Water

Albany Calling

Albany Calling

May 17, 2023 at 1:34 pm

I am not on the Port of Sydney’s media list, so did not receive the press release headlined: Port of Sydney to Host U.S. and Atlantic Canadian Ports During Port Days I actually knew the Port of Sydney would be welcoming the North Atlantic Ports Association (NAPA) and the IndependentRead More

Encounters with an Actual Cruise Junkie

Encounters with an Actual Cruise Junkie

February 1, 2023 at 12:02 pm

As someone curious about the cruise ship experience but with zero desire ever to board a cruise ship, I was delighted to discover the existence of Emma Le Teace, a 28-year-old from the UK who took her first cruise at the age of 11 and now cruises professionally—as in, hasRead More

Nickled and Dimed by the Cruise Industry

Nickled and Dimed by the Cruise Industry

August 10, 2022 at 12:23 pm

A recent Cape Breton Post story painted an uncharacteristically accurate picture of the cruise industry simply by quoting one of its biggest beneficiaries, Dennis Campbell of Ambassatours Grey Line. Campbell’s company is one of two (both Halifax-based) handling cruise line shore excursions in Halifax and Sydney. The story was aboutRead More

Top (Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) Adm. Jonathan Greenert welcomes Commander of the Royal Canadian Navy Vice Adm. Mark Norman for an office call at the Pentagon. (U.S. Navy Photo by Chief Mass Communication Specialist Julianne F. Metzger/Released)
Bottom: Bottom: MS Asterix naval replenishment ship, post-conversion.

Vice-Admiral Norman/NSS Timeline 2004-2019

June 15, 2022 at 12:32 pm

Editor’s Note: I’ve added new items to the timeline below, but my real update can be found in this new article, for which I’ve written a new introduction. Rather than repeat myself, I thought I’d let the old intro stand because it still serves a purpose: it explains why IRead More

Photo by Commander John Bortniak, NOAA Corps., Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Into the Fog

May 18, 2022 at 1:58 pm

Real business news is good stuff. I say this as someone who used to read the Wall Street Journal regularly, after a co-worker gave me the sage advice to “throw out the op-ed section and focus on the articles.” The quality of such articles is high because businesspeople, although happyRead More

Cruise News: Identity Crisis

Cruise News: Identity Crisis

May 4, 2022 at 1:08 pm

The arrival of the first cruise ship of the season — the Seven Seas Navigator — in Sydney on Sunday set me to thinking about all things cruise again, so I tried to compose a snapshot of the industry, particularly as it relates to the Port of Sydney, and that’sRead More

Cruise News: Courts & COVID

Cruise News: Courts & COVID

May 4, 2022 at 1:06 pm

My snapshot of the current cruise industry (see part one here) would be sadly wanting if I failed to note that Princess Cruise Lines, fined a record $40 million in 2017 for what the US Department of Justice called “environmental crimes,” has failed to mend its wicked ways. The 2017Read More

Fast & Curious: Short Takes on Random Things

Fast & Curious: Short Takes on Random Things

March 3, 2022 at 10:00 am

Felicity Ace In mid-February, as noted at the time by Tim Bousquet, the Felicity Ace, a car carrier that sometimes calls at the Dartmouth Autoport, caught fire near the Azores. All 22 crew members were rescued from the 650-foot long vessel which was carrying about 4,000 Volkswagen Group cars, manyRead More

Port of Sydney AGM

Port of Sydney AGM

March 2, 2022 at 10:55 am

It’s time for Confessions of a Bad Reporter. In this week’s episode, I have to confess that I did not attend the Port of Sydney’s Annual General Meeting (AGM) on February 23. It was on a Wednesday night, a week before I publish, and I thought I would be ableRead More

Fast & Curious: Short Takes on Random Things

Fast & Curious: Short Takes on Random Things

November 18, 2021 at 11:35 am

Cruise news And now, from the “counterintuitive” department, I’d like to suggest that there are ways in which COVID may actually prove a boon to the cruise industry. It’s a theory I developed watching a “recovery of cruise” presentation from a November 2020 conference on “post-COVID” tourism in Cape BretonRead More