This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Lisa Mclean, Le Boat, Marketing Manager for North American. Le Boat is the market leader in providing luxury houseboat vacations on the beautiful rivers, lakes and canals of Europe and Canada. They have the world’s largest fleet of luxury houseboats and the widest choice of fabulous boating destinations to choose from. Le Boat has been at this a long time—over 50 years’ experience on the water. Here’s the part that fascinated me when I first heard of Le Boat from a previous guest on The Joy of Cruising Podcast: You don’t need a license or prior experience to be the p of your own houseboat. As Lisa will explain, Le Boat conducts a pre-departure briefing with you, explaining safety, controls and maneuvering the boat, how onboard features of the boat work, and even take you for a test drive. 


I first heard about Le Boat from Judy Cohen, Traveling Judi when she was on the show in December https://www.buzzsprout.com/2113608/14100013. I featured Judi in Cruising Interrupted amzn.to/3seFU8y, and while she is one of the most prolific world travelers I know, Judi enthralled me talking about her return to cruising—during the Covid lockdown—in Canada where she lives, and one of several places in the world, Le Boat operates. “You captain your own boat! When we arrive there—we don’t have a boating license—they gave us 2 hours of training…and away you go. You maneuver through the locks and stop at the various ports.” At this point I loud exclaimed. “Get out, that sounds amazing!” Judi went on to talk about how they brought their whole family, including their dog for a 4-night cruise. They cooked their own food. Judi said, “The kitchen is nicer than the one I have at home!” Read more at https://travelingjudi.com


I am anxious to speak with Lisa, and to have the listeners of The Joy of Cruising Podcast get the inside scoop on this unique way to cruise with family and friends.

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This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Lucy, creator of the Cruising As Crew, website, YouTube channel, and Instagram platform. Lucy has worked for P & O and Virgin Voyage in the shops, and for Royal Caribbean and Disney Cruise Lines as a shopping ambassador. I will be sure to ask Lucy to elaborate on and differentiate between those positions. Lucy’s passion, the mission of her website and channel is to facilitate the entry of others into working on cruise ships. Her tagline is: “Helping People Land Their Dream Job On Cruise Ships.”


After qualifying as a beauty therapist/masseuse at 19, Lucy got a job with Steiner International, a leading recruiting agency for cruise ship spa departments, which Lucy calls “hard work but the best thing I’ve ever done,” Lucy’s cruise ship work includes: The Onboard Spa 2015- 2017 on Royal Caribbean, Harding Retail 2018- 2022 on P&O and Virgin Voyages, and in 2022 she became a shopping ambassador and worked on Disney Wish and Royal Caribbean Harmony OTS. Lucy’s motivation to create Cruising As Crew was because before I she started working on cruise ships, she would scour the web for information on ‘life onboard’ and couldn’t find much, so she thought she would put together something that she wishes she could have read. 


I wrote about cruise ship crew, staff, and officers in my latest book The Joy of Cruising Again amzn.to/3lAfyON in a section called “Ship Life,” and from when I first started cruising have been intrigued with what it would be like to work on a cruise ship. It is my pleasure to chat with Lucy to gain some additional insight into that and to share her story with the listeners of The Joy of Cruising Podcast.

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I am delighted to welcome back to The Joy of Cruising Podcast Ilana of Life Well Cruised. Ilana is one of my first friends in the cruising blogosphere, having been featured in my second cruise book, Cruising Interrupted http://amzn.to/3seFU8y, and she has been a social media friend since my first book (which Ilana would have been in if not for an email issue!) Life Well Cruised  was the second episode of The Joy of Cruising Podcast over a year ago and amazingly, her episode remains in the top five to this day Episode 2, Life Well Cruised. Life Well Cruised is a well-read blog, one of the top cruise You Tube channels in the world, IG and more. In fact, across all platforms Ilana has a fervent followership and Life Well Cruised is one of the mostly followed and influential cruise brands in the world.


It's been over a year, so I wanted to catch up with Ilana, get her reflections on her recent Sun Princess cruise, compare our recent MSC experiences, and get an update of her cruising plans in this red-hot cruising market. 

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This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Tom and Dom, a couple from UK and creators of the Tom and Dom Travel blog, YouTube channel, Instagram platform, and Facebook group. Tom and Dom have only been cruising since right after the pandemic, sailing MSC Virtuosa on a short cruise to nowhere—referred to UK as a staycation as UK phased in cruises after the lockdown. Only three years and many cruises later Tom and Dom are now sailing exotic itineraries to Greenland! Also, in that short time they have appeared in BBC Radio Wales, BBC NEWS, The Times, The Sun, Daily Mirror, OUT Traveler, and Business Insider. They are a CLIA Choose Cruise member 2023. 


I consider Cruise Bloggers, Vloggers, and Content Creators as Cruise Community Champions and have featured them throughout The Joy of Cruising Trilogy and on The Joy of Cruising Podcast. Passionate cruisers like Tom and Domepitomize the joy of cruising; they are so passionate about cruising that they want to share it with the world! Cruise Bloggers, Vloggers, and Content Creators champion the cause of cruising and at the same time they are champions to cruise fans by providing them with free, useful information, reviews, videos, photos, and cruise tips to cruisers planning a voyage, and prospective cruisers considering their first cruise. 


I have interacted with Tom and Dom occasionally on cruise social media, and it is now my pleasure to chat with them, and to share their story with the listeners of The Joy of Cruising Podcast.

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