Learn about the social media efforts to keep the cruise lines in Jacksonville, Florida.  You can join the page here.

You CAN choose the cruise that better for the earth! To help get ready for the 40th Anniversary of Earth Day on April 22nd, Friends of the Earth has put together a report card comparing 10 major cruise lines. Marcie Keever, Clean Vessels Campaign Director for Friends of the Earth, shares with us the criteria that go into their Cruise Ship Environmental Report Card. See how your favorite cruise line did, here:  Cruise Report Card

Be sure to follow us on Twitter at CruiseRadio.

Powered by Podbean.com

Show Questions or Comments? 1-866-874-7957

The Jacksonville Port Authority will decide within the next two months whether it will pursue a new cruise terminal in Mayport.

Authority board Chairman David Kulik’s plans to direct his staff on Monday to restart the pursuit of a new terminal come a year after the authority put its plans on hold. If the authority stays in the cruise business, a new terminal is needed since the site of the present cruise terminal at Dames Point will be the future home of Hanjin Shipping’s new container terminal.

“If we don’t make a decision and if we don’t have a plan, I wouldn’t blame the cruise line from continuing its operations elsewhere,” Kulik said.

Savannah has recently expressed interest in attracting Carnival Cruise Lines if Jacksonville doesn’t build a new terminal. Kulik said potential terminal sites east of the Dames Point Bridge other than Mayport have been found in the past year, but he declined to discuss them so as not to impact negotiations.

When a new cruise terminal will be needed is unclear because no date has been set for the start of construction on the Hanjin terminal.

The authority held back on choosing a design firm for the Hanjin terminal after negotiations between the South Korean shipping company and the longshoremen’s union stalled.

Kulik said relations between Hanjin and the International Longshoremen’s Association have greatly improved since then, and he expect a signed contract or understanding between the two soon.

The $208 million container terminal is slated to open in late 2013.

The authority held back on pursuing the new cruise terminal, Kulik said, because it was in the midst of an international trade slump and it was unclear how the cruise industry would fare in the recession. Trade is recovering and, although the cruise industry has made less money, it has kept its Jacksonville ships at more than 100 percent occupancy.

Carnival, the world’s largest cruise company, had a profit of $175 million on revenue of $3.1 billion in the first quarter, compared with profit of $260 million on revenue of $2.9 billion in the same quarter last year.

A new cruise terminal is also needed to allow larger ships to call on the port because height restrictions caused by the Dames Point Bridge and nearby wires prevent access for about 80 percent of major cruise ships.
The cruise line unveiled its $34 million renovation of its 2,052-passenger cruise ship Fascination this month. The poor economy hasn’t prevented the ship from sailing at more than capacity and carrying nearly 185,500 passengers in fiscal 2009.

The number of passengers has grown by 34 percent since Carnival began sailing out of Jacksonville in 2005. The revenue from the sailings helps the authority pay for port infrastructure maintenance and improvements.

Some of the features that were added were:

Serenity (Adults Only): You guessed it, no kids allowed! This is in the aft part of the ship and is a paradise just to escape. There are a couple of hot tubs, a sea of comfortable deck chairs, a drink service station, shade and servers waiting on you hand and foot.

Dining: A couple new features were added to the poolside cafe called the Coconut Grove Bar and Grill. Talking to a staff member we were told that the dining area was fitted with new tables, buffet area’s, floors, fixtures and a Mongolian WOK grill station was added.

In March, the ‘Your Time’ dining program will be added to the formal dining rooms where you can eat when you want. Currently the formal dining rooms have regimented dining where you eat at 6 or 8 pm.

Aqua Park: On the back of the ship a water park area was added that now has a 300′ yellow Twister slide, two 82′ racing slides and a splash zone for the kids.

Balcony Rooms: 98 rooms were fitted with balconies during the renovation stint. I found it amazing that they could retrofit a ship to add so many balconies, most rooms being aft of the ship. A lot of the ship’s room amenities were replaced too. One replacement I noticed in the room was the TVs went from your standard television to flat screens.

Overall the ship is in good condition but my personal feeling is that it will be one of the next to go. The ship is almost 20 years old and with so many ships being released with state of the art features, these older boats may not be the next best thing to some cruisers.

Here in Jacksonville, Florida it has been just as bitterly cold. I wake up every morning at 3:45 to get ready for work and there is nothing like stepping outside and waiting for the car to warm up in sub-arctic temperatures! I find myself doing a dance sometimes outside my car while the car warms up (luckily no one is up that early).

Just to give you an idea of how cold it actually was around the state, check out these record breaking temperatures:

Miami: 37 F
Tampa: 25 F
Orlando: 29 F
Key West: 42 F
Tallahassee: 14 F
Jacksonville: 17 F

You can only imagine how this effected the power grids in all these communities across Florida (we usually has temps in the 60′s this time of year).

On Saturday night, I refused to go out. My digital thermometer on my porch said 27 F and that was at the beaches!  Okay, I will stop complaining. My best friend lives in Indianapolis and he has been getting dumped on with snow.

Jacksonville, Fla., city scape

In case you didn’t know I work at a radio station as my full time job (on air personality), I am a blogger for fun. Saying that, we do a lot of events downtown Jacksonville, Fla., at a couple of the night clubs. Every once in a while I will come and sit by the river and enjoy the view of the boats slowly passing by or the music from all the waterfront venues before I make my way into the night club. It’s so relaxing …..

Tonight as I am sitting here (yes, writing a blog from my iphone) I am reminded of how relaxing and fun cruises actually are. I could go on and on about how you get so much bang for your buck, how entertaining they are, and the people you meet that will last a lifetime. Not tonight though. Tonight I want to share with you how refreshing they are mentally.

I have just under 20 cruises under my belt. There is nothing like stepping on a cruise ship and checking all your problems at the gangway. If you don’t want to have email, cell phones, or beepers, you don’t have to. Escaping the everyday rat race is so refreshing. If you want to have those couple extra drinks or glasses of wine at dinner, go for it. If you want to stay up dancin til 4 am in the disco, nothing is stopping you . Sleep til noon, sure. Eat ice cream and pizza for breakfast, go ahead (we all have that inner kid in us still). Get a facial and pedicure at noon, it’s not like you can do it when your back home. Those are just a couple of my thoughts in why cruising is so mentally refreshing. When you get back on land, sure you will have the same issues you left at the gangway — just a more relaxed approach of dealing with them.

I hope your having a great weekend. For me, it’s off to our night club night we do every Saturday evening. Cheers!