World will be taking 10 days to voyage up and down on the cruise from Cabo San Lucas in Mexico, which is at the tip of the Baja California Peninsula. That means the ship will be cruising just 86 miles a day!

That's still faster than John Steinbeck (Author of The Grapes of Wrath). He took six weeks to sail the sea, but he was on collecting marine specimens for a non-fiction book.

It's the marine life that attracts people here; over 10 days the people of The World should have time to see some of it while they are hiking, kayaking, diving and snorkeling, especially as there is an expedition team on board to help them with sightings.

Catch it at the right moment and you get humpback whales, killer whales, manta rays, leatherback sea turtles, even the blue whale, the world's largest animal, passing through. And there are lots of smaller fish and marine mammals.

The World is sold through The Cruise Line. Call 0800 008 6677 for more information.

People booked to cruise on Hebridean Spirit, just sold by Hebridean International Cruises, have become hot property.

We've had Swan to the rescue offering them a 5% discount, Silversea to the rescue offering a 10% discount and now SeaDream Yacht Club has stepped in offering 15% off the "book today" prices for 2009 and 2010.

Decisions, decisions.

SeaDream's two 112-passenger vessels are closest in size to Hebridean's 98-passenger Hebridean Spirit (and they have the added advantage of being all-inclusive, as was Spirit) but they only sail in the Med and Caribbean.

Silversea's Prince Albert II, with capacity for 132 passengers, is also pretty close, and also all-inclusive. But at the moment it only sails in the Arctic and Antarctica.

If passengers want greater choice of exciting destinations, it has to be Swan. Minerva is bigger - 350 passengers - and unfortunately you have to pay for drinks on board, but you do get to visit places such as North Africa, the Black Sea, South Africa, Turkey and Mozambique. And that's just the sort of thing that Hebridean Spirit did too.

The way things are going, though, the best thing is probably just to sit tight and wait for the next "rescue package". Judging from past experience it will be offering an even bigger discount!

Regent Seven Seas Cruises has been forced to cut short Seven Seas Voyager's world cruise after discovering the damage done when fishing lines got tangled in a propulsion pod was greater than first thought.

Attempts had been made to fix the damage in Cochin and Dubai, but it's not been enough. Now the ship is going into dry-dock in Rome for repairs, meaning the end of the line for the world cruisers on board.

They should have sailed from Istanbul, arriving in Fort Lauderdale on May 8. Instead they will all be flown home from Rome. Regent has also cancelled the May 8 sailing from Fort Lauderdale to Southampton via Reykjavik.

It must be pretty gutting to have got so far around the world, only for the voyage to end on such a sour note. But there is a silver lining: Regent has offered a generous compensation packet - and without the passengers even having to threaten a mutiny - including a full refund for passengers on the March 18 voyage from Singapore to Dubai, which was marred by missed ports (the damage was done on leaving Singapore).

Cruise Critic quotes one member saying the "mood of the ship has changed from disappointment and complaints to elation".

Nice one Regent. It might be painful financially but at least passengers will leave with happy thoughts.

Hearing that my cruise to Libya was cancelled when Hebridean International Cruises sold "my" ship, Swan Hellenic has stepped in and I am now booked to go with them instead.

There are just over three weeks until the off and I can't wait. Internet allowing, I'll be reporting back daily on the cruise and destinations.

Swan, you may remember, moved fast on news that Hebridean Spirit had been sold, offering all the newly de-Spirted passengers a 5% discount. Details on the website.

I wonder if others who should have been going to Libya with Hebridean will be on Minerva with me. We could form a Swan Appreciation Society.

Depends what you think of Marco Pierre White and spending your holidays being yelled at while slaving over a hot stove.

Because the Hell's Kitchen star will be hosting cookery classes on three Ventura cruises this year.

Why Marco? The White Room on Ventura is named after the fiery chef, who also devised all the menus served there, and he rather fancies passing on his culinary skills to us ordinary mortals.

Marco Pierre White Heavens Kitchen sessions - for groups of up to eight adults and children only - will cost £75 per adult and £35 per child and are available on three 14-night cruises from Southampton to the Med. One departs on May 8, another on July 3 and the last on September 25.

Is anyone surprised that Miles Morgan Travel took 100 bookings in 24 hours for its Titanic memorial cruise?

The ship might have sunk 100 years ago, but there can't be anyone in this country - dare I say in the western world? - that does not know, and is not interested in, what happened that fateful night in April 1912. Even the young generation knows thanks to Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio.

When she heard of the memorial cruise, my 15-year-old daughter asked whether it wasn't a bit gruesome. Well yes. But that's the point. We all love the gory and the gruesome. It's why people go on Jack the Ripper walks in London and why Ground Zero in New York became a huge tourist attraction.

A Titanic cruise that even stops for a memorial service where the ship went down fits the gruesome bill perfectly, but there's more to it than that. Those on board - Miles Morgan has chartered Fred Olsen Cruise Lines' Balmoral for the voyage - will be living history in their own small way.

I expect the other berths to be snapped up in no time, even though the cruise doesn't happen until 2012. A website has been set up with all the details for those who want to book.

Miles says they will be avoiding ice-bergs at all costs. It'll certainly be a good idea to avoid hitting any, but I bet most passengers will be disappointed if they don't see at least one. It would add just enough authenticity.

I'll also bet a few passengers will be sussing out the lifeboat deck as soon as they get on board. Counting seats. Just in case.

It's getting hard to keep up with what's happening in the cruise market from the UK for 2010.

First Norwegian Cruise Line pulls its cruises from Southampton on Norwegian Jade - the ship will instead be sailing from Venice - then Thomson launches its 2010 brochure with all traces of cruising from the UK gone. Instead it will be sailing from Marmaris, Palma and Corfu.

And now Royal Caribbean has announced it will sail year-round from Southampton with the 3,600-passenger Independence of the Seas starting winter 2010/11. Cruises go on sale June 1 2009.

Winter in the Med? Departing from Southampton? Taking on the Bay of Biscay when the weather can be atrocious? The very thought fills me with horror, especially after Balmoral's rough ride over Biscay this winter.

Independence might be a newer ship, but it was built to cruise in the Caribbean. It's got stabilisers it's true, but they are not much good when things get too rough. It's also very tall - the equivalent of a nautical brick wall. Just what you don't want on a windy day.

Robin Shaw, Royal Caribbean Cruise Line vice-president and managing director UK and Ireland says bringing the ship to Southampton year-round is all about cementing the line's position as one of the leading players in the UK cruise industry.

Very flattering. But what's wrong with a nice flycruise from Barcelona, where there's a chance of better weather, cutting out the two potentially rocky days it takes to sail from Southampton to the Med and the two it takes to get back.

It's great news for the city of Southampton of course - it reckons that each passenger who joins a cruise at the port generates £380 for the local economy. That's a potential £50 million if the line can fill the ship all year. But that's a big if.

Or is it? The cruises, ranging from 11 to 18 nights, will be visiting the Italian Riviera and the Balearic Islands and cost from just £799 for an 11-night cruise to the Canary Islands. That's £73 a night with all food and entertainment thrown in.

It's a small price to pay for a few days of discomfort.

P&O passengers have voted Aurora their favourite ship, with Ventura (above) bottom of the pile at number six. The ship even scored less than Artemis, the old lady of the P&O fleet.

Given the negative publicity Ventura has suffered since its launch last April, it's really not a surprise, so I mention it only because interestingly, the results are so very different from the scores in the Berlitz Guide to Cruising.

Author Douglas Ward puts Ventura in top place with Aurora at number five. Arcadia is number two (5th place with passengers), Oriana number three (2), Oceana number 4 (3) and Artemis down in 6th place (5).

Has the Bible lost touch with the people? I'm cruising on Ventura at the end of May so I'll let you know.

The Israeli security staff on MSC Melody who repelled an attack by pirates in the Gulf of Aden over the weekend by firing on them have become overnight heros.

Not with the bleeding heart human rightists - they are still wringing their hands over news that the Israeli security staff had guns - but with ordinary people who can't understand why governments from all countries are dancing around the Somali pirates instead of blasting them out of the water.

The Israelis on MSC's Melody, hired from a private security firm, didn't even need to do that. Captain Ciro Pinto, who is also something of a hero in my book for having the courage to take action, ordered that pistols kept in a safe on the ship be handed to the guards.

They opened fire as the pirates tried to board the ship and water hoses were also turned on the bandits so they gave up.

Domenico Pellegrino, MSC Cruises managing director, said of the Israeli security guards: "We use them because they are the best -- and we have just had a demonstration of that."

Interestingly, Ally suggests on TravelMole that MSC brought the attack on by telling the world last week it was changing its route through the Gulf while another writes on Cruise Log that MSC was a brand struggling to become known in North America. "Now everybody knows who they are.....the cruise line with REAL security on board. Bravo!" writes King Bob.

See where I'm going? No. A marketing ploy too far surely!

But do take a moment to read some of the comments on Cruise Log. These are some of my favourites:

* In a related news story in which Royal Caribbean says: "We will charge a surcharge for pirate entertainment."

* A new on-board activity......shoot to kill the pirates. Prizes for the best killshot, sinking the pirate craft, etc. Ship could offer free gratuties, free casino plays and free pirate costumes for the winners.

* Bring back skeet shooting on cruise ships! Then passengers could provide their own security. More fun than any rock-climbing wall. For every pirate taken out, the cruise line could offer an onboard credit!

The people have spoken!

News of the fun and games on MSC Melody at the weekend has put Fred Olsen Cruise Lines off taking its chances through the Gulf of Aden.

It probably was never too comfortable with the idea of sailing through pirate waters after its own experience back in March. The Sun's version makes fun reading. What I believe to be the more accurate account is here.

Whatever happened that night, Fred is not taking any more chances. The return leg of its world cruise on Balmoral in 2010 will now take passengers from Australia across the Indian Ocean to South Africa and back to the UK by the west coast of Africa.

They should have been visiting ports in the Indian Ocean en route to Dubai, Oman and Egypt, and coming home through the Suez Canal.

The cruise will still leave Dover on January 5 2010 and return 106 nights later on April 21.

Royal Caribbean International has finally rolled its My Time Dining scheme out fleet-wide, allowing passengers to escape the evening shackles of old and eat when they want while sitting with whom they want.

They've been trialing the scheme since early last year on selected ships, apparently keen to avoid mistakes made by other lines (I'm mentioning no names) where passengers opting the new flexible system couldn't get a table in the restaurant.

So what a surprise to see they are allowing guests who don't want to take their chances with being flexible to make bookings as that proved one of the big mistakes!

Unusually passengers can register for My Time Dining on board if they wish. Most other cruiselines require you to decide in advance so they can manage numbers.

Less surprising is that My Time diners have to prepay gratuities. It's the way Royal wants everyone to go. Which comes back to that thorny one when is a tip not a tip question.

Naturally fixed dining is still available for those who prefer the Soviet system of being told when to eat and who they have to be friends with.

There is also a new My Family Time Dining scheme, which promises to get children aged 3-11 fed, watered and back to the kids club in 45 minutes (escorted by a youth counsellor) so parents can eat undisturbed and the youngsters don't have to learn the art of dining out.

I'm not sure why mums and dads don't just take kids who want a quick meal to the self-service. Or is it just too much trouble for them?

That's it for land-based blogs from me for a few days as I'm off to join Swan Hellenic's Minerva for a cruise around Libya.

I'm visiting three ports in Libya - Benghazi, Al Khums and Tripoli - then Corfu, Delos and Myknos in Greece, before flying home from Athens.

Remember to keep checking back as, Internet willing, I'll be posting details every day about the ship and the sights including Leptis Magna and Sabratha.

Getting to Alexandria and on board Swan Hellenic's Minerva was rather like a military operation, which was very fitting given my first excursion was to El Alamein, famous for the battle that proved the turning point of Britain's fortunes in the Second World War.

My flight landed in Cairo at 12.40am, by 1.15am I was in a car and heading out of the airport, 4am I checked into the Hilton hotel in Alexandria, 7am I checked out again and by 8am I was stepping on board Minerva. At 9am I disembarked again for the excursion.

It was a good two-hour drive from the port to the museum and cemeteries at El Alamein, which was a good chance to see what the countryside is like. Amazingly, it's almost one big building site, with one resort after another going up along Egypt's the north coast.

What was even more surprising was that they were all called Marina, which must be very confusing if you are trying to find your way back one evening, and that they all looked deserted. I know it is out of season - the chill wind bore testament to that - but there was no sign of life at all. To be honest, the area anyway looked so bleak, I can't imagine who would want to go and stay there.

That bleakness, without the hotels, is what met our army during the war. It's hard to think what the young lads must have thought about being stationed in an area many had probably never even heard of.

First stop on the excursion was El Alamein Military Museum, where there are displays of what life was like and some of the weapons that were salvaged. It was all done at a bit of a gallop, but was interesting, and then it was on to the British cemetery, where a wreath was laid and a prayer said for the people who died.

Some 7,367 men from Britain, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, Greece, France and Malaysia are buried in the Commonwealth cemetery, which is beautifully looked after by the War Graves Commission; another 11,900 are names on the wall because their bodies were never found. It's a very moving sight. 

By now the wind was whistling across the cemetery so hard that we were almost blown back to the coach. "It's not usually like this," Farouk, our assistant guide, assured me (in Egypt, everyone comes in pairs, which is a brilliant way of keeping unemployment at a minimum).

Mind you, when he picked me up from the hotel that morning he said it was going to get into the 80s!

Two hours later I was back on board Minerva and at 6pm that evening, we sailed out of the port at Aexandria, leaving Egypt and on the way to Libya.

After a series of delays, caused first by rocky seas in the Mediterranean, and then by the Libyan authorities (of which more another time), my excursion from Benghazi to the ancient city of Cyrene finally set off.

Originally we were supposed to leave at 8.30am but our arrival in Benghazi had to be rescheduled when we lost time rocking across from Alexandria. As the morning ticked on, it was delayed again and again, until morning became afternoon and the authorities just ran out of reasons why we shouldn't set foot ashore.

So five hours after the original time we were supposed to leave and more than three and a half hours after the rescheduled one (if you're still with me), we were finally on our way.

A quick aside. As we passed the morning reminiscing about the bumpy crossing the day before, one woman revealed she made the mistake of saying she didn't think they got such bad weather in the Med. Apparently that was the cue for the "I remember when..." brigade to pop up - something they do with alarming regularity on Minerva.

But more of life on board this Swan Hellenic ship another day.

Mohammed, our guide, was very apologetic for the delay, said a few words about Libya's coastline and then did the unthinkable. Sat back and said almost nothing until we arrived at the site. In fact, he was at a total loss when one person asked if he could tell us about life in Libya. I was not alone in thinking the trip was going to be a disaster.

We were all wrong. As soon as we got to Cyrene, Mohammed (pictured below) came alive. He told me he was involved in the excavation work there for 40 years, in between working at the university, and was passionate and knowledgeable about everything to do with Greek and Roman archaeology.

He taught himself English - and Italian and a bit of French - because they don't teach any languages in school and now, having had to retire (62 and you're out in Libya), he takes the few tourists who get to Libya around the site.

Leptis Magna is the best-known Roman site in Libya, and we will be visiting there in a couple of days, but Cyrene has to be a very close second.

I won't go into the historical detail as you can look that up, but in a nutshell it was built by Greeks from Santorini, taken over by the Romans, destroyed during a Jewish uprising, rebuilt and destroyed again in an earthquake in 365AD which destroyed all the cities along the North African coast, which sank four metres.

The site is huge - and they have only excavated 20% of it - and there are some fascinating remains to see. Temples, columns, a huge gymnasium, which was built as a forum by the Romans, theatres, amphitheatres. Below is the Gymnasium, which became the Forum under the Romans, the running track, overlooked by the gods, and me with one of the remaining statues. Mohammed said they reckon up to 25,000 people once lived here.

What was as fascinating for me, though, was the three-hour drive there from the port, which gave just a small glimpse of life in Libya. Good roads, hardly any cars, no road signs (I am intrigued as to how anyone finds their way around), no arrows to indicate a bend or roundabout (so how do they know what to do), and just two pairs of traffic lights - and they weren't working.

As I am walking around the site, a voice in my ear says, "I remember when..." As I said, they pop up everywhere.

After a horrible day rocking and rolling across between Alexandria and Benghazi, I am pleased to say the Med returned to it more usual millpond self for the journey to Al Khums, our second stop in Libya.

It's meant another day at sea and finally I've been able to get a taste of real life on Minerva - one where everyone does not walk around apparently drunk.

Like everyone else, that means I've done very little.

Sea days on Swan Hellenic's Minerva are quiet affairs. Everyone goes to the lectures so they can talk about them later over lunch or dinner; in between times they sit and read or chat, walk a mile or two around the Promenade Deck, have a go at the jigsaw in the library and send emails.

At least they try to. There are just three terminals, lined up in a row at the edge of the library and they go at a snail's pace (which is why you are having to do without links on these blogs, so my apologies for that). Judging by the constant moans and groans, a bit of modernisation wouldn't go amiss.

And of course the passengers eat. Non-stop it seems. About five minutes after 12 today, barely three hours after breakfast had finished, the pool deck was packed as everyone got in line for the curry specials executive chef Christian Wastl was serving outside. I waited an hour, not just for the queue to go down but to find somewhere to sit.

Was it worth it? Well, I guess it wouldn't have been so popular if it wasn't any good - or was it just that it was something new to do? - but the curry was too mild for me, even after a hefty dose of chilli was added.

Overall though, the food has been good and the service excellent. The barmen know my favourite drinks already and which cabin to charge. All I have to do is say yes please and thank you when the drink arrives - oh, and sign the bill as well, but prices are very reasonable and there are no gratuities added.

The lectures are the highlight for most passengers. I have been watching them, but on my cabin TV rather than going to the lounge as it's more comfortable and you can switch over if they get too heavy or detailed, which they tend to do.

"We only went to one today and it went on for far too long," a couple I met over lunch admitted after discovering that I too had been very errant in my education this morning. But there are only so many pictures of ruined vases and tales from the antiquities a girl can take.

I use the term advisedly, having been called the "girl" from the Telegraph yesterday. I pointed out I was neither a girl or from the Telegraph, but do write for the paper, but inwardly was rather flattered.

I guess it indicates the age of many of my fellow passengers, but I should say there are also quite a few younger people than on my last cruise with Swan. Put it another way, no one has asked me yet if I am the entertainment!

Judging by the comments on the coach, today's visit to Leptis Magna was not just a dream come true for me. "I've been wanting to come for so many years," one passenger told me later. "Fabulous."

That one word just about sums up Leptis Magna, in the city of Al Khums, about 15 minutes by coach from where Minerva tied up this morning for our second stop in Libya on this Ancient Wonders cruise with Swan Hellenic.

Today there was no messing about with the Libyan authorities and we were off the ship within 30 minutes of the scheduled time and on site before 9.30am, which gave us a whole morning to do justice to the place.

It's an enormous site, founded by Phoenicians, once ruled from Carthage and finally Roman (that's the very abbreviated version, by the way, because I got very lost somewhere in the 4th century BC).

It became a colony of Rome in 109AD but really shot to prominence in 193, when Lucius Septimius Severus, who came from Leptis, became Emperor of Rome, and set about turning his home town into a city to rival any other along the North African coast.

What's so amazing about this place is how much has survived the centuries and attacks, first by the Vandals and then by the Berbers.

Our visit started at the baths, where there are the usual hot, cold and tepid rooms, all once covered head to toe in marble and heated by the fuel produced from the residue of olive oil manufacture, according to our guide Ziad, and what must be the most public public loo in the world, with seating for 70 people.

In front of the toilets there is a channel with clean water for washing - except just how clean it was after 70 people had been using it is anyone guess.

From there we walked through the sports ground, past the Nymphaeum, where once there was a fountain (water, nymphs, geddit?), into the colonnaded street, once lined with covered shops, and then into the Forum - a huge area measuring 60 metres by 100 metres and in Roman times with two storeys.

We also visited the Severan Basilica, the harbour (experts reckon it was only just finished when the 365AD earthquake hit so was actually never used), the market and the spectacular theatre. This is me in the plebs' seats!

Apparently the 1957 film Legend of the Lost, starring Sophia Loren and John Wayne, was filmed in Leptis Magna and gives a good picture of what it looked like before all the statues were removed for safe keeping. I suggest Blockbuster dusts off its copies as there'll be a rush on when we all get home next week.

What was almost as interesting as the ruins was the number of locals milling around the site. There were teenagers hanging out and what seemed like hundreds of school kids, all smiles and laughing, who were definitely more interested in trying out their English on us than learning too much about the history.

I was also enthralled by the immaculately-dressed traffic cops stationed at the busy junctions between the ship and Leptis Magna. At one junction, he had our coach and two cars to cope with. On leaving the site, I noticed three cars had been halted to allow us to pull out.

A tough job but someone has to do it!

I've only heard passengers on this Swan Hellenic cruise around Libya moan about two things so far.

Many are missing Minerva II, the ship which replaced the one we are on now when Swan was owned by Carnival. It's an interesting turnaround, as on my last cruise with Swan, in June last year, Minerva II was almost a dirty word.

And just as many - the men, I should add - are really fed up they didn't spot a single pirate coming through the Gulf of Aden.

Somehow I don't think they are joking either. "A bit like going to Antarctica and not seeing any penguins," one whispered to me.

I have visions of them all with walking sticks at the ready (hopefully not the chairs and tables on the pool deck, as used by the passengers on MSC Melody, as there are not enough to go around as it is), ready to fend off any bandits.

That's the kind of spirit that made Britain great!

This morning Minerva docked in Tripoli for the third and final call to Libya on this Ancient Wonders cruise on Swan Hellenic.

The excursion options today were between Sabratha, another ancient Roman city, or the Jamahiriya Museum in Tripoli. There was also a coach transfer to the city, to spend a couple of hours in the medina.

That last option was tempting, but I was finaly won over by the thought of seeing the theatre at Sabratha. It was rebuilt by the Italians between 1926 and 1936, is still used for concerts (Mussolini attended the first one in the reconstructed theatre in 1937) and is simply stunning.

As I saw it for the first time I was reminded of my Ephesus moment, when I saw the façade of the ancient library there for the first time, and the fact that it was reconstructed as opposed to having survived the centuries did nothing to detract from it for me.

Our guide Toriq explained that the three levels were for the different roles being played by actors. If they were playing gods, they were at the top, if they were emperors they were in the middle and ordinary folk were at the bottom.

The centuries have not been as kind to Sabratha as they were to Leptis Magna and you do need to use quite a bit of imagination (and Toriq's books) to picture things as they were.

For instance, this was the main road in Roman times, stretching from Carthage in Tunisia to Alexandria in Egypt. About 3,000km. Not quite the M25 is it?

Now that we have left, here are some final thoughts about Libya.

It was somewhere I'd always wanted to go, to see the ancient Roman sights, and I was certainly not disappointed. The sights were wonderful, and I was also very impressed by the guides, who all spoke good English and really knew their stuff, and by the coaches, which all had air-con (sometimes too much) and were in far better condition than many I've been on in America.

Mind you, they obviously haven't got many as the same coaches and drivers - and actually the guides as well - were at each port.

It is incredible - and amazing - that at all these ancient sites you can clambour over the remains to get that perfect picture and touch the mosaics and no one tells you off! It's so very refreshing.

But there are some frustrations. The delay I mentioned in Benghazi was caused by the authorities insisting everyone on the ship - passengers and crew - have their temperature taken to make sure we were not harbouring swine flu.

That's fine, but the helpful thing would have been for the immigration lot to clear the passport side of things while the medics did their bit. It seems that was asking too much. As a result, my feet did not touch Libyan soil until 1.20pm that day - more than four hours after we had docked.

Once we were back at sea, Hugh Leslie, our cruise director, thanked us all for our cooperation with the medical checks and said the chief medic had said "only the British" would have submitted to that in such good humour. Was it a test or am I being too cynical?

Also, because Libya is a strict Muslim country with no alcohol allowed, bars have to be locked while ships are in port. At least that's the theory. In practise, anything can happen.

In Benghazi they allowed the bars to open, in Al Khums they not only had to be locked but stay shut for the overnight cruise to Tripoli, and only open again once our ropes were cast and we were away from the land.

The no-alcohol rule is hardly a problem, but I can see it would annoy less-tolerant people than the lot on this cruise - and of course it's not great for cruiselines that rely heavily on sales of booze.

It's a fabulous destination, but ready to take its place on the cruising map? I don't think so. It's been hard work for the shorex team on Minerva so full marks to them for getting it all sorted - and still smiling at the end of the day!

Nearly 48 hours after leaving Tripoli, Minerva reached Greece yesterday, tying up in Heraklion, Crete, just before lunchtime. Today's blog should have been all about Knossos, which was the main attraction we all trooped off to see.

My coach started with around 20 people; by the end of the tour we had dwindled to seven as people got bored, fed up, older passengers were unable to cope with the steps and so on. Back on the coach I overheard the woman behind me say: "So that was Knossos; I won't be going there again."

I stuck with the tour through to the bitter end, sure there must be something really good lurking around one of the corners, but I think we had all been so spoilt on this Swan Hellenic cruise by the wonderful sights in Libya.

So I will just say Knossos is the site of an old Minoan palace, destroyed in the 14th-century BC, when the Minoans - who came from the Middle East - also died out, and tell you instead some more about the passengers on board Minerva.

There are 347 of us - including the lecturers and their wives - so the ship is pretty full (it holds a maximum of 352).

I have met one other Hebridean refugee - regulars readers will remember I was supposed to visit Libya last month on what as then called Hebridean International Cruises, before the company sold the ship - and she tells me there is at least one other couple who were saved by Swan, possibly a few others but we have not found them.

Most of the people I've met are charming, well-cruised and well-travelled sorts, quite elderly, but I heard tonight there is a couple on their honeymoon.

Many have only ever cruised with Swan Hellenic and have no desire to try another line; a few are happy to shop around. Some have been on since Mombasa and came through Pirate Alley; this morning I met a couple who have been on for seven weeks, since Minerva left Cape Town in South Africa.

Another couple I met today were on a Spirit of Adventure cruise I did around South Africa a couple of years ago (SoA, by the way, is a Swan lookalike, started by Saga, but for all ages, when it looked like Swan would disappear for ever).

We were happily reminiscing about the day we were supposed to visit Durban, but it was so rough that the pilot, who risked all to get on board, had to be winched off by helicopter. We never got to Durban and finally ended up in Maputo, in Mozambique, which I now feel able to happily strike from "must-visit" list (note - actually if you never go there it won't be a great loss!).

As Walt says: "It's a small world after all."

One of the most unusual sights on Minerva are the inflatable Zodiacs that adorn the top deck of the ship. They've not been used on this Swan Hellenic trip around Egypt and Libya, but they are an essential piece of kit when the ship relocates to Antarctica for winter as they are the only means of getting ashore in the White Continent.

Minerva will be back there this winter - if you book now there are still cabins for £2,995 per person for departure in December, and that's with all flights, transfers, meals and drinks included - but it then joins the procession of ships that are quitting Antarctica.

Sister line Voyages of Discovery and Saga's Swan look-alike Spirit of Adventure are both pulling out of the White Continent this winter and sailing instead to the Far East, while Hurtigruten is cutting back to having one ship there.

Destinations do fall in and out of fashion, and it could be Antarctica has had its day for a while, but I wonder whether it's not also getting very difficult - and too expensive - to operate there, just as Alaska, which is also seeing a mass exodus of ships at the moment.

The environmentalists are keen to see all the cruise ships leave Antarctica, the US has been talking about tighter regulations and there has been a spate of potentially serious accidents recently, not least when Gap Adventures' Explorer hit ice and sank in November 2007.

A note I've had in my cabin about 2010 itineraries says the plans is for winter Minerva to sail to India and the Far East in winter 2010/11 - as I said, destinations come in and out of fashion and right now the east is hot stuff.

So hot, that Royal Caribbean International has not only decided that Brilliance of the Seas will stay in Dubai for a second season in winter 2010/11 - this before it has even completed one season cruising the Gulf states - but has added two 12-night itineraries that will be calling at Mumbai, Mormugao and Cochin in India.

Having just been to all three ports with Silversea, I admit to being more than a little intrigued by what Royal passengers will make of them. And indeed what the locals will make of Royal passengers.

But back to Swan. Before Minerva embarks on its as-yet-not-finalised Far East tour, it will be spending summer 2010 back in the Med and Northern Europe, sailing from Dover, which is good news for anyone not keen on flying.

The ship will be back in Libya in May and November; in July there's a lovely (if, like me, you love France) French Vintage cruise, with five ports in France including an overnight in Bordeaux; in September, there's a Venetian Republic cruise from Naples that includes a transit of the Corinth Canal. I've never been through but the pictures of ships going through with inches to spare fascinate me.

Minerva will also be making a return visit to Jeddah, in Saudi Arabia, as Minerva sails from Aqaba to Dubai. I suspect the rules and regulations there - and the much stricter alcohol policy - will make Libya look like chicken feed.

You can find out more at Swan's website or call reservations on 01444 462 180 for more information.

I was intrigued by news of a "no hidden extras" cruise on Marco Polo from Tilbury to the Norwegian fjords over the May Bank Holiday. Had they suddenly become all inclusive?

Actually, the news was that there are no gratuities to pay. Which is not really news as tips are always covered on Marco Polo.

It's still a great deal - from £549 for an inside cabin and £649 per person for a room with a view for an eight-night cruise. That's less than £70 or just over £80 a day, depending which cabin you go for, including all meals, entertainment and the tips.

You will have to pay if you want something to drink or want to take an excursion. But now you know, they are not hidden!

A few weeks ago I posted a few pictures of Golden Princess, stripped bare and definitely not looking her usual elegant self.

Well after three weeks hard labour for the shipyard workers in British Columbia, the ship has re-emerged with a host of Princess Cruises latest signature features, including an adults-only Sanctuary and piazza-style atrium.

I've seen it happen loads of times, but the transformation in such a short time is amazing. You can check out the new-look Golden Princess here.

The ship is now back in action and cruising in Alaska.

I can't believe it's been almost a week since I disembarked Swan Hellenic's ship Minerva - high time for my final thoughts about my cruise around Libya.

The one thing I didn't mention much in my daily blogs was the crew, so I will make up for that first. They are a lovely crowd, friendly, courteous and always willing to stop for a chat if they have time.

I must single out Bella, my room stewardess, from Odessa in the Ukraine, who was so caring and thoughtful - ordering me a few nibbles when she knew I was having drinks in my cabin, worrying about my wereabouts when she spotted my cabin was empty late at night, after the excursion to Cyrene.

I was actually in the library, one of the only wi-fi hot spots on the ship, posting blogs and sorting emails; she had visions of me still on the quay in Benghazi!

Also, apart from tidying a few clothes, she left my things were I'd put them. How annoying is it when you put your suncream or toothpaste in one place and they move it, or they keep tidying papers you have carefully put in separate piles into one stack.

There are too many crew to mention every one I came into contact with, but I will also single out Kennedy, the assistant maitre d' in the Veranda self-service, who was so concerned about my well-being on the day we hit bad weather, and Michael, in the bar, who kindly served a drink late one night in the library (see above!) while I was working - and had the sense to come back later and ask if I'd like another!

The excursion team also did a great job, smoothly disembarking everyone at each port deck by deck to avoid queues at the gangway - but always varying the order so everyone got a chance to go first - and being on hand at each site to get passengers on the next coach to get back to the ship. It's a slick operation and usually means very little hanging around.

Excursions, which are mostly included in the price (there are a few that cost extra, but very reasonably priced), are an important part of the whole Swan experience so getting these right is vital. And they do, in spades.

The open dining in the evening is also important for Swans, as it means they can move around tables, meeting new people, or just go down for dinner as a group one night. The food overall was fine, but not great. There were moans about it, but to be honest what was on the plate was always far less important than the conversation going on around it.

Last but by no means least, Swan would not be Swan without its lectures. There were three on the sea days and they often managed to sneak one in an afternoon if we left a port early.

As a very rough generalisation, I would say from my conversations with other passengers that almost everyone goes to the lectures when they first get on board, then the numbers slowly start to fall so the room is full rather than packed.

I did watch a few and one or two were of interest, but personally I found the presentation dry. Full of facts, but assuming a level of knowledge that I for one did not have when it came to the ancient civilisations, and lacking any light and dark. My solution, as I mentioned before, was to watch in my cabin so I could turn over if things got too dull.

On the positive side, you could always get a seat in the sun around the pool during the lectures - the trick was to hang on to it when the talks were over!

Libya itself, which was the reason I was on this specific cruise, was magic, with amazing sights and friendly locals - the school kids at Leptis Magna especially were enthralled to see so many tourists. Even the immigration people had a smile and hello if you bothered to greet them.

If you ever get a chance, do go. It won't be like that forever.

So that's it. It's official. The first vessel in the new TUI Cruises fleet really is called Mein Schiff (my ship), a moniker chosen in a "name-that-ship" contest. And it's painted large on the side, just so no one forgets.

TUI Cruises, which is aimed at the German market (guess the name gives that away), is a joint venture between Royal Caribbean Cruises and TUI AG.

Mein Schiff, which holds 1,914 passengers, was the former Celebrity Galaxy. It's had a 38-day makeover and will be sailing the Baltic this summer, and from Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic in winter.

My question is, what happens if they add another vessel. Does it become Mein Schiff Zwei? Or Mein Anderer Schiff? We could start the contest now.

While on the subject of wind, this excerpt from a review on Cruise.co.uk is for all those who dismissed my qualms at the thought of crossing the Bay of Biscay in rough weather on Royal Caribbean's Independence of the Seas when it starts its winter cruises from Southampton.

For the largest cruise ship in the world surprised at the lack of stability in rough weather. Whether this was the result of an economy measure or cruise schedule in not utilizing the ships stabilisers which adds to the fuel consumption and slows progress, is not clear, as there was very little feed back by the Captain or ships crew. By the end of the cruise the ship looked like a hospital ship by the number of walking wounded.

You know who you are!

You've got to hand it to MSC Cruises for a worthy attempt at putting a positive spin on the fact they have changed course and will now be cruising up the west coast of Africa to avoid another encounter with the Somali pirates.

MSC Melody was attacked by pirates last month; a potentially serious incident was averted thanks to the quick thinking of a few passengers who spotted the bandits trying to board the ship and threw deck chairs and tables at them.

To avoid another such incident, MSC Sinfonia will be sailing "exciting" (so the missive says) new itineraries around West Africa, calling at Morocco, Senegal and Namibia.

I gather gather sand-boarding in Namibia is good fun but none can replace the amazing sights in Jordan, Yemen and Egypt that you visit by cruising though the Gulf of Aden.

Be interesting to know what the passengers think, especially after meeting the gung-ho lot on Swan Hellenic who were so disappointed to have sailed through Pirate Alley and not seen a single miscreant. I'd say that was the Brits for you, except for this report on Silversea's venture through the pirate-infested waters.

After a fleeting glimpse of home last Friday - about three hours! - I left again, this time bound for Southampton and a one-week cruise to the Norwegian fjords on P&O Cruises Ventura.

It promised to be a bit of a shock. Temperatures in New York had been in the early 80s; the Norway weather forecast was for fleeces and raincoats weather. Well it is only the end of May!

Ventura was berthed at Southampton's new Ocean Terminal. "It's where Titantic sailed from back in 1912," I told a passenger in the lift as we got on board. "I don't think that's what people want to hear," my daughter whispered as we got out.

The terminal is very spacious, inside and out, which means the meet-and-greet parking works much better than it did at the Mayflower terminal, but the passenger flow is poor.

There must be at least 20 check-in desks, but all the checked-in people then have to get through just five security scanners, which created long queues. All the scanned passengers then had to get past one man on the gangway checking they were in possession of a ship's card, which created yet another bottleneck.

We finally made it to the cabin in time to pick up our lifejackets and exit again for the lifeboat drill. Strangely, our muster station was the corridor outside East, the Asian restaurant, which was fine for most of us, but I spotted a few elderly people with walking difficulties who were desperate to sit down.

Day one was spent crossing the dreaded North Sea. Dreaded? It was like a mill pond and there was even some sunshine in the morning, although it was several degrees too cold for me to think of sitting outside. Nevertheless, I did venture out and up to deck 19 to have a go at the bungee trampoline.

Unlike when I did it last July, there were quite a few kids (and adults!) queuing for their turn, and others trying their hand at juggling and stilt walking, which was good to see. I still didn't quite manage to do a somersault - a rather scary move that involved having to throw yourself backwards.

"Try later in the cruise, after you've had another go," Nicole, from the Circus School, suggested. I smiled and nodded but she has got to be joking!

At 7.40 Monday morning, just as we were expecting to see the port of Alesund on this P&O Cruises' voyage around the Norwegian fjords, news came through from the captain that it was too windy to dock Ventura.

As the ship was shivering and shuddering and the sea was grey and stormy, I was not too sorry to hear his next announcement - we were going into Olden, our next port, a day early and staying overnight. As the town is down a long fjord, we would be in calm waters and protected from the worst of the wind by the high mountains on either side.

Needless to say, my teenage daughter managed to sleep though the announcements, even though they were made into the cabin. When she finally came to soon after 9.30, she was a little baffled that there was no sign of land out the window.

I brought her up to date on the day's news, adding that while there didn't seem much to see in Alesund, I was quite sorry not be going there because "sometimes it's nice to see new things even f they are not interesting".

"A bit like Fujairah really," she said, smiling, remembering they were the words of the receptionist on Costa Victoria when we were cruising the Arabian Gulf in January.

I'm now just waiting for the first compensation claims from passengers on the grounds they "only came on this cruise because they wanted to go to Alesund".

It's a shame the weather has turned on us as yesterday in Bergen was quite pleasant. We planned to take the funicular up to the top of Mount Floyen, to get a good view down over the town, but unfortunately half of Norway had the same plan (it was a Sunday) and after calculating we would queue for an hour for the seven-minute ride to the top, which was a little too disney-esque for my liking, we - daughter and partner - decided to walk.

So there we were, puffing our way up the hill while locals who looked twice our age came sprinting past. It's back to the Wii Fit for me if I ever get home long enough!

The views from Mount Floyen were stunning, as was the price of a drink at the top - £7 for a 40cl beer. "You'll have to stick to drinking on the ship," Mark said. A pint on Ventura costs £2.90.

Of course, Norway is renowned for its expensive booze, but I did a piece in the Telegraph recently proving that across Europe it's cheaper to drink on board than ashore now the value of sterling has fallen through the floor.

The cruise lines must be rubbing their hands with glee!

It was another day of wind and rain - and even hail - in Norway yesterday, but everyone on Ventura was being very British about it, dusting down our stiff upper lips and bringing out the rain coats and umbrellas that have been as vital to the packing as the formal gear on this cruise of the Norwegian fjords.

This being Norway, the weather could have gone either way. Captain Keith Dowds was really delighted when the pilot bade him farewell the other night with the words, you should be here next week, when apparently a ridge of high pressure is on its way.

"I really didn't want to hear that!" the captain admitted, having just had to cancel our call to Alesund due to high winds.

It's not just that bad weather upsets plans - and stomachs - but it can also be very costly. About a dozen coaches, each with a driver and guide, were waiting for our arrival into Alesund that never was. They still have to be paid, but not with passengers' money as the cost of the missed excursions had to be refunded. And then there were the extra port fees for Olden.

As I forecast - actually it was supposed to be in jest - a few people have tried the "I only came on this cruise for Alesund" trick to try to get some money back. I think they have been told where to go, politely of course. This is P&O after all.

Stavanger, the last port on this P&O Cruises voyage, turned out to be an sweet little town (well actually it's the fourth largest city in Norway), but fairly dripping money thanks to the oil and gas industries.

My daughter got very excited when she found an H&M and Mango, but instead of allowing her time for shopping, we dragged her off on a boat excursion along the Lysefjord to see the Pulpit Rock (that's the one high above a fjord, open on three sides, always pictured with people sunning themselves on the top).

There were a few disappointed faces when we finally reached the rock (it's the one with the flat top to the right of the picture). Did we really get so wet to see something so small?

No matter. It was a nice trip through the scenic islands around Stavanger and we also got to see three goats that live on a patch of grass at the foot of the rock (I never quite worked out why they were there) and so close to a waterfall that they filled a jug and handed around cups of water for us to taste.

We arranged our boat trip ashore, but P&O does sell excusions to the Lysefjord and Pulpit Rock. I see their excursion booklet warns the rock will look small because it's such a long way up. Just proves you should always read the small print!

Back on Ventura, the ropes were cast and we headed back out to the North Sea for the return run to Southampton.

Last night, after my first dinner in the dining room, I just caught Elton John and Dusty Springfield performing in the Havana Lounge. Not the real thing, you understand, but a couple of tribute acts. Elton, aka Jimmy Love, was actually quite good, Dusty, aka Maxine Mazumder, was blond, which was probably a good thing as just a couple of days before she had been Lulu.

Coincidentally, the real Lulu will be performing on Fred Olsen's Boudicca in November. I hope she is a little more authentic!

A lot has changed on Ventura since I was on the ship in July 2008 - all of it for the better, I'm pleased to say.

I must admit I decided to have another cruise on Ventura with slight trepidation. Sure, P&O told me they had ironed out the problems they were having with Freedom dining and sunbeds (or lack of them), but then they would say they wouldn't they?

The bags in the cabin and lifeboat drill over, my first test was to go to a bar and ask for a drink. Do you know what? The barman served me in a twinkling of an eye. The nonsense where all drinks orders had to go through a bar steward, causing huge delays in service, has gone.

It may sound trivial, but actually when you want a drink with your meal, which I like, and the drink only arrives after the food is eaten, which happened last time I was on board, it does matter.

Incidentally, if you did order a drink from a bar steward this time, the drinks turned up promptly and with a smile, which also never happened before.

I also smiled when I ordered a drink from Melvin, dived for my cruise card and he said, "don't worry, I remember your details from yesterday". I was on a ship with 3,337 other passengers remember. How impressive is that!

Freedom dining - or rather the lack of it - was a big problem when I was on Ventura last time. In a nutshell, it's supposed to mean you can eat in the dining room at a time that suits you, on a table with your nearest and dearest or sharing with other people if you want.

In practice, getting a table in the Freedom dining restaurant was like looking for hens' teeth, largely because so many passengers booked tables every evening, which somewhat negated the freedom aspect of the whole thing.

You had to eat either very early or very late, which didn't suit, so as a result, on a two-week cruise my family and I ate in the main dining room just four times.

Actually we didn't do much better this time, only making it down there once on the seven-night cruise, but this time it wasn't because we couldn't get a table but because we discovered the Beach House Diner.

This is a new - and free - evening-only waiter-service restaurant P&O has created on one side of the Beach House self-service to help take pressure off the Freedom dining restaurant and it is brilliant.

The menu includes chicken wings, potato skins, chicken tikka masala, ribs, sizzling chicken and plain old fish and chips - all tasty stuff, cooked fresh and served hot.

We discovered it the first evening, when we dined there almost alone; by the last evening of the cruise it was packed and they were having to issue bleepers to alert diners when a table was ready. "It'll be 15-20 minutes," we were told. Actually, it went off in less than 10 minutes - so fast we were still deciding what drink to order in Metropolis, an über-popular bar at the aft end of the ship.

That evening we had been intending to eat in the dining room, but hearing there was a 15-20 minutes was the excuse we all wanted to change plans and head upstairs to the diner, where we were happy to put up with the small delay.

It's not that there was anything wrong with the food in the dining room, but the diner is just so much more relaxed and the menu less fussy. And I do like my food served hot.

Other notable changes include waiter-service breakfast in The White Room for suite passengers to take pressure off the buffet - it was very nice but the service was desperately slow - and staff in the self-service are no longer causing a bottleneck by insisting on handing out trays, plates and cutlery.

At lunchtime on the last day we treated ourselves to tapas in Las Ramblas. It costs £2.50 for three dishes but the food was so good last time we had to go back.

This time, the experience was made even better by Sid Real, from the Philippines, who is a wine waiter in the evening but was helping out in Las Ramblas during the day and took time to chat with us between serving our drinks and food.

"Have you noticed what's missing in here?" he asked. I looked around, but saw nothing. "Spanish brandy," he said triumphantly. "We have Spanish beer, but no Spanish brandy. People are always asking for it."

I pass the message on.

After a whole two days at home, I was off again - this time back to New York to join Cunard's Queen Mary 2 for a transatlantic cruise back to the UK.

Surprise number one. I got in a cab at JFK Airport and asked for the cruise terminal in Brooklyn, only for the taxi driver to ask me where it was. I replied that I was kind-of hoping he would know, but said I did remember it was near Brooklyn Bridge.

Thanks to heavy traffic and several wrong turns, what should have been a $40-ish ride, according to a piece of paper thrust in my hand at the airport, the meter ran up $70. "I never even knew this was here and now I do," the driver enthused. Rather wish it had not been at my expense.

Surprise number two was that on boarding (an incredible 15 minutes from walking into the terminal to walking onto the ship, which has to be a record), there was no one escorting passengers to their cabins - or staterooms, as Cunard likes to call them.

I actually like finding my own way but I had expected ranks of crew waiting to show passengers the way given Cunard prides itself on being so traditional.

Over the next week, internet willing, I will be reporting back from the ship as well as keeping an eye on other things happening in the world of cruising, so keep checking back.

It's always interesting to listen in on other people's conversations, especially when they turn to cruising.

This morning I forgot to take my single traveller's companion - my book - to breakfast so I had nothing to do but listen in as the other two couples in the alcove I was in started talking about Queen Mary 2 and QE2.

The alcoves, by the way, are along each side of the self-service restaurant on Queen Mary 2. They are a pain when you are trying to find a table because you have to stick your head right inside to see if there is space and if there isn't you have to go to the next one. And all the while your food is going cold.

Of course there are other tables but I do like the alcoves because they have a seaview and are quiet and feel very private, away from the usual self-service clatter. Of course that privacy also means it is almost impossible not to overhear conversations, book or no book.

Neither couple had been on Queen Mary 2 but the American duo had cruised with Cunard on QE2. "Did you prefer QE2," British wife asked, making a wild assumption because a couple they had met last night said QE2 was a much nicer ship.

"Oh no," American husband replied. "It was so noisy, creaking and vibrating. This is so peaceful I even forgot I was on a ship last night."

I have to concur, at least in how quiet the ship is. Despite its size, it's also very friendly - people say hello when they pass on the stairs or in the alleyways, complete strangers start chatting at meal times (especially in those alcoves) and in the lift.

I met one woman today who was over the moon to discover the shop allows passengers to take garments to their cabins to try on. "They think I'm going to buy it," she said.

It struck me as a reasonable assumption, but I suspect they might be disappointed!

I'm lucky enough to be crossing the Atlantic in one of Queen Mary 2's Princess Grill suites. That's not quite the top spot - there are Queens Grill suites passengers above me, but it's still a nice position to be in.

It's not the biggest stateroom I've ever had - that honour has to go to the fabulous Owner's Suite I had on Silversea - but it is spacious and there is more storage space than I have in my bedroom at home, with a walk-in closet, two big wardrobes and plenty of shelves.

My selection of clothes looks very meagre (I'm keeping the closet door shut in the hope the room steward won't see!) but I'm only on board for a week; for the world cruise passengers could be on for four months.

On one wall there's a glass cabinet that is, surprise, surprise, full of glasses. I am intrigued to know what happens to them in rough weather but honestly am happy never to find out!

There is also a lovely big sofa, a rubber strip all around the sill of the stateroom door so it closes with a sort of sigh rather than slamming - a great touch - and joy of joys, no net curtain. Actually that's not quite true. There is one, but my room steward, Reneboy, has never closed it, for which I am very grateful.

I've never understood why you pay huge amounts of money for cabins with sea views, only for the view to be obscured by a piece of net. In fact, my first task on entering a cabin with a net curtain is to tuck it out of the way.

The best room stewards - for which read Bella in Swan Hellenic's Minerva - catch on and leave them open, but most just operate on auto-pilot and shut them as trained.

There was a bottle of fizz waiting in the cabin to welcome me on board and bottled water is provided free, which are both nice touches.

But there are also some disappointments with the cabin. I have a chunky TV, and no DVD, rather than the sleek new flat-screen model I would expect in a ship that sells itself as luxury.

"I suppose it's a problem if you want to spend your time watching DVDs," one of my table companions said disdainfully. Actually I don't - I've not even had time to put on the TV these past two days - but it's a question of expectations. And again, Cunard is pitching itself in the luxury market.

Also, while I have no end of wine glasses, there is no corkscrew. I had to call room service for one and it arrived with incredible speed on a silver tray. I asked the waitress whether she wanted to do the honours, but she apologised and said she didn't open bottles. Luckily, it is one of my skills.

Neither is there a stopper to keep an opened bottle of wine fresh, which seems especially strange to me given I use one at home with "Cunard" written on the top.

Some nice plump pillows on the bed would be nice too. I have four rather deflated ones that are so small they can all fit abreast across the double bed.

"They are a rather small, but at least as we are cruising alone we can stack them up to make a back rest for reading in bed," Edward, a fellow single traveller, told me. He is one of 500 so-called in-transit passengers, out of about 2,450 people on board, which is a rather strange term used to mean they are doing a return transatlantic crossing.

He's right, of course, but it's not quite the same as sinking into a stack of deep, soft pillows like you do on other less classy ships. I wait to hear news of a refurb! 

Yesterday I made a great discovery on Queen Mary 2 - the Canyon Ranch Spa. It's the only Canyon Ranch spa at sea and there was a real friendliness and genuine helpfulness on the front deck that seems to be missing in the ubiquious Elemis spas. Put it another way, I felt like a customer rather than a moving dollar sign.

Actually I wasn't going to have a treatment as it is very expensive, especially with the poor £ to $ exchange rate (all prices on QM2 are charged in dollars), but I couldn't resist the Thai massage.

As it was, it turned out to be a good choice, first because it came up as one of yesterday's daily offers so I saved $36, second because the masseur, Jintana, who trained in Bangkok, was very good, bending my legs into positions I would never have thought possible.

"Your neck is in knots," Jintana told me. After bearing the pain of her pressure, all the time telling myself it was doing me good, I had worked that out. I did feel good afterwards though.

On the issue of cost, one thing that did impress me was that all prices include a 10% gratuity (although like all bills on here there is space to leave another tip, maybe hoping people won't have read that it is included).

It's far more honest than one cruiseline I know that lists one price but slaps on a mandatory gratuity (and nothing so reasonable or easy to calculate as 10%). As you have no choice but to pay, surely that is the price that should be in the brochure?

As I had bought a treatment, I was entitled to one day's free access to the aqua therapy pool and thermal suite, where I cooked nicely in the steam room, herbal sauna and ordinary sauna. There's also a quiet relaxation room with views out to sea - or there would have been except we were sailing in low mist the whole day.

"We did see some dolphins earlier," a couple I knew from dinner with the hotel manager a few nights ago told me. They had been looking for a quiet place with a view so they had paid $40 each for a day pass to the thermal suite (there's also a three-day pass for $75 and a five-day one for $95).

"It was free when we cruised on Celebrity," they added, a bit miffed at having to pay so much just for somewhere to sit away from the grey skies and wind (the indoor pool was packed, apparently). I tried to mollify them by telling them that most lines charge for the thermal suite these days as it's a nice little earner.

And judging by the number of people in there yesterday, they were earning very nicely. Miserable weather must be manna from heaven for them.

Saga Rose will be saying a very long goodbye as she prepares to leave the Saga fleet in October. Like QE2, the ship falls foul of new SOLAS regulations that come in on October 1 next year. Saga had the choice of spending shed-loads of money to make it compliant (assuming it was even possible) or getting rid of it.

Saga decided it had to go.

The first farewell is to Dover, from where the ship will sail today for the last time, cruising to Guernsey, the Isles of Scilly, Ireland and Scotland, and ending up in Liverpool, where it will spend the summer, sailing to Norway, Iceland and Greenland.

After saying more goodbyes in Liverpool, the ship will move to Southampton, from where it will be saying its final farewells.

The very last voyage, after 44 years in service, departs October 30 and will be visiting Spain, Italy, Croatia, Greece, Cyprus, Israel, Egypt, Malta, France, Morocco.

What happens then has not been decided. At one point it appeared Dubai would snap it up, as happened with QE2, and turn Rose in to a floating hotel as well, but that seems to have fallen by the wayside now the recession has hit and the emirate has discovered cash is in short supply and it has rather too many hotels anyway.

I guess the other options are to find a buyer in a part of the world where no one bothers too much about SOLAS (as Fred Olsen did with Black Prince) or selling it for scrap.

All Saga says at the moment it that it is discussing plans for a fitting retirement.

It's lunchtime on my first day on Queen Mary 2 and I've picked some rather scrummy-looking Asian dishes from the Lotus, one of four sections in the King's Court self-service.

I find a table, sit down, taste the food and realise it needs some seasoning. Great. I've chosen a table without any salt or pepper pots. So I look at the neighbouring tables. No condiments on any of them.

I remember seeing chilli sauce at the servery yesterday afternoon. That will do, so I go to get some and what do I find? The salt and pepper. Not in pots, though, but small paper sachets, like you might expect in a cheap seaside cafe.

Most unimpressive for a luxury liner.

Apparently they have had to do that because the rather affluent people who think they are a bit special because they are cruising with Cunard (ah yes, I did come across a few of those during my transatlantic crossing) steal the salt and pepper pots (and anything else, given the chance).

"Do they have the Cunard logo on them," I ask David Stephenson, the hotel manager, thinking this might make it understandable, if still a bit tawdry. But no. They are ordinary, cheap pots - cheap especially after they discovered they kept going walkies.

I was assured more would be delivered to the ship when it docked in Southampton the next day. I wonder if they were.

It's been a few days since I disembarked Queen Mary 2 in Southampton so it's time for some last thoughts about the ship.

I still find it strange to reflect that it took me seven hours to get to New York and five days at sea to get back to the UK, with no sign of land at all. "Is this the view all the way," one of the passengers mused at breakfast on the first morning, while looking out at the horizon. I said I thought it probably was. He didn't look overly impressed.

On first walk-about, QM2 is a confusing ship, especially if you are a regular cruiser, because nothing is where it should be. But it all soon falls into place.

The self-service, always aft on one of the top decks on modern ships, is on deck seven and mid-ships because the Princess and Queens Grill restaurants - these are the ones for the higher-paying passengers - are aft.

Likewise, the theatre isn't at the front of the ship; instead there is a huge another part of the ship forward of the theatre containing the Planetarium.

I watched three different shows there - they are free but you should pick up tickets in the morning to guarantee a seat - and loved them. Didn't always follow the narrative - at one showing in particular the snoring man in front kept grabbing my attention! - but the effects were great, planets whizzing about the dome, collisions, explosions and so on.

A bit of rough weather (which thankfully we didn't have) and you'd think you were at a theme park.

The show was only marred by the ridiculous safety warnings broadcast at the start of each show. I could just about live with the spiel about locating the emergency exits (but they don't ask you to do that when in the theatre, self-service, dining room, etc) but what was the bit about banging your leg on a protruding table as you leave the seat all about?

There was very little chance anyway. Intrigued to find this table, I fumbled about but couldn't even get it to come out of its slot at the side of the seat. And I tried each time I went to the show.

Before you get the idea I am really sad, I should add you have to do something to pass the time while passengers bumble around trying to work out what "sit in the red seats" means! "How difficult is it," the exasperated guy in charge said under his breath - or it should have been but I'm sure I wasn't the only one who heard him.

Illuminations, the room which houses the Planetarium, was also used for the lectures, which were the best I've seen on a ship. Interesting subjects and well presented by people who really knew their stuff.

I went to three presentations by film historian Barry Brown, who had brought lots of wonderful old film clips to illustrate his lectures, and the one about the history and restoration of the Statue of Liberty by art historian and conservator Christine Rousell was the talk of the ship.

Apparently when Frenchman Frederic Bartholdi had this plan to build a colossal statue (that is the technical term), his plan was for it to stand at the entrance to the Suez Canal, but the Egyptians turned down the idea because it was too expensive. He then offered to America as a gesture of the friendship between France and the US.

Both countries had huge problems trying to raise money for the project, but finally they did, although it meant it was finished 10 years behind schedule, in 1886. Almost 100 years on some French engineers went up the statue and saw it was falling apart. Cue Christine and her team to set things right.

It took the best part of three years and $150 million but they did it. She said the crown is being reopened this summer but for just 30 people at a time. Expect long queues.

I was less enthralled with the art auctions - and so were all the other passengers if the lack of bidding was anything to go by. These events are so tacky I'm surprised they even have them on QM2. I was also surprised to see those awful car boot-type stalls set up in the corridors on a ship where, I was told, they carry guests, not passengers, in staterooms, not cabins. Oh and of course the ship is actually a liner.

It makes it all sound so sophisticated and refined, but you soon realise Cunard is only out to make money, money, money, just like any other line.

There are some big rooms, especially the Queens Room, where afternoon tea is served by waiters in white gloves (tradition, tradition) and all the dressy folk go to dance in the evening.

Another couple of surprises. When I went to the Queens Room one evening, they were holding a Miss Queen or some such competition. It was just not in keeping with the elegance of the room and the evening. Also, there are three formal nights on a six-night transatlantic crossing and most people do dress for the occasion - it's part of the Cunard thing - but there were quite a few who just didn't bother. And they got away with it.

The ship has lots of small bars, which gives QM2 a small ship feel. My favourite hangout was the Chart Room, a popular place thanks to the jazz band that played there every evening.

My biggest complaint about the ship was the dining. If you are in the standard class cabins you eat in Britannia Restaurant. Two sittings, set tables. Easy and traditional (that word again), as Cunard likes to be, but not really to my taste.

If you are in a Princess Grill cabin, as I was, you dine in the Princess Grill, if you are in the Queens Grill cabin your table is in the Queens Grill. Both are small restaurants, much more intimate than the Britannia. Easy so far, but crucially you don't have a set time to dine.

That normally works for me. Turn up, join others who have also just arrived and dine together. It's a nice social occasion. Ah, but that's not how it works here. Grills passengers are allocated a table so you could turn up just when the others are finishing eating, as happened to me the first evening.

It made for a very awkward dinner as they clearly felt it would be rude to leave me, but I felt equally unhappy eating while being watched and trying to make conversation.

I guess it was partly my fault as I was asked before the trip if I wanted to share a table or dine alone. So great. The other option would have been to dine on my own each night.

"It doesn't work because you are alone," the hotel manager David Stephenson told me. So there are no single passengers on the ship? I don't think so. Actually, the system wouldn't necessarily work for me if I was with a partner. Mine was a table for eight. I would not want to sit on a table of that size with just one other person either.

Luckily, it wasn't too much of an issue as I dined one night in Lotus - part of the self-service by day that becomes a waiter service Asian restaurant in the evening. The food was delicious.

The lovely maitre d' in the Princess Grill, Sandro Ranieri, also arranged for me and a companion to eat in Todd English one evening - $30 per head extra, but again the food was very good (had to take out a mortgage for a bottle of wine mind!) - and he also got me a table in the Queens Grill, which was actually just like the Princess Grill, except this time I was dining alone.

No matter. Osman Pinaroglu, the charming maitre d', came over regularly to see all was OK and the service was good, even though the waiters were rushed off their feet. The wine waiter was less impressed with me. I just browsed his menu to make a note of the prices. "You don't want to buy a bottle," he asked. Not at those prices I didn't.

People celebrating birthdays on cruises usually have to make do with a cake and rather tuneless happy birthday to you from the crew at the dinner table, but Dorothy Dick is a bit special.

Not only did she celebrate her 90th birthday on Hebridean Island Cruises' Hebridean Princess, but it was her 33rd cruise with the cruiseline. That makes her a very important person. So she was presented with a Harley Crossley print of the ship and a card signed by all the crew.

Here she is with the Captain Michael Hepburn, chief officer James Forbes Simpson, assistant purser Valeria Semina and chief purser Dave Indge.

Who says cruising is all about putting on weight?

Starting Monday morning, GMTV's Mr Motivator will be showing the female half of the nation how to get fit, healthy and in shape to wear a bikini this summer in live show broadcast from Princess Cruises' Ruby Princess while it cruises the Med.

Three "Bikini Ladies", representing the body shapes of an apple, a pear and a tofi (that's thin outside, fat inside, by the way, not lousy spelling), have been picked by GMTV to take part in the programmes, which are on all next week and will come from a different port each day.

The ladies will be working out in the ship's gym and on-deck and learning how to prepare healthy food with the help of the ship's executive chef, as well as getting active on ship's shore excursions.

Oh, and Princess will be using the opportunity to show you the many best bits of Ruby Princess of course.

It takes me back to a cruise I did in the Caribbean a few years back that also proved you don't have to put on weight on a cruise.

Don't believe me? Then tune in to ITV1's breakfast show all next week and get Mr Motivated!

Dawn Princess is the latest Princess ship to have been given a makeover. After two weeks in dry dock in Brisbane, Australia, the vessel is now back in service sporting a signature Movies under the Stars screen by the pool and an adults-only Sanctuary.

It's a case of one out, one in for Princess.

Royal Princess checked into a shipyard in Piraeus at the weekend, where it will undergo repairs following the engine room fire on June 18, as the ship was departing from Port Said in Egypt.

No one was hurt in the blaze, but two engines were disabled. That cruise and the June 25 departure were cancelled. The ship is expected to be back in service in time for its next scheduled cruise, departing Venice on July 7.

Less than a week after Peter Deilmann announced the imminent demise of its river cruise operation, its ocean-going vessel, Deutschland, arrived in London on a round-Britain voyage.

The vessel was moored in the Thames at Greenwich, it's usual spot by Tower Bridge having been closed. That's a real shame for passengers, who still had to tender ashore when they were by the bridge but at least they didn't have to negotiate the DLR once on dry land.

With river cruising almost gone - it finishes at the end of the season in October 2009 - Deilmann is pinning its hopes on Deutschland and ocean-going cruising, and especially the US and UK markets, which are seen as the growth markets.

The problem is, Deutschland feels very German, which could put off most Brits (although there were four on board, I am told, who had travelled to Hamburg to join the ship and sail back to the UK).

It comes across in the name of the ship (and the names of some lounges and restaurants - Berlin, Lili Marleen), which helpfully is on the chairs so you'll never forget where you are (as the average age is 72 maybe that is considered a possibility)...

...the fact that so many passengers are German or German-speaking and the slightly decadent, verging on kitsch, very 1930s Germany decor. This is the Terrasse Lounge (note the statues), below is the ballroom, below again the Old Fritz Pub.

The spa is interesting. This is called a Kraxen Oven and it is basically a sauna for people who don't do saunas (with apologies to Ocean Village). You sit here with a towel covering your front half and the hay behind is heated, which in turn heats the top half of your body. It costs €5 for 15 minutes.

And this is Cleopatra's Bath. It's filled with either goat's milk or coconut milk and you can lie here for half an hour with a glass of Champagne and the one you love (they reckon two can fit in it), doing oodles of good to your skin. It costs €45 for 30 minutes, but I suspect that excludes the bubbly.

I have to admit I was not a great fan of the ship when I first saw it a few years back, but it has grown on me. The little bit of service I experienced in my very short time on board was lovely - the passenger-facing crew all speak good English - and I was impressed with the food.

I also loved the fact there are nuts on tap in the Terrasse throughout the day. Such a mark of civilisation, but a bit of a killer where the diet is concerned. It's probably also one of the reasons why the average per diem is an eye-watering £250. And that excludes drinks.

You don't have to be elderly to cruise on Deutschland, but if you need to find that kind of money, it certainly helps.

Proving that glitz isn't everything, the 800-passenger Marco Polo, which cruises from Tilbury in London, has beaten off ships with lavish theatres and big entertainment budgets to come number three in Cruise.co.uk's reader surveys.

Actually it was at number at the start of the week, but these scores change faster than Yulana Plotvinova changed her clothes on Crown Princess last summer.

At the time it was brought to my attention, Marco Polo was number one with 4.29 points out of 5. As I write this, it is number three with 4.23, behind Cunard and Thomson, but ahead of Princess, Royal Caribbean, Ocean Village and P&O Cruises.

If you want to see what all the fuss is about, there are always bargains to be had on Marco Polo. How about an 11-night cruise around the British Isles departing July 26 for £699 per person? And there are no gratuities to pay. At that price, you can't afford not to trade up to an outside cabin, which is just £100 more.

Katy Setterfield, who won the BBC TV series The One and Only as Dusty Springfield will be performing on board. Call 0845 833 9798 or check out the website for more information. 

I'm really excited to be cruising with Crystal Cruises this summer but looks like I picked the wrong date.

If I had gone for the Venice-Barcelona run departing October 20, I could have been getting the there style experts on board to help me with my fashion sense.

Or lack of, perhaps I should say.

During the Fashion and Style cruise, experts will be offering one-on-one consultations, answering fashion dilemmas (but possibly not ones along the lines of "why doesn't my dress fit any more") and helping passengers develop their own sense of style. How useful that would have been!

The style gurus - Anna Wycoff and Gayle Davis - will also be talking about the evolution of European fashion in the 1950s and '60s, and hosting a themed 1950s fashion show.

Prices for the 12-night cruise, on the 1,073-passenger Crystal Serenity, start at £3,775 including flights and transfers, soft drinks and basic gratuities. And as you'll get $1,000 per person on-board credit as well, to spend on alcohol, spa treatments, shore excursions - really anything you want - you'll have virtually nothing more to spend.

To book, see your travel agent, call 020 7287 9040 or check out the website.

The port of Dover was at its most awkward when I turned up yesterday to board Holland America Line's Eurodam. The man at the gate sent me down to the terminal where someone would give me further instruction.

There was indeed somone else to give me instruction. It was to drive back to the entrance and park in the red car park. I asked why, given I was talking to the man within easy walking distance of terminal 2 and right next to some parking spaces. "Because that is what we are doing," was the reply. Don't you just love jobsworths?

Anyway, by the time I got to the terminal, it resembled the Marie Celeste, so I was able to check in and get on board fast, which was excellent.

My cabin is comfortable but not nearly as grand as the one I had when I was on Eurodam in Southampton last summer (luckily I am cruising alone because by the time I had spread myself out, as I have a bad habit of doing, there is no room for anyone else!), but this time there are real passengers on board so naturally they have been allowed to snap up the best accommodation.

As I say, the cabin is comfortable and the bed is supersoft, but there are a few strange things for a line that calls itself a premium brand. I've got shampoo, conditioner, bath gel and soap in the bathroom, but no body lotion. There's a mini bar but it's locked.

Last night before I went to dinner, my room steward gave me a form to order room-service breakfast, a card reminding me the clocks go forward an hour and two chocolates. And that was the last time he came in my room. When I got back after dinner - we ate in the main dining room and my meal was very good, by the way - all the lights were still on, the curtains were open and the bed was just as I had left it.

It wouldn't have been so bad except I just put the bundle of stuff he gave me to one side and promptly forgot, however many hours later when I went to bed, to change my clock.

I'm assuming the lack of a turndown was because these guys are super busy on the first night. I'll let you know what happens tonight.

When I went down to the theatre on Holland America's Eurodam to pick up a sticker for my cycling excursion from Zeebrugge I was sure they would say it was cancelled.

While working in my cabin, I had been watching my balcony flood with all the rain that was pouring down. Even if that didn't put them off, surely the fact that I was wearing a pair of sandals (wot, no protection for your toes!) would break all the health and safety rules.

Wrong on both counts. So an hour later, I found myself in Bruges, doing some practice turns on my bike during a break in the clouds. There were quite a few such breaks, and the sun even came out at times, which was very welcome as in between, we looked like a group of drowned rats.

Actually despite the rain, the trip was really good. Jos, the manager of the bike company QuasiMundo in front, Rony, who had picked us up at the port, bringing up the rear and doing a grand job of stopping the traffic by taking off his clothes and lying in the road.

OK, that was Jos' joke. But Rony really did stop the traffic for us when we needed to get over roads - just a formality really as the Belgian drivers are all very polite and stop anyway when they see a bike (actually I think it has a lot to do with the fact they are always to blame if they hit a cyclist, but whatever, it works).

Our bike ride took us from Bruges to Damme, a thriving port until the entrance from the sea silted up and the port was moved to Zeebrugge. Now it's a pretty little village with a handful of people and cobbled streets, which are not a lot of fun when you're on a bike.

On the way we learned that Belgian Blue cows are white and have been so inbred to create stocky little cows with lots of meat that they can't give birth naturally and always have to have a caesarean. We learned about windmills, bridges on ropes that are rolled up to let boats through, the canals around the city that were dug by Napoleon (there's me in front of one, in one of my drier moments) and the German officer who became a hero because he ignored orders given in the last war to destroy Bruges.

Jos was very lavish in his praise for our cycling abilities, which struck me as strange until he explained a lot of people come on the tours who can't ride a bike. How odd is that?

Back on board Eurodam, I sat in while Diana Moran, otherwise known as the Green Goddess, gave an inspiring talk on the importance of staying fit and healthy despite growing old. As I had just cycled about 15km, I felt very virtuous.

Next stop on this mini-cruise is Cherbourg, where hopefully the weather will be a little kinder.

The trouble with a four-night cruise is that there is just not enough time to report from the ship. I got off Holland America Line's Eurodam in Dover early yesterday (Friday) morning and have a day at home to get myself organised and am then off again.

But more on that later.

Eurodam is a nice ship. I thought so when I saw it in Southampton last year and have not been disappointed this time around. It's a comfortable size, certainly not overwhelming, with some nice design features.

I loved these bar stools and the cabanas pictured below, which are by the pool. The pool area itself It has a roof that opens when the weather is nice. Must admit I was amused to see they had opened it on our cruise, when it really wasn't very warm - so everyone was wrapped up under their towels!

You can rent these cabanas by the day - $30 a day on a port day, $50 a day on a sea day, which buys you this private area (you can shut the curtains), an iPod with pre-selected music, the towels and bathrobes, chilled bottled water, a fuit basket, glass of house champagne, chocolate covered strawberries and more.

I was surprised how well used they were, even on our cruise, especially give the weather was so overcast. It's not cheap and you would feel you have to stay there all day to get your money's worth. I'm afraid I would find that too boring.

I am less sure about these other cabanas, higher up the ship and with a view of, well, the retractable roof. Surely it makes more sense to book a cabin or suite with a balcony and sit on that - at least you get a view of the sea.

I was also intrigued by this - as in why did anyone think it looked nice? There were several suggestions as to what it looks like, some of them not printable in a family blog. You almost expect it to start moving.

The thing that disappointed me most though, was the service. I have already reported that my cabin didn't get turned down the first night (it did subsequent evenings, I'm pleased to say, but was never made up in the mornings until well, the afternoon).

I should add here that it really doesn't matter to me personally if it is or isn't turned down. I can switch off lights, shut curtains and turn down the bed myself. But the point is that these things should happen automatically on a premium cruise line.

Most of the crew were charming and polite, with a cheery hello if you passed them on the stairs, but every now and then there was one that let the side down, forgetting that a smile and "hello" is a nice way to greet someone who is about to spend money with you. That was a shame.

One of Holland America's proudest features is its culinary arts centre, where chefs put on "how-to" demos. Our cruise had guest chef Jeremy Bloor, top man at the OXO Tower in London, on board to show off his cookery skills.

The kitchens are impressive - apparently they cost $1 million each to install - but they do need a chef with the gift of the gab to get the show going. HAL should see if Jamie Oliver fancies a cruise with the family!

Inevitably, the norovirus outbreak on Marco Polo last week has sparked a "how clean is your ship" debate on Cruise.co.uk. You can read the official cruise ship inspection scores and pick up tips on how to have a healthy cruise.

Reading the comments, it's amazing how paranoid people are and what lurid tales they have. I wonder how they dare to go on a cruise. And how do they get on at home, where there are no crew washing and cleaning day and night to keep surfaces clean?

Personally I have a theory that one of the problems generally is that we are all so clean these days that our systems have no immunity when faced with a dirty bug.

Not that I'm advocating we all give up washing or cleaning, you understand. For my part, I never touch the bannisters on a ship (if it's rocky, an steadying elbow or sleeve does the trick) and am very careful opening public toilet doors, having seen too many people who do not wash their hands. Sad to say, while the kids are often blamed, it is usually the older women who don't bother.

I have to say I have been very impressed with the way Bremen-based Transocean Tours has handled the outbreak on Marco Polo, with regular updates on what is happening and no attempt to cover up the severity of the outbreak.

The latest news is that Marco Polo arrived in Tilbury this morning and will be cleaned from stem to stern, inspected and hopefully cleared to depart as planned on July 14 for a 12-night Baltic cruise.

Yesterday, all passengers on the curtailed cruise - the ship had been moored up at Invergordon since Monday July 6, when the bug struck, and have now just returned to Tilbury - were told they will get a full refund of the cost of the cruise, a refund for all their beverage expenses and a 50% off voucher to put against another Marco Polo cruise from the UK.

The company has also said it will continue investigating the cause of the virus outbreak, which is quite unusual in the summer. Suppose they find a passenger brought it on, which is highly likely. Someone is going to feel awful.

First P&O Cruises reported record sales for its long voyages for 2011 - 1,374 passengers booked on the first day on sale, July 1, and more than 1,000 of those for a full circumnavigation.

Now Cunard says first-day sales for its 2011 world cruise programme, also on July 1, were up a recession-defying 150% compared to last year.

It's terrific news given the experts tell us we are in the grip of a global economic crisis. I suspect people are just fed up with the bad news and determined to have some fun instead of sitting watching their money earn paltry interest.

Interestingly, P&O reports increased demand from first-timers. Now that's brave. Imagine booking a three-month cruise and discovering you didn't like cruising. My advice always would be to try a seven-nighter first just to make sure.

The record demand could, of course, also have something to do with the prices -book with P&O and you can see the world from £6,899 per person - and the fact P&O and Cunard have come out with something a bit different for world cruisers in 2011.

P&O has four long voyages, including an 84-night cruise on Oriana that sets sail in September 2010 instead of the usual post-New Year departure (OK, so it really shouldn't be in the 2011 programme, but they did that, not me).

Cunard will be offering its first circumavigation on new ship Queen Elizabeth, but also a veritable Queen cruise-fest - voyaging from Southampton to New York on Queen Victoria, New York to Sydney on Queen Elizabeth and Sydney to Southampton on Queen Mary 2.

I've never had a cabin so low down on a ship as on Lindblad's National Geographic Explorer.

My daughter and I are at the very front of the vessel, as low as it is possible to go if you are a passenger - neither places I would choose to be. I just hope we don't hit bad weather as we will be the first to feel it!

The cabin has a pole - guess it's a structural thing rather than decor - and a tiny porthole, which is really not great as you can't enjoy the views and it is always dim in there (it looks bright in the picture as the sun was shining in - but we haven't seen sun for two days!).

The other drawback for me is that you either have to close the porthole at night, in which case the room is too dark for me (I always sleep with cutains a bit open on a cruise ship), or leave it open, in which case it is too light to sleep (there is 24-hour daylight up here). However, we have discovered that a towel, drapped over the window, works to dim the light enough.

On the plus side we have a huge shower, which is wonderful, and bath robes and slippers, which seem a little incongruous but did a sterling job this afternoon when we returned wet and cold from a fabulous non-landing Zodiac cruise, of which more later.

Walking along the corridors at cleaning time I have been able to spot bigger and better cabins, and ones with proper picture windows. Yesterday, as we were returning in the Zodiacs from a walk on shore, I spotted some balconies.

OK, so it's too cold to sit out on them up here in the frozen wastes of Svalbard but how lovely to have the view.

I said before I left the UK for this Lindblad cruise around Svalbard that I wanted to see Polar bears and I have not been disappointed.

The first was spotted just after breakfast on the first morning, the second just after lunch, as we were on our way to the end of a fjord to go kayaking. Yes, as well as Zodiacs to take us ashore there's a fleet of infatable kayaks on board our ship, National Geographic Explorer.

The expedition team strings a platform between two Zodiacs and then we can get in and out of the kayaks with ease - well almost.

Unfortunately the rudder on the one Ilana and I were in got stuck so we spent a long time going around in circles! Finally someone came and took the rudder out of the water, which helped, but we are not planning to enter any kayaking competitions just yet.

We were warned not to go too close to the big icebergs, which was useful as one split and then turned over. Spectacular but a little scary when you are underneath. But it was fun trying to kayak over the small bits of ice.

We were also kitted out with emergency alarms in case a Polar bear came up to the kayak. They are a constant danger so the expedition team guides always carry guns when taking us on hikes ashore. This is Jason, our guide, on a short tour ashore yesterday.

But back to the bear spotting. This morning's 7am call alerted us to yet another Polar bear, so it was on with the hats, gloves and cameras. This was the picture I got with the help of a telescope and my camera zoom (naturally the ship doesn't get too close and upset the animals).