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Is Cruising Becoming Too Pricey? - Audio Only 🎧 | Cruise Cast Ep.18

• Linzi & Mark - Suite Natured

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Did you ever think cruising might be stretching your wallet too thin? Join us as we embark on a humorous and nostalgic voyage through our cruising past. Linzi and Marky kick off the episode with a lively discussion about mood music, surprising ties to the three ages of Elvis, and some cheeky Father Ted moments that will surely tickle your funny bone. We're also teasing an exciting end-of-year awards ceremony, celebrating the best of mood music and more, making sure you stay entertained before we set sail towards our main topic.

As your trusty cruise companions, we're diving headfirst into a candid exploration of cruising's rising costs. Remember our unforgettable 2018 transatlantic adventure aboard the Celebrity Eclipse, from Southampton to Bermuda, with an all-inclusive drinks package and flights for under £2,000? We unpack these fond memories and compare them with today's pricing trends, pondering whether cruising has become too exclusive for the average traveler. Share in our reflections and insights as we consider what the future holds for cruise enthusiasts like us. Tune in for a blend of nostalgia, humor, and thought-provoking discussion that's sure to engage and entertain.

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Cheers, and have a lovely day
Linzi & Mark

Linzi:

Welcome to episode 18 of the Sweet Natured Cruise Cast. Hi, I'm Lynx. As always, I'm joined by Marky. Hello, and today we're talking about whether cruising has got too expensive. But first a little mood music.

Mark:

What did you think of today's movie? I'm laughing because I even asked you that, because I feel I know the answer.

Linzi:

I don't know what to say.

Mark:

Does that mean you loved it?

Linzi:

I feel like you know your father did when they had the three phases of Elvis. That's what they had.

Mark:

It did feel a little bit like that, my lovely horse.

Linzi:

No, it wasn't my lovely horse. Is it phases or stages?

Mark:

It's the three ages of Elvis.

Linzi:

Ages of Elvis, and that's the type of music that Father Ted danced to.

Mark:

So they didn't have to actually pay for his music. Well, there we go. So does that mean you liked it?

Linzi:

You know what I think? I think I'm going to say yes.

Mark:

I don't know.

Linzi:

You liked it at first, and then I saw it.

Mark:

But now you've linked it to something else.

Linzi:

No, I've seen that in my mind's eye.

Mark:

That's all you can get out of it.

Linzi:

I love it.

Mark:

I'm not saying the search is over. It's not over, but I'm going to take the win.

Linzi:

You know what that's up there for Mood Music of the Year know what that's.

Mark:

That's up there for mood music of the year, which I've just invented. Let us know in the comments if you agree. Is that one of the better mood music? Or, as lindsey's now give it, the mood music of the year? No, no, it's up, there isn't are we gonna have an official awards at the end of december?

Linzi:

at the end of december we're gonna have mood music of the year. We're gonna have most inappropriate comment of the year.

Mark:

Oh, there'll be a lot of them. Anyway, we better start talking about cruising stuff on. We're not not just mood music and sort of old father ted's references. We're two and a half minutes in.

Linzi:

We've not mentioned cruising I mean apologies if you have no idea what we're talking about. Well, but just what youtube youtube's you?

Mark:

this youtube thing, that's good it's this youtube thing is good. Okay, youtube thing that's good, this YouTube thing's good. Okay, that's up there for comment of the year.

Linzi:

Have a look for that and then you'll see what I mean. Yeah, to give it context.

Mark:

Well, shall we start talking some cruise stuff? Yeah, let's do that. I hate to be the one to bring it down. Oh Well, this came up in our live stream. Did that we did yesterday? Yeah, we did yesterday, at the time that we're recording because it's monday night. Um, and we've said this before about some of the questions, you don't really get a chance to get stuck into them on the live streams. You don't want to take up the whole live stream on one question. No, but it came up with with the recent price hikes. Yes, is cruising getting too expensive?

Linzi:

that was the question yes and we felt it was, and you know why I think it, I, I it felt true to say yes, it was. Do you remember when we went on celebrity eclipse transatlantic out of southampton and we did about?

Mark:

that was 2018 and we did.

Linzi:

I think we did about 16 or 18 nights.

Mark:

It was a hefty cruise, I think. I think it's actually in between that I think it was 17 nights, because it's it remains the longest cruise that we've done.

Linzi:

Yeah, we went across Southampton, we did North Transatlantic. We then went into Boston, we cruised into Manhattan, went to Bermuda, went to Nassau. It was an incredible cruise. We were overnighted in Manhattan.

Mark:

Yeah, absolutely Included the drinks package.

Linzi:

Included the drinks package. Included the drinks package and it cost us, including the flights back. I don't think it was £2,000.

Mark:

No, it wasn't, and that was for both of us.

Linzi:

no, that was for both of us. Yes, yeah, and we're not In a concierge.

Mark:

Well, yeah, concierge class, wasn't it? So that was our first celebrity experience. Yes, and Transatlantic's are generally a bit cheaper anyway. Yeah, but you can't get through Because it's a repositioning cruise. Yeah, but, and you can still get some great pricing on Transatlantic. We were looking the other day Because I think it's Sky Princess has got one. It's like 21 nights. It looks really good and they've got a balcony for £1,099 each.

Linzi:

Yeah.

Mark:

Now that doesn't include your airfare? No, but that's still long cruise to put on. Yeah, but there are still ones out there, but I don't think that there's anyone that would really say that cruising hasn't got more expensive, certainly since the pandemic restart. You know, we we had some real sort of cheaper ones right at the stand um encouraging prices to get back people back on yeah, it would get back cruising pricing, won't it? Yeah? And then, since then, I think it's probably fair to say that cruising is more popular than ever.

Mark:

The stats seem to say yeah, 30 million passengers a year, apparently I was reading something in the last couple of days about the number of new ships that are in build, and there's something like 172,000 cabins currently in build on new ships. Wow, when you think about that, it's not only oh, there's 20 ships being built.

Linzi:

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Mark:

When you look at it 172,000 cabins with an average two people a cabin yeah. 72,000 cabins with an average of two people a cabin yeah, that's 350,000 people. Mm-hmm. The additional yes, which is just staggering growth, yeah, so yeah, I do think it is more popular than ever. Will we get to a point, do you think, where we've got all these new ships coming, because there's been so many new ships in the last year?

Linzi:

but the pricing does not. It's not oversaturated pricing. The pricing just seems to go up well.

Mark:

Do you think that is to a degree because some of the bigger cruise lines and some of the smaller ones I guess as well to a degree? Um got rid of a lot of their older ships during the pandemic.

Linzi:

Razorblades yes.

Mark:

So there wasn't as much sort of capacity. Then we've had them spending a lot of money on new ships.

Linzi:

New ID. What am I trying to say? It's late, I've been working all day. What am I trying to say? I don't know. Like they've come back plusher, haven't they? And fancier? Yeah, they've come back plusher, haven't they? And fancier.

Mark:

Yeah, they've evolved. They've evolved. We've seen some cruise evolution, for sure. I mean, we had Celebrity's Edge class before the pandemic, yes, and a lot of the ships that have just come out now have been in development since before that as well.

Linzi:

It seems to have been accelerated in the type of it does.

Mark:

I mean they've just started fitting out in the last few days the third Edge class that's now in build, not Edge class, icon class. Crazy, yeah, we've not seen the second one Star come out yet.

Linzi:

No.

Mark:

The third one's already been built.

Linzi:

So that's three massive ships, and am I right in thinking it's two and a half thousand pounds per person for an inside cabin?

Mark:

On.

Linzi:

Icon class.

Mark:

I think it depends which cruise you're looking at.

Linzi:

Either way it's so pricey now it's so pricey.

Mark:

But I think we have to put it into perspective as well and this isn't me defending cruising against other types. You do, you, I will. If you look at, for instance, another holiday that we use tech a lot, certainly when I was somewhere younger, which is to disney, the cost of going to orlando now, and in particular staying at disney, is so much more than it was because that us being over there was why we ended up starting cruising, because we were at Disney World and your family were going on a cruise ship, so we joined them.

Linzi:

Yeah.

Mark:

So the cost of that is much more expensive. The cost of getting into a Disney park for the day is over $200 per person. What grief.

Linzi:

Yeah, money's not what it was now, is it? No, it's not like an old crooner, no, I mean, I know I felt like that was a lyric from like are you giving me more song lyrics to? No, I think I've made that song up, but I feel that it would have been. I think there's something similar out there I I. I think I'm just having a past life moment right now. It was that music. It was your Elvis music.

Mark:

It's putting you back into that sort of 60s era. I didn't say 50s, 50s and 60s. Elvis started in the 50s, not that you were around.

Linzi:

I mean, I know I'm a vampire, but come on 12 50s, can we just?

Mark:

But, yeah, going back to what we were talking about. What we were talking about, if you look at other vacation types.

Mark:

They've all gone up, yeah, and I think they all seem to have gone up at a similar rate. I think that when we're talking to people about cruising being more expensive, we're generally talking to people who are regular cruisers, who cruising is their main type of holiday and therefore they're comparing it to that. If we were doing a Disney podcast and talking about Disney holidays, I suspect we would be having the same conversation is Disney too expensive? I think you're right. If we were doing all-inclusive beach holidays, your sandals type ones, your ultra luxury in the maldives and stuff would we be having the same conversation I mean I've, I've costed maldives just for fun, because I'm not a maldives bunny you're not a beach bunny.

Linzi:

I'm not a sea bunny. I'm not a beach bunny. The maldives on the holiday in the mald is basically my kind of health.

Mark:

Well, but they do good food and cocktails. What it means is that's all you would be doing.

Linzi:

I'd be. Can you imagine my face if I'd this barefoot chic that you have to then just flip-flop it to the bar in your cocktails and I'd be covered in sand, and you would then have to have a drink with me covered in sand and sunburn? That'd be covered in sand. I knew I'd then have to have a drink with me covered in sand and sunburn. That'd be quite funny.

Linzi:

Oh no, I wouldn't get sunburned because I'd have to slather on the Factor 50. I'd be covered up in a caftan all day and a hat and glasses I'd just it's startling, isn't? It Either way.

Mark:

Getting back to it, yeah it's.

Linzi:

If you want a really, really nice resort and I'm not saying ultra-luxury, six-star, like a nice all-inclusive resort, you're looking at £12,000.

Mark:

I think that's where we've got to properly look at cruising, and I think, to a degree as well, the cruise lines know this. Yeah, so they know in terms of how far they can continue to push it. Yeah, because more people are booking than ever.

Linzi:

Yeah, the flights have gone.

Mark:

The cost of flying around, the cost of getting around the world, is more expensive? Yeah, but the cruise lines, I feel, still know that they're in that space at the moment where they're not discouraging people from cruising, no, and choosing a different type of vacation, yeah. Discouraging people from cruising, no, and choosing a different type of vacation, yeah, and therefore there's probably still more increases that I suspect we're going to say. That doesn't mean that we don't get some great offers that, you know, will there be last minute. Will we see? We've talked about last minute cruises disappearing and but I've also seen them coming back again in the last few weeks I think he's.

Linzi:

I think you just got to be easy breezy about your dates and where your itinerary to get a good last minute price yeah and probably want a longer itinerary as well yeah, longer itinerary is definitely on a per day basis. I'm generally speaking cheaper can I ask a question and I realize I'm going off piste, that's alright in respect of if you were going on that princess one that you talked about, and how many nights it was about 19 would we get the premium art package for 19 nights?

Mark:

I don't know whether it'd be, whether because we couldn't do cocktails the way we do cocktails for 19 nights no, but we've worked this out before on princess the special on their new premier package, and this was on sky. So you've got more speciality dining on there than, say, ruby not as many as some, but you've still got a lot more choice. It now includes those within there as well yeah, it includes the coffee, I guess you only need to have probably four drinks a day.

Mark:

Yeah, maybe a glass of wine with your meal. Coffee, yeah, and you've covered it and that's before the specialty dining goes on right, I'll shut up. No, I think it's a fair point and certainly if you're just looking at drinks packages on bigger cruises, most of the cruise lines now for longer cruises bring the price down. I don't think princess have introduced that yet. I've certainly not noticed it.

Mark:

But we haven't been looking at any really long no long cruises okay, I'll be quiet um, but when, going back to sort of expensive and we have talked about the value of cruising on podcasts before yeah, do we still feel even though it's more expensive, it's still for us the best value? Vacation?

Linzi:

It is because it is for me, because I I'm not a beach bunny.

Mark:

No, you're not bothered about going to the beach.

Linzi:

No.

Mark:

If we compare it to, going to say, disney World, which again completely different type of holiday.

Linzi:

Yeah, but I like the cultural side of things. I like an excursion.

Mark:

I like waking up in a different place.

Linzi:

I like being able to absorb the history. I like all those things which you don't get on a beach holiday.

Mark:

No, we've been to destinations on cruises that we never would have been to if there were just a land one, because we would have never gone there.

Linzi:

But if we had to pick a beach holiday, we'd go oh, cruising has got so expensive now we can't do a beach holiday. Then the place I'd want to go and even though we've been before, I just don't feel we've explored it enough would be Mexico.

Mark:

Okay, Because I, I mean, we did like that one. That was what. 21 years ago it was a while ago. Now it was a while 2000. 20 years ago it was 2004. So yeah, I would, I'd definitely like to go back there.

Linzi:

I mean to be honest, any sort of but then you can go to. You see, you can do Mexico, that coast I'm thinking Tulum, chichen Itza, all those places you can do it, aren't you? It's a bit what down in Tulum. Yeah, you can, they do. I know they also like to go to. Where is it? Is it called Cosimo? We've been. Oh, cosimo, oh on the cruises.

Linzi:

Yeah, yeah, so we can do it again, because I still get to explore those things and then I don't, but I get to still have all the food. Oh, I'm confused. Your music's confusing.

Mark:

So, in summary, yes.

Linzi:

More expensive, but there's everything else.

Mark:

It is more expensive, but I don't think proportionally it's any more than any other. I think just everything's gone out.

Linzi:

Fancy coffee from a coffee shop now.

Mark:

Five pound.

Linzi:

Yeah.

Mark:

Yeah, I've been down in London and we've seen a pint of beer for £9. Not that we would buy that.

Linzi:

No, cocktails are £15 to £20.

Mark:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, everything's just more expensive, and cruising hasn't been excluded for that, but for us it's still good value for money. Yeah Go, would you like a cruise confession? Well, have you got anything else that you want to say about? No so would you like a cruise conference?

Linzi:

okay, but are we still calling it that? Because it does, it's called the cruise confession.

Mark:

Okay, go on. But then we decide whether they're going to be allowed to continue to cruise okay, I remember remember the end of it. Yes, okay, okay, so this particular one. So let me just bring up the story. Sorry, sorry, so myself You're not the story.

Mark:

So I'm not looking, I'm not looking. The name of the person has been changed for this one, so we're just referring to them as Pete. Pete, yes, and this one's called the Midnight Buffet Heist. Oh, so this is from them. Cruise bots. I don't know. I don't think they're necessarily referring to us on that, but we'll take it, I will accept. I implore you to have mercy on my soul. Oh, okay, it was the final night of the cruise and the allure of the midnight buffet proved too strong to resist. It does my stomach. A bottomless pit after a day of swimming and sunbathing, growled with a frosty that could rival the ship's engines. A ferocity, a ferocity.

Linzi:

that's a big growl you know what I'm look? I'm loving the the scene setting okay, continue.

Mark:

I crept out my cabin. The hallway dimly lit and eerily silent wow the buffet, usually bustling with activity, was now a haven of tranquility. Nice Bathed in a soft glow of heat lamps.

Linzi:

In a soft glow of heat lamps.

Mark:

He can visualise this guy. They've done very well painting this picture. Yeah, it was a culinary wonderland. I don't think I've ever thought of that when I walked into a midnight buffet. Okay, okay, okay, to be fair, we don't know exactly when this was no. Mountains of glistening shrimp Shrimp. Yeah, oh well. He narrows it down to them not being from the UK. Confident it's shrimp Exactly Explores themselves Flatters of a bite-sized desserts.

Linzi:

Okay.

Mark:

And a whole roasted pig that seemed to wink at me invitingly.

Linzi:

A whole roasted pig.

Mark:

Yeah. So I'm going to say this isn't on a recent buffet cruise. This is definitely going back.

Linzi:

I mean, I can't tell you where my mind has gone now.

Mark:

My plate, initially intended for a modest snack, groaned under the weight of my culinary conquest. There were mini quiches, each one a creamy, cheesy delight. There were skewers laden with plump shrimp, the aroma's teasing my nostrils, and, of course, a generous helping of that mystery pizza, its sauce possessing a flavour that can only be described as magical. As I made my way back to the cabin, balancing my precariously loaded plate, disaster struck. Oh no, a rogue wave, or perhaps the vibrations from an overzealous dance party on the deck above, sent my plate tumbling from my grasp. Shrimp flew through the air, mini quiches met a tragic end on the carpeted floor and the pizza, oh the pizza landed face down with a sickening thud.

Linzi:

Oh dear.

Mark:

Panic seized me, I bet. Confronted with the evidence of my gluttony, I did the unthinkable I fled the scene. I left a trail of culinary carnage in my work, a testament to my midnight munchie madness. Cruise gods, I am filled with remorse. I envisage the poor soul who stumbled upon the scene. Their face a mixture of horror and disgust. I vow to henceforth control my late-night cravings and own up to any future food-related fumbles, no matter how embarrassing. Please, I beg of you, forgive me.

Linzi:

Okay.

Mark:

Very good scene setting.

Linzi:

Wow, I mean.

Mark:

I can imagine that Pete's a thudding.

Linzi:

I can. I can also see the shrimps flying.

Mark:

Are we telling Pete, in quotation marks, that he needs to hand over his sea card and get off at the next port?

Linzi:

Mm-hmm.

Mark:

Or are you going to allow him to carry on cruising and then go to the next port, because he's very remorseful and has promised in the future to own up to those? What would you do in that situation?

Linzi:

It depends on the age of the ship, because if you've got cameras, you're going to have to attempt to clear it or find something or do something. If it's an older ship, and you know it, you can't be like oh goodness. However, as Pete recognises that I am in fact a goddess, we.

Mark:

He may have been talking to the wider cruise. Gods oh oh but if you want to have him recognizing you for that and basing your forgiveness purely on flattery and setting the scene for future, that all you need to do is flatlands in.

Linzi:

No matter what happened, you get forgiven no, you don't have to flatter me, you just have to be realistic.

Mark:

You're a vampirist.

Linzi:

No, I'm not. No, no.

Mark:

So what do you reckon?

Linzi:

It wasn't his fault. It was a wave's fault.

Mark:

Or the overzealous dancing.

Linzi:

Or the overzealous I'm going to say wave, I'm going to be again.

Mark:

We have been on a ship when a bigger wave's hit and we'd been in the buffet at the time and sim plates go flying.

Linzi:

I bet people end up in all sorts of precarious positions when a rogue wave.

Mark:

I think it's more the fact, not that that happened, yeah, but then then you just bolted.

Linzi:

He ran away.

Mark:

He bravely ran away. No For me, I would have picked it up and put it on the plate and then pushed it to the side. I wouldn't have carried on taking it to our room. I might have gone back up to the buffet to get some more.

Linzi:

I would have gone to get you Because.

Mark:

So I'm going to say that Pete can keep his seat pass.

Linzi:

He can so keep his seat pass. He can so keep it, and he'd written it very well. He's written it so well. I mean Goldstein.

Mark:

Okay, so Well done. Well done, pete, you get to carry on New story time.

Linzi:

Okay, so we've got three new stories oh, and, as usual, you don't know these. No, I never know them.

Mark:

I never know anything. You knew the title, so we talked about on the live stream. This is true. Good story number one hurtigruten yeah has announced the first truly zero emission ship what are we paddling? It's got. When they said the, I have to say you want a million miles from my initial first smug remark. When did they announce that I'm like? Well, what about the vikings?

Linzi:

I guess that weren't shit oh, you're gonna go go Phoenicians as well. You can't forget about them guys.

Mark:

So I think the main modern one seems to be the use of fossil fuels. So it's going to be the first fossil fuel free.

Linzi:

Okay, I understand.

Mark:

Not using any other one, not the LNGs or anything Polynesians they used to travel thousands of miles. They did Not with engines and they didn't have a midnight buffer either. They could have done. Well, they could have done. I've not seen evidence of the midnight buffer. Well, you could tweet it Well, yeah, that's true.

Linzi:

And you know.

Mark:

I suspect they were asleep at midnight. Maybe they were silent disco.

Linzi:

Who do you think steers the ship at night there? Still needs things to do.

Mark:

They want autopilot.

Linzi:

I can't believe we're having this conversation.

Mark:

Let's get back to her. It's going to start sailing in 2030. So it's not that far off for something like that. No, and the ship uses a series of large electric batteries and a flux capacitor. Close, you're Close. You're not far off, so it doesn't go back in time, but it does look like it's from the future. It genuinely looks like it would fit in Fifth Element. Oh, it looks like what. Fluxton Paradise, fluxton, fluxton.

Linzi:

Paradise, Fluxton Paradise I think so.

Mark:

Yeah, it looks like that, yeah, and it definitely won't look out of place in like a doctor who special with a shipping space, because the other part of it, as these large electric batteries, are very tesla-ish, yeah, but obviously I assume it can get further than a car. Um, the other part of it is it has tall sails that are solar powered wow, wow, from the future, yeah, okay okay.

Mark:

It does look really impressive, so they're doing a lot of testing at the moment in terms of all the bits and pieces. Yeah, it is an expedition ship, so it's obviously much smaller in terms of passenger count. There's not really any details out on about it apart from this. This is the technology. It uses no names or stuff, but I thought it was genuinely fascinating.

Linzi:

Okay.

Mark:

It'll be interesting to see how long it will then take to get the bigger ships, Because you imagine something like that that probably holds I'm going to guess 400 people. Yeah, how long it then takes to scale it up to an icon of the seas. Okay, okay, okay. So we're probably a little away from that, but well done to the mum being the first one, I'm sure it won't be the last one.

Linzi:

Gold star for them.

Mark:

You're giving out these gold stars to her like they're going out of fashion. I can see Cruise. New story, number two Okay, and this has a happy ending to it, all right.

Linzi:

So there to all right.

Mark:

So there was a recent lady overboard situation on his believed harmony of the seas. Believed to be harmony, yeah, because royal cabins still haven't said which of their ships it was, and there were two ships. They could have been okay, but the pictures seem to look harmony okay. Um, who fell overboard? As the ship was docking in honduras, honduras, honduras. So I'm not sure as to what she was doing to fall overboard at that point. Okay, but she fell overboard.

Mark:

This is the happiest subject no, it is because of what happens next. So a passing firefighter from Dublin called Rory Foy. Rory Foy was on holiday at the time and, to quote the local paper, sprang into action, dived into the water, swam to where she was someone had thrown a life ring over as he was swimming grabbed the life ring, got over to her, pulled her back to the side and she was fine and are they getting married now?

Mark:

Shall we say yes then, just to make that uneven up here. No, I'm sick of you. That was a meet-cute, it was from a rom-com.

Linzi:

Yes, I like that Nice start there.

Mark:

And well done, rory Foy. That was special. They'll fall in love. They will definitely fall in love. There'll be some turbulent, sorry, channel 5. There'll be some waves along the way. It will be Channel 5. It'll be Netflix or Amazon these days, okay. But yeah, I thought that was a lovely story and it's nice to hear a happy ending to those sorts too many tragic, okay, okay, so, um, new story three okay juno juno. Juno juno in alaska yeah, I've been there.

Mark:

So we have been there. There's been talk for a long time in alaska reducing the number of ships down okay, and back in 2023 there was an agreement, um, with juno and the various cruise companies to reduce down the um maximum passenger capacity. Okay, going in there on a saturday, on a saturday specifically um, and they reduced it down by 25%. Now, to put that into context as to how many that reduced down to, it was 16,000 maximum capacity, good grief, yeah, I know, this is what I thought when I saw it. And it's now 12,000 on a Saturday Every other day. It's still limiting 16,000. Yeah, now that doesn't mean that they have 16,000 in every day.

Linzi:

No of course not.

Mark:

And when we went to Juneau there were a lot of ships in that day. Whether there were 16,000 people or not don't know, but there were a lot of ships. So there's a vote just gone through at the moment to ban ships altogether on a Saturday.

Mark:

Oh my Well, when they say ban them altogether, any ship with more than 250 passengers, okay, which is pretty much any ship, yeah, yeah, even even you sort of bigger expedition ships, bigger than that, um, but they have put it through to to do that. That obviously we've seen it there, and same for a lot of the other elastica ones. They're heavily dependent on the tourism, yeah, yeah, and if you drop off one-sixth of the days that they can go in there, then the cruise lines we've got to find some wells to go that day doesn't necessarily mean that they will go back to there.

Mark:

I suspect they would do, because it's still juno yeah yeah, it's still a big port, but I feel a lot of the local businesses weren't as keen as other people who maybe weren't running a business there, who just lived there.

Linzi:

Yeah.

Mark:

So they've had the vote. It's still unofficial at this point, but the city results have been released. I guess it has to be tabulated or something.

Linzi:

Yeah.

Mark:

And it showed that 2,586 residents voted in favour of it and 3,873 voted against it. Okay, so, about of the 6,500 people who voted, 60% voted to reject what's been so-called ship-free Saturdays. Okay, so it looks like that isn't going to change, but if it does, if those figures figures, if someone's got them very wrong yeah then that means that would take effect from the next cruise season.

Mark:

Wow, so they would have to change it for what people are already have planned and what the cruise lines. But by the look of it, it's not going to happen. Okay, but we can. I can understand why, yeah, but it's a. It's that balancing of sort of tourism against sort of, uh, the ecosystem up there and balancing it. Yeah, but for now it doesn't look like, um, that is going to be the case. No, but that brings us to the end of the Cruisecastment. Well, thank you, darling Cheers. We haven't drank much of those drinks today, have we? It's only tonic.

Linzi:

Thank you for listening and have a lovely day.

Mark:

And we'll play out with a little music.

Linzi:

My music, my music. Thank you,