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How to find cheap flights for your cruise Cruising is more popular than ever, and the appeal is obvious: an all-inclusive vacation on a floating resort hotel with great ocean views. According to the latest figures from trade publication Cruise Industry News, the three busiest cruise ports in the world are in Florida and the absolute busiest, Miami, welcomed 4.8 million passengers in 2016. Rounding out the top 10 are Cozumel, Shanghai, Barcelona, Civitavecchia (Italy), Nassau, the Canary Islands and the Balearic Islands of Spain — but let’s take a closer look at the top-ranked U.S. ports and the best ways to get to them. No.1: Port Miami. Fly to Miami International (MIA), about 3 miles away. No. 2: Port Canaveral. Fly to Orlando International (MCO), about 45 miles away. No. 3: Port Everglades. Fly to Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International (FLL), about 6 miles away. No. 12: Port of Galveston. Fly to one of two Houston airports: William P. Hobby (HOU), about 40 miles away, or George Bush Intercontinental (IAH), about 72 miles away. No. 21: Port of New Orleans. Fly to Louis Armstrong New Orleans International (MSY), about 16 miles away. Once you choose a cruise, start planning travel to the port: • Give yourself plenty of time. If the ship departs at 9 a.m., don’t plan to fly in at 7 a.m., even if the port is only a couple of miles from the airport. Flights get delayed all the time (storms, mechanical issues) and if you’re not there when the ship leaves port you’ll be out of luck and, given that cruises are non-refundable, a lot of money. Consider arriving the day before the cruise departs, or even a few days before and make the port city part of a longer vacation. There are plenty of attractions for all ages in southern Florida, and other port cities, too. • Compare nearby airports. Before you automatically book a flight to the port’s closest airport, check prices to that one plus nearby airports. For example, if your ship departs the Port of Miami, look at fares to Miami but also check Fort Lauderdale, which is only 25 miles farther away and might be significantly cheaper. These round-trip fares — for weekday travel in May — were found late last week on Farecompare.com: Chicago-Fort Lauderdale, $89 Chicago-Miami, $151 • Fly into one city, depart from another city. Before you book flights, be sure to check your cruise itinerary carefully; the ship may leave from one port but end up in another. This is not uncommon for cruises and here’s where you need a two-pronged strategy to find the best fares. First, find and compare fares using a "multi-city" itinerary: Depart city A, arrive city B; then depart city C, arrive city A. Then, find and compare fares for two one-way trips: Trip No. 1 - depart city A and arrive city B; trip No. 2 - depart city C and arrive city A. Take a look at these May fares for a passenger in Los Angeles who will take an Alaska cruise. The ship departs from the Anchorage area and ends its voyage in Vancouver. Two separate one-way flights, found on a comparison search site, for travel in May: Los Angeles-Anchorage. $199 Vancouver-Los Angeles. $112 Total: $311 Multi-city itineraries found on airline websites: Los Angeles-Anchorage, Vancouver-Los Angeles. Total: From $366 to $900+ Note that separate one-way flights are not always cheaper; you always have to compare. • Don’t forget transportation between airport and port. Some cruise lines include an airport shuttle between the terminal and the ship in the overall package price; check to see if your line offers this or gives any options for getting from plane to port. If not, see if the airport offers port shuttles or consider a taxi, Uber or Lyft. If you are entitled to a free shuttle ride, be sure you nail down where to wait for it (and how long you’ll have to wait); some airport websites like Miami’s list shuttle pick-up locations for various cruise lines by terminal. Happy cruising! By Rick Seaney, Farecompare.com Re-posted on CruiseCrazies.com - Cruise News, Articles, Forums, Packing List, Ship Tracker, and more For more cruise news and articles go to https://www.cruisecrazies.com

Changes to the Cayman Islands Gambling Law made two years ago to encourage cruise ships to register here, in the same way yachts or merchant marine ships do, have not accomplished their stated purpose. “[Cruise ship registrations] are a market that we can’t enter because Cayman legislation doesn’t allow one simple thing,” Maritime Authority Chief Executive Officer Joel Walton told the Legislative Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee Friday. “We fixed the Gambling Law, but we haven’t been able to fix the Marriage Law yet.” While the authority would like to get into the business of registering cruise ships as well, Mr. Walton told the Cayman Compass Friday that cruise lines will not do it if they cannot host weddings on board the ship – a popular offering for cruise customers. Mr. Walton told committee members that while the Maritime Authority earns most of its money from regulatory inspections of Cayman-registered vessels, some money is earned each year via ship registration, mostly corporate and individually owned yachts, at present. Marine vessels which register in the Cayman Islands fly Cayman’s red, sea-going flag and must adhere to relevant local legislation. In the case of the Marriage Law, cruise ships would currently be required to have a Cayman-licensed marriage officer aboard to officiate the ceremony if the ship was registered in Cayman. It is similar to the issue that arose with the Gambling Law a few years ago. Gambling is illegal in Cayman and cruise ships are not allowed to permit gambling while they are within Caymanian territorial waters. However, the changes made in 2015 to the Gambling Law permitted cruise ships registered in Cayman to allow gaming while sailing in international waters. According to then-government Minister Wayne Panton: “The law allows gambling if they are 12 miles out to sea and on an international voyage. They have to be going to an overseas port. The aim is solely to facilitate the shipping registry in marketing its services to cruise lines.” Mr. Walton said the Maritime Authority has been seeking a similar type of change to the Marriage Law, allowing non-Cayman licensed chaplains to perform wedding ceremonies aboard Cayman-registered ships “for as long as I’ve been here.” Mr. Walton has been the CEO of the Maritime Authority since it was created in 2004. During the Public Accounts Committee hearing Friday, Mr. Walton responded to questions from lawmakers about whether he felt Cayman’s shipping registry was still a “growth” business. Various committee members noted the Maritime Authority’s travel and entertainment budget had shown recent significant increases and that the last two budgets had been “break even” years for the historically profit-making authority. Aside from cruise ships, Mr. Walton said there was room for growth in the merchant marine ship registration market and while yacht registrations have been in decline, he believed overall global trade, particularly in the underdeveloped Asian and African markets, would continue to grow. “Unless we eliminate global trade, unless we as the Cayman flag mess up … we’ll be fine for some time into the future,” Mr. Walton said. The Maritime Authority had 2,150 “units” or vessels registered in Cayman as of Dec. 31, Mr. Walton told the committee. Almost 80 percent of those were yachts, he said. Some 1,100 registered companies are involved with the ships, most of which are owned by corporate entities. The Maritime Authority employs 47 people, 30 in Cayman, 15 in the U.K., one in Greece and one in the U.S. It also works with another 31 contractors around the globe including at locations in the Netherlands, Japan, Singapore, Panama, China and Brazil, Mr. Walton said. Ninety-one percent of the authority’s full-time employees are Caymanian, he said. By Brent Fuller, Cayman Compass Re-posted on CruiseCrazies.com - Cruise News, Articles, Forums, Packing List, Ship Tracker, and more For more cruise news and articles go to https://www.cruisecrazies.com