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Perhaps belatedly, the cruise industry is throwing in the towel on their efforts to profitably fill staterooms on several of their ships that have regularly run the Mexican Riviera from both San Diego and Los Angeles. Although this story focuses on the potential economic damage to the US ports, the fact is that all of these ships called at Cabo San Lucas, as well as ports such as Mazatlan, Puerto Vallarta, and even Acapulco. This will certainly be felt in Cabo.



Carnival, other cruise lines leave Southern California as tourists spurn Mexico amid drug war - latimes.com

The Tourist Trade has sure taken a heavy hit this last few years. I used to bring my daughters down and go fishing and exploring all along Baja. Now my oldest daughter will not even cross the border or allow her children to come South. This effect on the local economy is tough.

Not an easy situation to resolve or at some times , even to comprehend!

If things keep going the way they are... we should be seeing Cruise ships from China within the next 5 -10 years...

Those Carnival Clunkers, if they hurry, can go to Australia and take tourists down the rapids of Main Street. What a ride. The passengers can throw Hors D'Oeuvres to the Aussies on their rooftops.

Originally Posted by DENNIS

Those Carnival Clunkers, if they hurry, can go to Australia and take tourists down the rapids of Main Street. What a ride. The passengers can throw Hors D'Oeuvres to the Aussies on their rooftops.

Brazil too.

And I agree with you Wiley - I expect for the next wave of tourism / immigration down here to be largely Chinese...

A few of my co-workers and their families love these cruises. For them, and I imagine the other regular cruisers, they want new ports of call. They've done those same ports a few times.
Gotta keep the product fresh in a stale economy.

Originally Posted by soulpatch

A few of my co-workers and their families love these cruises. For them, and I imagine the other regular cruisers, they want new ports of call. They've done those same ports a few times.
Gotta keep the product fresh in a stale economy.

I always thought the same thing. The same three/four day cruises with the same ports of call all the time - you can only work that so much...

The "local" cruises that do LA-Catalina-San Diego-Ensenada are not yet effected. It the longer 7-10 day cruises where the cutbacks are being made.

One of the problems I see with the redeployment of ships is when it comes to positioning a ship for Australia, you are all of a sudden dealing with a different socio-economic class of customers, in that there is no deeply discounted air fare to down under. Fundamentally, one could pend almost as much getting there, as on the cruise itslef.

Another issue, in my mind is the Caribbean is a traffic jam of ships. When there are seven huge mega-liners in port simultaneously in Charlotte Amalie, staying on board is a good option.

There are many factors that contribute to the redistribution of the worlds cruise ship fleet. One is that people have been there, done that, and need to buy a different T shirt on their next vacation.

With the decline of the US economy, fewer Americans are cruising, which impacts domestic cruise routes.

Ships formally used on North American routes are being redistributed to Europe and South America.

I (want to) think that Mexico's drug violence is not a very big part of Carnival's relocating their ship.

I have to believe that it's wishful thinking on your part. I really do believe that the drug violence is the major reason, in that if those ships were still filling cabins, there would be no reason to redeploy them elsewhere. Consider that unlike cruising 20-30 years ago when the ports of call were the attraction, the newer mega liners now contain amenities that almost make the destination ports superfluous. Pool slides, waterfalls, rock wall climbing, ice skating rinks, bowling alleys...the list goes on.

Funny thing is there was drug violence in 2006 and 2007 and tourists were still coming. I see a bigger drop in general over folks not having money than fear of dodging bullets.

Proof of that is what has happened to destinations like Las Vegas...

Overall, it may be a mixed bag. But according to the cruise industry's own trade association, business for them is booming. Not quite sure how one operates at 103% of capacity, but if you read this article, in my opinion, it leaves little doubt that taking ships out of service to Mexican ports reflects a targeted action to a specific problem. That being people are afraid to go to Mexico.

Cruise Lines International Associations State of the Industry 2011 :: Cruise Industry Wire

You may be right. I need to keep reminding myself that I am nothing more than a dumb gringo with his head stuck in the sand...

There is no doubt that some folks aren't going to cruise to Mexico because they're afraid of drug violence, and if I was arguing with the mayor of San Diego about doing more to help curb the violence I would certainly make the point.

But..

This is only one reason people are moving away from the pacific Mexico routes. Economics, the desire to see new places, and the simple fact that the Pacific Mexico trips are pretty boring, also contribute to lower bookings on that route. Notice that there are no reductions in Caribbean Mexico Itineraries.

I run a small Expedition Charter Boat in SE Alaska, and am a member of a Wilderness Best Managment group that includes many big cruise ship representatives. In talking with them, they tell me that they are allocating more vessels to Europe and the Caribbean, and moving into new regions. My somewhat educated opinion is that many of the cruise ships in Alaska are operating at around 50% occupancy. Our 2009 was pretty scary, and 2010 was only marginally better. 2011 is running slightly ahead of 2010 on bookings, but still no where near where we were in 2008.

I am surprised that the cruise ships are claiming to be looking at 2011 bookings of 103%! I'm not seeing that from here (although I wish I was!)

Originally Posted by Islander

There is no doubt that some folks aren't going to cruise to Mexico because they're afraid of drug violence, and if I was arguing with the mayor of San Diego about doing more to help curb the violence I would certainly make the point.

But..

This is only one reason people are moving away from the pacific Mexico routes. Economics, the desire to see new places, and the simple fact that the Pacific Mexico trips are pretty boring, also contribute to lower bookings on that route. Notice that there are no reductions in Caribbean Mexico Itineraries.

I run a small Expedition Charter Boat in SE Alaska, and am a member of a Wilderness Best Managment group that includes many big cruise ship representatives. In talking with them, they tell me that they are allocating more vessels to Europe and the Caribbean, and moving into new regions. My somewhat educated opinion is that many of the cruise ships in Alaska are operating at around 50% occupancy. Our 2009 was pretty scary, and 2010 was only marginally better. 2011 is running slightly ahead of 2010 on bookings, but still no where near where we were in 2008.

I am surprised that the cruise ships are claiming to be looking at 2011 bookings of 103%! I'm not seeing that from here (although I wish I was!)

Maybe apples and oranges. The CLIA companies fundamentaly cater to the middle class. The way their fare structure is set up, they have many cabins that accommodate four, with fold down beds. That allows families to bring their kids at a drastically reduced rate. This is probably what is behind the 103% occupancy. They consider the cabins as two people. Extra guests drive the number over stated capacity. I'm guessing that your business caters to a small subset of the population. If I had to hazard a guess, I would imagine that the expedition type cruises that go to remote locations, are suffering similar to what you are reporting.

Wouldn't be the first time I was wrong.

The multi-person cabins explain the 103%, they must figure that 100% is 2 people per cabin, and they are getting some families, or adults sharing cabins.

This is a different organization than I'm familiar with, so it could easily be me that is missing something here.

And, I'm no stranger to being firmly and unarguably wrong my own self. Perhaps we should start a club (I hear Keith Olberman has some free time, perhaps he'll want to join too!)

We could form a trio!