Ocean Liners/ Cruise Ships

A cruise ship is a passenger ship used for pleasure voyages, where the voyage itself and the ship's amenities are considered an essential part of the experience. more...

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The first vessel built exclusively for this purpose was the Prinzessin Victoria Luise, commissioned by Albert Ballin, general manager of Hamburg-America Line. The ship was completed in 1900.

Cruising has become a major part of the tourism industry, with millions of passengers each year as of 2006. The industry's rapid growth has seen nine or more newly built ships catering to a North American clientele added every year since 2001, as well as others servicing European clientele. Smaller markets such as the Asia-Pacific region are generally serviced by older tonnage displaced by new ships introduced into the high growth areas.

The practice grew gradually out of the transatlantic crossing tradition, which, despite the best efforts of engineers and sailors into the mid-20th century, rarely took less than about four days. In the competition for passengers, ocean liners added many luxuries — most famously seen in the Titanic, but also available in other ships — such as fine dining, well-appointed staterooms, and so forth.

In the late 19th century, Albert Ballin, director of the Hamburg-America Line, was the first to make a regular practice of sending his transatlantic ships out on long southern cruises during the worst of the winter season of the North Atlantic. Other companies followed suit. Some of them built specialized ships designed for easy transformation between summer crossings and winter cruising.

With the advent of large passenger jet aircraft in the 1960s, the vast majority of inter-continental travellers switched from ships to planes. There are some however, who enjoy the few days of luxury and enforced idleness that a liner voyage affords, so a small niche market has remained for transatlantic voyages. Excluding this exception, the ocean liner transport business crashed. Cruising voyages however gained in popularity; slowly at first but at an increased rate from the 1980s onwards. Initially the fledgling industry was serviced primarily by redundant liners, and even the first purpose built cruise ships were relatively small. However, after the success of the SS Norway (previously the SS France, re-launched in 1980) as the Caribbean's first "super-ship", the size of these vessels has risen dramatically to become the largest passenger ships ever built.

The 1970s television show The Love Boat, featuring Princess Cruises' since-sold ship Pacific Princess, did much to raise awareness of cruises as a vacation option for ordinary people in the United States. Initially this growth was centered around the Caribbean, Alaska and Mexico, but now encompasses all areas of the globe. As of 2004, several hundred cruise ships, some carrying over 3,000 passengers and measuring over 100,000 gross tons, ply routes all over the world. For certain destinations such as the Arctic and Antarctica, cruise ships are very nearly the only way to visit, a fact that is the primary attraction for many tourists.

Read more at Wikipedia.org