CRUISE NEWS - Cruisers Arrested for Fraud, ROYAL ORDERS ANOTHER MEGA SHIP, Holland Offers Samples

Cruise news time and well we got some toughies today we've got tragedy in Alaska and we've got a disturbing story about four Cruisers that were arrested Cruise news and My Views let's talk about it hey hey hey what's up everybody Welcome to L Loca I am your host Tony here with the latest Cruise News and Views for your face for your face on a Tuesday Tuesday the 27th of August 2024 and man some days the the news piles up and it it ain't exactly good news let's start with the tragedy that happened Sunday at a popular cruising destination cetakan Alaska Alaska plagued with landslides over the last few years Skagway memorably impacted by landslides but there was a landslide in ketchican on Sunday where three locals were injured and one local lost their life um yeah it's uh it's it's so sad it it's so sad you know stuff happens all over the place all the time but when it's familiar to you because it's part of this community these cruising ideas then it feels even more impactful of course katakan a popular cruising destination and we're smack dab in the middle of the Alaskan cruising season cruise lines have come out released statements about the tragedy certainly uh expressing sadness and concern but also saying that they are going to continue with their cruise port stops there uh saying that some tours will probably be impacted but the best way that the cruise lines can support catch a can is to continue to support katakam with their creu stops and their calls so um yeah certainly anytime life is lost it's a it's a sad thing and uh yeah our our thoughts and our prayers just go out to the folks there in catch can Cruise news story number two Royal Caribbean excited excited about the success of their new line of cruise ships headed up by the icon of the Seas they've decided that they don't have enough of them on order currently there's two more icon class cruise ships that are set to enter the cruising scene over the next few years and well like I said that the Royal Caribbean has decided that two more is not enough they've now committed to build what would be the fourth icon class ship so there's three currently in the pipeline and they're throwing down the money and they're going to build a fourth one and they're going to continue their relationship with the Meyer turku Shipyard really is a testimony to where the demand in cruising is going icon of the sees when that thing's fully loaded with crew members and passengers can hold like 10,000 people we've got the second version of the icon of the Seas the second ship in the class coming out next year the star of the Seas and then we have a third one that's unnamed and now they're committing to building a fourth one and they've even signed an agreement saying if we build two more you can do that also Meer turu so uh yeah it doesn't look like Royal Caribbean is slowing down at all when it comes to building these Mega cruise ships and if they follow the same pattern that they followed with the Oasis class of cruise ships they'll make each one of these icon class cruise ships just a little bigger than the previous one so that every subsequent version of that cruise ship is the world's largest cruise ship it's certainly a wild time for these Cruise companies an interesting scenario that every bit of inventory that they have they keep filling up so if you're a business and you know you have no more inventory and you're raising your prices so that you benefit the most from that maxed out inventory what's the next step to make more money well it's to have more inventory so you see an order of four ships from Carnival Cruise Line you see an order of four ships from Disney Cruise Line you see an order of four ships from Norwegian Cruise line you see MSC continuing to build out its Fleet and you see Royal Caribbean continuing to build out its Fleet and and all that's good all of that's good right now because you know there's plenty of people that are happy to go on those cruise ships and pay the price but but will that be the case when all of this inventory comes online and certainly you got to account for inventory that is you know getting jettison from The Fleets and certainly people making these decisions are a lot more privy to all of the data than folks like me but um yeah it's going to be an interesting next few years in cruising to see what happens as more and more inventory comes online will the demand of cruising continue to fill up those cruise ships uh is this a risky proposition or is it Rock Solid based on the data uh time will tell but yeah the Royal not slowing down Bru new story number three of an interesting story coming from Holland America line where they've introduced some ways for people to experience or to sample their big world cruises now these world cruises that they have they last you know like over a 100 days but not everybody can commit to a 100 day cruise so Holland America has come out with a you know a price point for $169 per day you can sample you can sample a world Cruise they've come up with a bunch of itineraries from 20 to 50 days and they're going to take advantage of their to big world cruises next year the 2025 Grand World Voyage aboard the zider dam and the 2025 Grand Voyage pole to pole aboard the volen dam both of those depart in January next year from Fort Lauderdale and you can get on there and you can ride the whole thing out for over a 100 days but they've also kicked in some shorter cruises that you can get for as little as 169 a day uh they've highlighted a couple itineraries 55 day Fort Lauderdale to Singapore 20 days of Athens to Fort Lauderdale that's on the band Dam over on the pole the pole you could do a 47-day Fort Lauderdale down South to buenz arez or you could do something like 33 days from Amsterdam to Fort Lauderdale essentially what they're trying to do is cut out segments in this world Cruise so that people can experience it and experience what they offer in a world Cruise if you remember we talked about it a while ago they're developing 15 new Production shows for these big Grand voyages uh it's interesting again we've been talking about it over the last few episodes whether we go cruising because we want to go see places or whether we go cruising because we want to see a cruise ship whether we go cruising just because we want to escape the cold and go to a beach these are certainly bucket list chasing type cruises where you can jump on a 55 day leg and go to a bunch of places You' never been before tempting tempting again all these things are so tempting you I guess we used to say in the corporate world you can do anything if you have enough time and money I think that's true when it comes to cruising there's always opportunities and there's those those limiting factors of time and money I I don't think would want to do a 100 days on a cruise ship but 20 days to some places I've never been before certainly is peing my interest uh are you interested in a world Cruise what do you think leave a comment below Cruise news story number four Royal Caribbean Cruise Line Is cracking down I'm probably being a little harsh for that wording but they're cracking down on people that they're giving free cruises to which seems counterintuitive right you can go on most cruise lines and gamble in there casino and if you gamble enough they will give you a free cruise and a lot of times they'll give you multiple free cruises well a problem has arisen with gamblers on Royal Caribbean who receive the free cruises that they've been given and then they don't show up for the cruise and this becomes a problem for Royal Caribbean because if they're not given notice that you're not going to show up for the cruise then they don't have the opportunity to rebook that cabin and like we've talked about even earlier in the show demand is so high that they could rebook that cabin and so they thought they were going to get a gamble on board that they could get their money from the gambling and then all of a sudden that person doesn't show up and now you've got an empty cabin for no good reason that they could have sold so they' lost out on the cabin Fair they've lost out on the onboard spending so uh the the busy wigs over there at Royal rightly so the leadership said well we should do something to fix that problem and and they have the change is pretty simple starting on September the 5th now people that are being gifted these free cruises for them to actually hold those cruises or to get those cruises they will have to put a $200 deposit down which this is different than the way it was before you got to put $200 down to get your free Cruise you have up until a week prior to the cruise to cancel to get your $200 back but if you don't do that and you just no show then Royal Caribbean is going to keep your $200 if you do show up and take your Free Cruise then you will receive your $200 back as onboard credit I guess that's really the best it could be I still don't see how this hugely benefits Royal Caribbean because $200 doesn't sound like a lot it's probably a deterrent right uh $200 maybe not a lot of money to people that are no showing anyways but maybe it's enough of a deterrent to make people think twice before they book a cruise so I I think it's probably going to work on on both of those levels um yeah you know you can't get over on the casino and and nothing brings that point home more so than the next story four Cruisers arrested over the weekend that were traveling on the MSC magnifica and they were arrested for apparently trying to defraud defraud the cruise line through through the cruise ship casino what was the Caper that these four have been alleged to be participating in well it's a it's one that we've seen play out before apparently they were attempting to get large amounts of money by putting that on their shipboard account through a slot machine if you've ever done any gambling in the casino you can charge your gambling to your room by using the slot machine and the challenge for these four individuals is while it's not against the rules to charge large amounts of money to your shipboard account through the casino it does raise red flags and those red flags kick in a process and one of those processes to take a look at how you funded your shipboard account when they looked at these individuals they found credit cards that were possibly fraudulent and so they reached out to uh customs of Border Protection they reached out to Miami Dade Police Department and all of that turned into a scenario where these individuals were not allowed to leave the cruise ship on their own they were promptly arrested when the cruise ship got back to Miami they've already started having their days in court uh but we don't know what the outcome is again this is an alleged thing that's happening but uh certainly these Cruisers were arrested it's a cautionary tale and this story another stories that are like it is just a reminder that you know cruising even though it seems like a fantasy land right like you're on a ship that's got an international flag on it you go into international waters and the rules can somewhat be different there's still a lot of legal jurisdictions that uh oversee cruising you know if you're close to land you're still getting us jurisdiction if you're close to another country you're getting that country's jurisdiction there's rules that govern international waters and companies have a lot of Protections in place when it comes to things that are illegal or things that are going to rip them off and so they're proactively looking at all those things so um yeah again the cautionary tale certainly don't do anything wrong we don't know what the outcome of this thing is but a a reminder for people that may not associate cruising with Law and Order uh yeah Law and Order exists so uh wild stuff wild stuff now excitingly today will be a day of big announcements L Deca back in the group Cruise space a lot of people have been asking when can we cruise with you Tony there will be an opportunity took a Hiatus no group cruises here in 2024 I really didn't like the stress that it was putting on my wife the lovely Jenny B and now well I found a different way got her out of the travel business which is good I found a new travel partner and now it's time for the first group Cruise announcement there's a live show tonight I would invite you to come to the live show tonight at 8:00 pm for people that are part of our patreon community 9pm for the general big YouTube show we're going to talk group Cruise I'm going to talk my new travel partner uh but you can see the Deets right now I'm going to leave the link pinned below thank you guys so much for checking out the show today if you want to stay informed with everything going on in cruising subscribe and if you like today's episode please hit the like button Tony for L Le Lo until the next time we'll see you on the Leo bye Cruise news Cru news Cru news it's over