The Joy of Cruising Podcast

40 Episodes
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By: Paul C. Thornton

The Joy of Cruising Podcast is a conversation with one of the dozens of amazing cruisers with fascinating stories that have been featured in The Joy of Cruising Trilogy—The Joy of Cruising, Cruising Interrupted, and new, The Joy of Cruising Again. In addition there will be conversations with global cruise personalities and cruisers I encounter with fascinating stories the cruise community would enjoy hearing.  Order here: The Joy of Cruising; Cruising Interrupted; bit.ly/TheJoyOfCruisingAgain; Contact Me 

The Traveling Type
Today at 4:00 AM

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome James and Tracey, making memories one trip at a time, and creators of The Traveling Type YouTube channel, and Instagram. As frequent listeners know, I watch cruise YouTube videos incessantly as I work on the podcast seemingly every waking hour—often with the sound down. When a The Traveling Type

 video comes on, I turn the sound up because I know they are likely going to chronicle a cruise (or l...


Jessica Jane Magic, Headliner, Disney Cruise Line, Performing on the Ocean
#208
09/11/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome to The Joy of Cruising Podcast, Jessica Jane Peterson, embodiment of Jessica Jane Magic, a dazzling magician, daredevil, and an experienced sleight-of-hand artist with more than 10,000 shows under her belt—many while performing on the ocean. Jessica has performed on cruise ships sailing to over 42 countries and has also entertained on tours for the men and women serving in the armed forces overseas.

 

Jessica Jan...


MH Family Adventures, Royal Caribbean Star of the Seas
#207
09/04/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome back RacQuelle and Ron, creators of the fast-growing MH Family Adventures, YouTube channel, Instagram platform, and Facebook Group. How fast is MH Family Adventures growing? We then were on the podcast well over a year-and-a-half ago YouTube channel had 15k subscribers, impressive especially give that less than 2 years prior, RacQuelle was a full-time educator. Now their channel is up to over 34k subscribers! 

 

RacQuelle Major-Holland is a Cr...


Cruise with Ben & David, Holland America Line Flagship Rotterdam, 1st HAL Cruise
#206
08/28/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. I am delighted to welcome back to The Joy of Cruising Podcast, Ben & David creators of Cruise with Ben & David, one of the top cruise brands in the world, certainly when it comes to content creators and cruise influencers. They have a massively successful YouTube channel with over 320k subscribers—in the top five of all cruise channels. This is the 3rd time Cruise with Ben & David has been on The Joy of Cruising Podcast—you can count on one hand the number of g...


Mete and I, Always Fun Onboard
#205
08/21/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Anwar and Lametrius Arif, creators of the Mete and I YouTube channel, Instagram, and Facebook page. As frequent listeners know, I watch cruise YouTube videos incessantly as I work on the podcast seemingly every waking hour—often with the sound down. When a Mete and I video comes on I turn the sound up!

 

Their channel is described as follows. “Our channel is dedicated to love, fun, weigh...


Hugo Ortega, Founder, Superyacht Sunday School, Seasoned Superyacht Captain, Below Deck TV Star (Season 12)
#204
08/18/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am proud to host Hugo Ortega a multi-talented seafarer who can bring a multitude of perspectives to the listeners of the show.

 

Hugo Ortega is a Superyacht Captain 500T, educator, and founder of Superyacht Sunday School, a global platform helping aspiring crew enter the luxury yachting industry. From his humble beginnings in the Bronx to captaining superyachts around the world, Hugo now mentors’ newcomers through accessible, expert-led courses that break down ind...


Paul & Cheryl’s All-Time Top Ten Cruises
#203
08/14/2025

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In the last couple of years, we have started checking off some bucket list cruises. Given that they are bucket list destinations, vessels, or both it is of little surprise that several of those bucket list check offs made it on to this list. And as we have a number of bucket list cruises in front of us, i suspect this list will evolve over time. Like later this year, our next cruise is a bucket list trip to the Panama Canal on Holland America Lines flagship, Rotterdam, and if what I have...


Alissa Musto, Recording Artist, Singer, Pianist, Actor, Miss America Finalist: Performing On the Ocean
08/07/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am proud to welcome Alissa Musto, Recording Artist, Singer, Pianist, Actor, Miss America Finalist. And Alissa performs as a guest entertainer onboard cruise ships. I am as passionate about music and comedy as I am about cruising so when I get a chance to have a conversation with an entertainer who also has performed on cruise ships, I am in my glory.

 

What a resume! Alissa’s website describes her as “Retired pagea...


Ashley Kosciolek, Cruise Writer Extraordinaire
07/31/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome freelance travel writer Ashley Kosciolek. Ashley is a former editor at Cruise Critic for 12 years, but I really got to know her work during her time writing mainly about cruises but also some general travel articles wrote about cruises for The Points Guy. Ashley can address virtually any cruise-related topic from the consumer side, and even make topics about as exciting as watching grass grow—like travel insurance—worth reading about. On nume...


Janet Bava, Chief Commercial Officer, Windstar Cruises
07/28/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Janet Bava, Chief Commercial Officer, Windstar Cruises. We have had several small ship specialists on the podcast as well as leaders from some of the lines, and of course passionate cruisers providing us their cruise reports from their time on various small ship and river cruises. This is the first time we have exclusive focused on Windstar Cruises, and I am excited to meet Janet and learn about Windstar.


...


Emily Gelineau, Grammy Award-Winning Violinist, Pianist, Vocalist, Composer and Arranger: Performing on the Ocean
07/24/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am proud to welcome Emily Gelineau, a Grammy award-winning Violinist, Pianist, Vocalist, Composer and Arranger who is known for interpreting modern styles of music from jazz to country, pop to rock, and world styles such as French and Brazilian music. Emily performs as a guest entertainer onboard luxury cruise ships. Listeners know I am as passionate about music and comedy as I am about cruising so when I get a chance to have a conversation with...


MrBucketlist, My 50th State, NCL Pride of America Around Hawaii, Plus, New Universal Epic Universe
#198
07/17/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. I am delighted to welcome this week to The Joy of Cruising Podcast, Justin Sorrell aka MrBucketlist. Justin is a video creator and influencer and the creator of the 19k subscribers MrBucketlist YouTube channel where you get to follow his adventures not only on the seas but anywhere else. You see MrBucketlist is a certified thrill seeker, never He cruises exclusively solo, which is relatively atypical for men, and has done 30 Solo Cruises—3 of which involved leading MrBucketlist group cruises. 

 

As sugg...


Christian McBride, Grammy-Winning Jazz Superstar Bassist, Christian McBride's World at Sea
#197
07/14/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am proud to host Christian McBride, multi Grammy-winning jazz superstar bass player! We talk about performing at sea, and hear about Christian’s inaugural charter cruise, Christian McBride's World at Sea, January 20-27, 2026. The cruise will be on Celebrity Summit from Ft. Lauderdale, stopping at Jamaica and Grand Cayman.

Christian McBride is creating a new kind of experience for jazz fans while breaking new ground for artists as he takes on a "captain" an...


Paul & Cheryl, Reflections of Dubai, and Abu Dhabi
#196
07/10/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast I am delighted to welcome back a special guest, my cohost Cheryl.

 

As some of you know we are largely in the bucket list checking stage of our lives and just got the opportunity to check one off. I will warn my listeners from the cruise community that this episode is about a land trip—don’t want to be accused of inviting you here under false pretenses. Yes, we cover cruising 99% of th...


Traveling Judi, Galapagos, Metropolitan Touring on La Pinta
#195
07/03/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome back Judi Cohen, travel writer extraordinaire known in the cruise community as Traveling Judi. I featured Traveling Judi in my second cruising book, Cruising Interrupted amzn.to/3seFU8y in a section called “Cruisers Like You and Me... Sort Of.” Traveling Judi is an ardent world cruiser with a penchant for nontraditional, smaller, and even tiny ships relative to mainstream cruise ships. I met Judi thro...


Jennifer Halboth, CEO for the Americas, Riverside Luxury Cruises
#194
06/30/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Jennifer Halboth, CEO for the Americas, Riverside Luxury Cruises. We have had several small ship and river cruise specialists on the podcast as well as leaders from some of the lines, and of course passionate cruisers providing us their cruise reports from their time on various small ship and river cruise. This is the first time we have exclusive focused on Riverside Luxury Cruises, and I am excited to meet Jen and...


See It With C
#193
06/26/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Carlene Reid, creator of the See It With C YouTube channel, Instagram, and Facebook page. Carlene starts each video, “Hi, my name is Carlene. I work a 9-5 but travel the world as if I don’t.”

 

Carlene is a lifelong traveler and educator who has turned her passion for traveling and teaching others into a growing community of travel aficionados. She has visited almost 40 countries and taken 3...


Helena and Dustin and Crew, Stranded at Sea, Carnival Splendor to the Rescue
#192
06/23/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast I am delighted to welcome Helena and Dustin, two “cruisers” with a once-in-a-lifetime harrowing tale with a happy ending on Carnival Splendor. Another one of those world-wide new human-interest stories I love bringing to the listeners of The Joy of Cruising Podcast.

 

Dusty and Helena are two Australians in their late 30s who have been living off-grid for the past three years. Their journey began with a motorhome adventure around Austr...


Recording Artist, Josh Christina, Performing on the Ocean
#191
06/19/2025

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This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am proud to welcome Josh Christina, Recording Artist, scene-stealing, piano-wielding frontman, and veteran headliner of several cruise lines. Listeners know I am as passionate about music and comedy as I am about cruising so when I get a chance to have a conversation with someone who has performed on cruise ships, I am in my glory.

 

Josh Christina is a dynamic and passionate musician whose love for piano rock has taken him on an incredible journey. His musical s...


Gian and Angie: Solo on Villa Vie Odyssey, Falling in Love, and Getting Married! A Global Love Story
#190
06/16/2025

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This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast I am delighted to welcome Gian and Angie, two cruisers living out two amazing stories on a cruise ship. That’s right, two amazing stories. The first is living on a cruise ship, Villa Vie Odyssey for the next three years, circumnavigating the globe and in the process visiting 147 countries across all seven continents—425 port stops in all. Anyone who is a regular listener of The Joy of Cruising Podcast knows I wouldn’t hesitate to host Gian...


Jodi Murphy, Regent Seven Seas
#189
06/12/2025

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This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Jodi Murphy, Director, Strategic Partnerships,Regent Seven Seas Cruises. I have long had desire a desire to sail Regent Seven Seas, stemming from my research in my first cruising book, The Joy of Cruising amzn.to/3lAfyON, where I research an organization, Friends of Festival at Seawhich organizes very high-end group cruises to exotic locations, many on Regent, which at the time I wasn’t very familiar with. Since then, Regent Seven Seas has been on my...


A Rich and Jazzy Life, on Assignment for MSC, on the new MSC World America
#188
06/05/2025

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This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast I am delighted to welcome back again to The Joy of Cruising Podcast Rich and Jazzy, creators of the amazing A Rich and Jazzy Life brand. A Rich and Jazzy Life is comprised of their top ten 110K cruise channel on YouTube; Melanin at Sea (MAS), their 115K Facebook affinity to group known for its legendary group cruises and, in my opinion the most influential cruise croup on Facebook; companion Instagram accounts and more.

 


Paul and Carole Love to Travel, Costa Smeralda, Dubai and the Emirates
#187
05/29/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. I am delighted to welcome back to The Joy of Cruising Podcast Paul and Carole, creators of one of the top cruise brands in the world, Paul and Carole Love to Travel. They are dominant on every social medium platform they are on, and whether you classify them as cruise influencers or cruise content creators they are among the world’s leader as either. Most importantly to me is that Paul and Carole are passionate cruisers, and just about every time I read about them on...


Linzi & Mark, Suite Natured, Windstar Star Legend
#186
05/22/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome back Linzi and Mark Cowgill, creator of the UK-based Suite Natured blog, YouTube channel, and Instagram platform. Over a year ago, I reached out to Linzi and Mark to come on the podcast to talk about transatlantics, in advanced of our first transatlantic cruise around this time last year on Virgin Voyages Scarlet Lady Ep 91. Suite Natured, Transatlantics. It was a fun conservation which ended with a hilarious anecdote. (Sure enough...


Zimbabwe-born Presley Pfereka: A Crew Members Perspective
#185
05/15/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Presley Pfereka, a crew member for Azamara luxury cruise line. I have long observed with awe and fascination cruise ship crew from the Captain to entry-level crew members and have hosted on The Joy of Cruising Podcast a cross-section of ship crew, both former as well as active over the past years. I would love to delve into their lives in an in-depth manner both on the home front...


The Chefs, Behind the Soul Food on the Soul Train Cruise
#184
05/12/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. I am delighted to welcome this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, a special group of guests, The Chefs: Jerome Brown aka Chef Rome, the chef to the stars with over 35 years of professional cooking, the go-to chef for celebrities worldwide; Chicago Chef George Outlaw specializing in elevated soul food with bold and unusual food combinations; Chef Sondra (Dra) Rhodes bringing creole and southern country cuisine to your table; and, Chef Ricky Simpson, Jr., an Atlanta resident whose credo is “To enlighten people to a...


Cruise Tips TV, MSC Euribia Yacht Club, Middle East and the United Arab Emirates
#183
05/08/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. I am delighted to welcome back to The Joy of Cruising Podcast Sheri of Cruise Tips TV. Sheri is a special friend to me, having been featured in my first two cruise books, The Joy of Cruisinghttp://amzn.to/2EAMddF and Cruising Interrupted http://amzn.to/3seFU8y, and then being my first choice for the initial episode of The Joy of Cruising Podcast which she graciously accepted Episode 1. Sheri returned to the podcast for Episode 93. Today Sheri becomes...


Greece, Dr. George Alexakis, Tourism & Hospitality Professor
#182
05/05/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am proud to welcome Dr. George Alexakis, a former colleague of mine from Florida Gulf Coast University in Fort Myers. George is a Hospitality Professor at FGCU, and he did some work some collaboration with the organization I led, which was the Office of Continuing and Off-Campus Education. George and I always had a good rapport given our mutual interests—not just in continuing ed but hospitality, which I had taught at my prior institution. George ta...


LadybugTravels: Adventurer on a Year-Long Cruise
#181
05/01/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. I am delighted to welcome this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, Belencia Wallace, creator of Ladybug Travel of Facebook, Instagram, and with its 55k following on TikTok, which is where I met her. I was amazed to learn Belencia decided last year to leave her professional career to embark on a full year at sea. Belencia sails on a variety of Royal Caribbean ships and estimates her one-year journey to cost approximately $100k. When Belencia’s The Joy of Cruising Podcast ep...


Raquel & Vincent, Sailing Around the World
#181
04/24/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast I am delighted to welcome Racquel and Vincent, two cruisers who have never been on a cruise ship. Yes, you heard that right. All of you, well the vast majority of you—I know we have listeners who aspire to take their first cruise—the vast majority of you have been on cruise ships, yet unlike most of you Racquel and Vincent have cruised around the world. Confused?

 

Well, with respect to mains...


Author, JD Harbor, Romance at Sea
#179
04/17/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome JD Harbor, author of the new seafaring novels, Emerald Tide, and Sapphire Seas. They are both set aboard a luxurious cruise ship and were inspired by JD’s own experience. You see, he met his wife onboard a singles cruise in 2014, and they have sailed together ever since. Man, that sounds fun! As JD notes, “Meeting my wife on that cruise is proof that the magic of the sea really can lead...


Paul & Cheryl, Reflections of A Journey to Barrier Reefs of Mexico, Belize and Honduras, Explora Journeys I
#178
04/14/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast I am delighted to welcome back a special guest, my cohost Cheryl.

We are largely in the bucket list checking stage of our lives, and just got the opportunity to check one off—a cruise on a luxury cruise line, specifically Explora Journeys and its first ship, Explora I. Let me preface with a brief overview oo the main categories of cruise lines:

Mainstream-Carnival, Royal Caribbean, NCL

Premium-Celebrity, Holland America, Pr...


Shelton and Ke’, Your Favorite Couple
#177
04/10/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Shelton and Ke' creators of the YouTube channel, Your Favorite Couple. As frequent listeners know, I enjoy watching cruise YouTube videos and from time to time I get introduced to potential The Joy of Cruising Podcast guests. That’s how I met Shelton and Ke'. I enjoyed their fun, informative video style and their diverse choices in terms of cruising and sensed similarities to our own cruise choices. They ha...


Sometimes Sailing, Uncruise Safari Explorer, Hawaii/ Viking Torgil in Portugal/AmaWaterways, AmaMagna (double-wide river cruise ship) on the Danube
#176
04/03/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast I am delighted to welcome back again to The Joy of Cruising Podcast Mikkel and Dan, creators of the Sometimes Sailing cruise website and Instagram. Mikkel and Dan are special friends, that I got to know when I wrote about Sometimes Sailing in my latest book release,  The Joy of Cruising Again http://amzn.to/3lAfyON where I wrote about their penchant for small ship cruising as well a...


SIG the Solo Cruiser
#175
03/31/2025

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This week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Cheryl Cooper, creator of the SIG the Solo Cruiser YouTube channel, Instagram, and website. As frequent listeners know, I watch cruise YouTube videos incessantly. Cheryl has carved out a solid niche as a specialist in solo cruising with high quality content and reviews from a solo cruising perspective of a diverse array of cruise lines and cruise ships—many I have sailed or plan to sail. Accordingly, her channel is on repeat. While I have never done a so...


Prof Cruise, Hawaiian Holiday, Holland America Line Zaandam
#174
03/27/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul. I am delighted to welcome back this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, Prof Cruise. I first met Prof Cruise featured her in my 3rd cruising book, The Joy of Cruising Again amzn.to/3lAfyON, to The Joy of Cruising Podcast. Yes, Sarah really is a former university professor—but her passion for cruising not only contributed to her decision to move on from teaching, but also directly influenced her family’s decision regarding where to live after she did so...


Emma & Jack, Live A Little
#173
03/20/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Emma & Jack, creators of the YouTube channel, Live A Little. As frequent listeners know, I enjoy watching cruise YouTube videos and from time to time I get introduced to The Joy of Cruising Podcast guests. That’s kind of how I met Emma & Jack. I say kind of because normally I just watch videos and then perhaps transfixed by someones video style, or sense of humor, comprehensiveness of their vi...


My Cruising Family
#172
03/17/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast, I am delighted to welcome Peta-Gaye and Allan, creators of the My Cruising Family YouTube channel, Instagram, and blog. As frequent listeners know, I enjoy watching cruise YouTube videos and from time to time I get introduced to The Joy of Cruising Podcast guests. That’s how I met My Cruising Family (with their fun, mostly family-oriented videos often accompanied by a Jamaican beat.) I also occasionally interact with them on social media and de...


Nancy & Dale Houchens: Still Living On Cruise Ships
#171
03/13/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and this week on The Joy of Cruising Podcast I am delighted to welcome back Nancy and Dale Houchens. I learned about Nancy and Dale when I read articles about them in both USA Today and Miami Herald. The Houchens retired in 2015 to a life—planned well before their last day at work—of living on cruise ships. I wrote a feature about the Houchens, Living On Cruise Ships in my new book, The Joy of Cruising Again amzn.to/3lAfyON in a sect...


World-Renowned London Community Gospel Choir, Caribbean Gospel Choir Workshop Cruise, MSC World America
#170
03/10/2025

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Hello, passionate cruisers! This is Paul and welcome to The Joy of Cruising Podcast, and in this special episode we meet members of the World-Renowned London Community Gospel Choir (LCGC) and discuss their participation in this summer’s Caribbean Gospel Choir Workshop Cruise on the stunning new MSC World America. I am delighted to welcome the founder of LCGC, Bazil Meade; Kaylin Cain, who is coordinating the Caribbean Gospel Choir Workshop Cruise, and long-time member of LCGC, Jenny La Touche.

LCGC is one of the most energetic and inspiring fo...