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Due to the latest Corona Virus (Wuhan China Virus/Covid-19) the Royal Caribbean ship Jewel of the Seas is not stopping in Oman since it shares an open border with Iran which has been seeing an uptake in the number of people with the virus.
The ship will stop in Doha, Qatar instead.
Since there will be 2 sea days instead of 1, there will be a refund of 1 days worth of the cruise fare paid.
Interview with Cruise Director Alastair Crawford on the Jewel of the Seas
When sailing on the Jewel of the Seas this summer I had the change to sit down and talk with who I think is the most cheery Hotel Director ever. Alastair Crawford! Read below to find out more of his interesting background that includes working for a Duke and what his favorite port is.
Where are you from?The U.K. from England, originally from Teesside which is the Northeast of England and now I live down in a place called Milton Keynes 50 miles north of London just straight up going north. I get the best of both worlds now. The city’s on the doorstep but I live in the countryside.
What made you go into this line of work? Did you see yourself doing that when you were a kid?
I moved into the catering hospitality side when I went to university. I did a Hospitality degree. Hotel and Catering Institutional Management it was called back then. I did that and I went to work for a Scottish hotel chain called Statons Hotels. And I went into a training management program with them and then from there I was made into the Assistant Manager and was working in several hotels around Glasgow, Edinburgh…those places in Scotland. Purely by chance I came across an advertisement to join cruises, so I applied for it I went down on a sleeper train for London for an interview and I was lucky enough to get the job. I was quite young in those days that was back in the early 80s and I went to work for P&O and Princess cruises until 1989. Met my wife on board, my wife’s from Mexico we got married, I left at that time.
So I started as a Junior assistant person which is like the front desk on here on the guest services desk when I left I was a deputy person with them which is like the assistant hotel manager,…and then I went onto ferries a few years in the Irish sea, running the hotel services on the ferries. Then my wife said to me it’s time you came home. We’ve got some small children it’s time to come home and back on land. And I went to work for the Duke of Bedford…which is why I live in the South of England now and I worked for him for 15 years doing various roles. Woburn Abbey is the ancestral home of the Duke of Bedford, the park around it and obviously the house is open to the public and everything. He has three championship golf courses, he has a hotel, he has a safari park with everything from Lions and Tigers to Elephants and what have you. In England? In England yes, which is all open to the public, so it’s a big leisure operation that we have there and obviously property and farms and all sorts of other things.
So I spent 15 years there, and then why come back to sea after all of that. I personally was turning 50 and it was at that time that I thought, do I stay and continue to do what I was doing working for the Duke, retire at 65 or whatever or do I do something different. To be honest I was a bit bored in a bit of a rut and I was again just surfing on the internet and came across a job opportunity here. My wife said “go on give it a try, it might give you a new lease on life.” I think she wanted rid of me really (laughs) so I applied for it and over a few months I went through the interview process came back to Miami for interviews, went on the ship a few days for familiarization and they offered me the job role.
That was just over two years ago now. So I joined the organization and as a new hire coming into it it’s quite a big adjustment after all those years away. I’ve been on the Adventure of the Seas those last two years, learnt a lot, really really enjoy it, and now I’m lucky enough to spend my time…2 months on a contract with the Jewel and I relieve the permanent hotel director here when she goes on vacation and then I go back to the Adventure and then I relieve the Hotel Director on there for his vacation. So I have the best of two ships, two different classes. The Adventure is voyage class which is bigger another thousand, 1100 guests in there and that’s the one with the ice rinks and lots of different facilities on the Royal Promenade in the center and then this one’s a little bit smaller a bit more intimate, smaller guests numbers. Both of them are really nice…I love it, I really do enjoy it.
How much time do you spend at Sea?
I do a four month contract on board and then I have 2 months vacation. So it’s not bad at all, and then of course you bring family on…as well. I go to the adventure again in the middle of August. I leave here fly over to the Adventure again in Europe. The week I join my wife and my youngest daughter (are) coming on board for two weeks and then…in September my parents are coming on for a few weeks so it’s nice and it’s not the long flight to pay for them to come out to the Caribbean. That’s lucky.
I get real quality time when I’m at home. That’s the bonus. Because I’m not working, I can go and do what I want so i my daughter wants me to go to school and see her rowing or something I can go along and do it. Nothing stops me doing those types of things which is really nice.
So if young person says to you this is what I want to be when I grow up. What would you tell them? What would you suggest?
I would recommend it to anybody I think. Get some experience first, work in a hotel, work in a restaurant, bar, whatever your interest is gain a little bit of experience first before you come. Because on board you’re expected to know, how to give service, how to wait at a table and so on. If you arrive brand new and you have to learn that as well you’re going to struggle. So get some experience first, then come, be prepared.
What’s the biggest difference? You’re working every single day. And unlike let’s say in a restaurant on shore where you have maybe one seating that you do you turn the tables over one, one and a half time in a restaurant, here we’ve got two complete seatings virtually every single meal that you’re doing so volumes are really excessive if that makes sense. Maybe that’s not the right word but massive volumes all the time in what were doing. There really isn’t anything comparable on land. Even a hotel in Vegas or somewhere, they don’t turn everybody over at the same time, they’re not feeding everybody at the same time, people have other choices about where they go for there meal or there drink or whatever. So that’s the difference .
Be prepared for all the things that come on the back of it. Obviously safety’s really important. So all of the people on board have a safety role to do so a lot of the training when people first come on board is all about learning the safety aspects of the ship. Because out staff are expected to act as guides, give instruction out to guests and so on. What to do in an emergency. So they have to be very confident and very adept at knowing what goes on and what is required of them. So there’s a lot of extra training.
What’s Your Favorite Port to Sail out of and your favorite port stop?
My favorite area to sail is probably Alaska. Just because of the natural beauty up there. The inside passage going up from Vancouver up to Alaska itself. Those unspoiled towns like Sitka and everything, it’s just beautiful. My favorite port has to be Sydney in Australia. You know with the Opera house and the Sydney Harbor bridge..it’s awesome going in the views as you sail in are just fantastic.
What ship goes over there?
Rhapsody goes out to Australia and we have some other ships out there as well.
Are there any Trans-pacifics?
Yes, they do because Rhapsody does half of the year out in Australia and the other half in Alaska, that’s probably one of the best ships to go on!
We have other ships out there as well.
What would you say to a passenger who’s on their first cruise? What would you tell them guarantees a great cruise?
Well I think that they should come on board prepared to try things that they don’t normally do. There’s a lot of activities, entertainment and so on, come on immerse yourself in it and enjoy it. A lot of activities they call for guest involvement, passenger involvement. If they’re not involved they don’t get the same experience at the end of the day. There are so many things that maybe as you’re older you wouldn’t try, on the Adventure for example you’ve got the ice rink on board. You know you might not expect in your 50’s to sail the Caribbean and go ice skating but why not give it a try.
It’s taking those memories away with you. What you’ve done. The other thing is always take shore excursions because you come to these places you’re a few hours in port you can just go to the beach, but if you did that at every single port that you’re at what’s the experience you’re getting? You’re not getting any new memories go off and do a tour get into the islands, see what’s behind that port you’re at. And I think you’ve got to immerse yourself in these experiences places as well even if it’s only for a couple of hours. The other thing is relax. If you don’t come on board to relax on your holiday you can wear yourself out. Because everything is done for you, you can really chill have a good time, and take things at your own pace.
Thank you Alistair for taking the time to do this interview. I hope to meet you again on another sailing. 🙂
All Material Copyright TravelXena.com 2013
Last month on my Jewel of the Seas Cruise we stopped in multiple islands across the Caribbean. St. Martin, St. Kitts, Antigua, St. Lucia and Barbados. The activities that I chose to do in each place varied, but of them all the two most enjoyable days was hanging out on Maho Beach with friends watching the planes go by, dodging rain drops and sipping Mojitos and Margaritas (why oh why am I not there now). The other was the tour around St. Kitts. We used Paradise Island Tours and Roosevelt the owner was our guide. He was informative, funny and showed everyone in the van the beauties of his island. Don’t miss Brimstone hill National Park. It’s simply stunning.
When you first arrive in Sint Maarten / Saint Martin pickup one of the inexpensive drinks at a vendor nearby, they’re cheaper than the ones on the beach and before getting back on the ship don’t forget to buy a few bottles of Guavaberry rum to take back home.
St. Maarten
Guavaberry Rum Shop.
I still had some left over from our trip to St. Maarten in 2011, but it didn’t stop me from picking up 2 more bottles! 
Plane underbelly. So close to landing the wheels are nearly fully down, and yes it was about as close overhead as it looked.
Video to come.
St. Kitts
Atlantic Ocean on one side and the Caribbean sea on the other.
Brimstone National Forest
We learned a lot about the local Flora and Fauna as well as the history of St. Kitts.
I didn’t buy any Batik clothes in the shop but I love trying out soaps from all over the world,
so I picked up this brand in Frangipani as well as coconut.
St. Lucia
Beautiful handmade wood works by artists that work together in an artisan village.
I love Mauby! And the bittersweet flavor of it works well with the salty crispness of Plantain chips. Best snack of the trip.
Unfortunately I left too late to take a tour of the Pitons (about 4 hours RT) so that’s something that I’ll save for my next visit to St. Lucia which is definitely an island I’d like to explore more.
Jewel of the Seas at the dock.
I’ve photos of Antigua as well as a few from Bridgetown Barbados that I will post soon along with video clips from Maho beach.
Hundreds more photos below! Happy traveling!
All Photos and Written Material Copyright TravelXena.com © 2013 All rights reserved.
All Photos and Written Material Copyright TravelXena.com © 2013 All rights reserved.
Interview with Jewel of the Seas Staff Captain Kate McHue
On board a party on the Jewel of the Seas wasn’t I delightedly surprised when the Captain announced his staff Captain and out walked…Kate McHue! I wanted to jump up and do a little “Hurray for girl power!” but I didn’t want to seem like that oddball passenger everyone wishes would move a little further away.
So I kept my glee hidden until after when I saw her standing in the entrance of the Safari club greeting passengers. Walking up to her I remember saying “Hiiii” and smiling wide, remembering after a few seconds to follow up with a few more words in the English language, which led me to, “You’re the Staff Captain!” to while she smiled and replied “Yes” and I went on rapid firing something about “so cool”, “my blog”, “interview you”, and to my surprise she made sense of the mash of thoughts, said “Yes, that would be great.” and it was arranged. Below is the bulk of the interview, and if you see Kate on board, tell her that you like Captain America too. 🙂
Where are you from?
Originally from San Francisco but home is Las Vegas now.
What made you go into this line of work?
When I was 12 years old I went on a cruise with my parents and when I got off the ship I told my Dad that I wanted to be the Cruise Director. That was the career path that I had chosen and my Dad looked at me and he said “you can do that, or you could drive the thing.” And I didn’t really think about it again until it was time to go to College and I didn’t know where I wanted to go what I wanted to do, so he suggested a couple of places. One of them was California Maritime academy, and it’s where he had wanted to go to school when he got out of the Peace Corps and they told him you’re too old, we have age requirements, they had all kinds of requirements back in the 70’s, they didn’t allow women in and all kinds of stuff.
That was always in the back of Dad’s brain. So I said what it this California Maritime Academy, because I was looking to go to college, and he said well it’s part of the Cal State University system, it’s Cal State Vallejo smack dab between San Francisco and Sacramento and he said so it’s a four year college you take …whatever degree you want to go for and at the same time you’re taking courses to get a license to drive a ship and I really didn’t think so much about the part of driving the ship, because where I grew up we weren’t close to the water ’cause I actually grew up in Augusta Georgia.
So I said, well that sounds pretty good and it’s out of state from Georgia to California where all my family was. My family was actually in San Francisco and Sacramento so I was smack dab in the middle, and I said that sound really great, then said tell me more about this Maritime part of it, and he said “well every year you’ll go on a cruise, a training cruise” and I remembered when I was 12 and how much I enjoyed going on a cruise. So I applied and I got in. I applied there and the Coast Guard Academy. And the Coast Guard Academy seemed a little bit more military than I was looking for.
So they took me to California, dropped me off for orientation and we sat down and they were going through some of the things and had a stack of uniforms and they passed the uniforms across the table to me and I looked at ’em – Khaki head to toe and said “no, no no no no, you don’t understand I’m here for college, I’ve seen the movies, I know what College is all about. I don’t wear uniforms in college.” And they said “here you do and every morning at 7:00am you’ll be down on the Quad for inspection.” And I was like “Dad what are you doing to me!” (laughs) So that’s how it was, we wore uniforms and it was a ratio of 15:1 men to women. Which was not too shabby.
The summer cruises that we went on, you’d take your courses – heavy course load – Business Administration was my degree and then the Maritime Courses on top so celestial navigation, Marlin spike that kind of thing and then during the summer when you would normally be off as a college student we were going on these training cruises. The first year you were standing outside in the pouring rain in the cold and chipping paint and learning how to de-rust things and operate power tools, and then the second year you get a little more navigation, the third year you actually take over the watch as a navigational officer, at the end of four years you take all your exams for your degree and then you also take your U.S. Coast Guard exams to get your license.
So you can’t get a U.S. Coast Guard license to sail anything from tug boat to super tanker without getting your business degree to fall back on and vice versa. If you did one you had to do the other. And the idea is when I decide I don’t want to go to sea any longer I have the degree to fall back on. Since then things have changed now they offer different majors and you don’t actually have to go to sea when you graduate but when I graduated that’s how it was, and it was a very, very good system.
Before I graduated I’d been to places like Easter Island, down to Chile, Asia, I mean I traveled places that a lot of people will never get an opportunity to and that was even before I graduated.
So how long have you been in this industry?
I started in ’96 at CMA and then I graduated in 2000. I did go work on land for a shipping company for a year and a half and I decided you know what I don’t like the 9 to 5 I’m going to go out to sea use my license and do…midnight to 4am. So I started with Disney cruise line for a year and a half and then I’ve been with Royal for the last 10.
So what the most exciting part of your job? The most challenging?
Every day is different. Every day is a different port. You wake up and there’s a different situation you have to handle, there’s a different emergency there are different people. That’s probably the most challenging and the most interesting part of this job. Never have the same day twice. That was one of those things that I wanted to get out of the office from. It was getting a little redundant.
What is your favorite port to sail out of and also your favorite port to be in?
My favorite port of all time would have to be Venice. We were doing overnights in Venice when I was on the Brillance of the Seas. Just sailing in is so iconic and so beautiful…that’s one of those places that you also get some time off, and the most romantic day of my life. Throw the wedding out the window and the proposal and everything, but I was by myself in Venice and it was October so it was the rainy season and it had started to rain and I was sitting in the front window of a Chinese Food restaurant by myself and I was watching all these lovers and couples that were huddled under umbrellas walk through the and it was just…and I was by myself, you know when it can be romantic and you’re my yourself that’s something. That’s probably my favorite place.
What would you say to a young person (especially young girls) that look at you and say: I want to be you one day?
Do it! Be cautious of the unknown but go for it. Because I had no idea what this was and when I look back and it’s been ten years I would have never thought that this was the path that I would go on but I kind of just went with it. So try new things and if it doesn’t work out there’s always something else, at least give it a try.
When you actually do have free time what does Kate enjoy doing?
I like to go to the gym. That’s pretty much it. If we had somebody to teach Zumba here they would be my new best friend.
My husband he’s…Chief Engineer he relieves Lorenzo who’s Chief now here on Saturday…
We sign on together normally and we sign off together, and so any free time, I get to spend with him.
What would you tell a guest who says it’s their first time on a cruise and asks: “What should I do to have fun?”
The Quest game show. (laughs) That’s kind of my favorite! I would say even if you don’t feel like going out on the Port go out, just put your feet on the ground so you can say that you’ve been there done that. Do a little exploring in every place we go…Try the local fare. On board. Get involved in as many activities as you can. Because they have stuff going on what the first…you wake up all the way through ’til you go into bed in the middle of the night. As long as you’re part of that you’re going to have a great time.
It depends on what you’re into but if you participate in the activities you will have a good time.
Do you have a favorite ship?
Oh gosh…yeah. You know every crew member,…I think that there’s something that ties them to one particular ship and mine is the Mariner of the Seas and that’s where I met my husband and that’s where we spent five years, so that will always be home. And it’s one of those things where if you leave and are transferred to another ship, if you get to go back and visit r you end up going back on board for whatever reason when you walk on you feel like it’s home, and even more so than your land based home.
We do ten weeks on ten weeks off in the Marine department…so you’re pretty much living a double life but here I’d say you kind of have a little more tied into it because you’re always switched on you’re always present, always in the moment at home you kind of switch off and that’s vacation mode so it doesn’t have the same connection as it does when you’re on board.
So you’ll find some people that…want to stay on board all the time. There’s a captain on Tom Cruise’s Scientology ship that we were in port with in Aruba last cruise, or two cruises ago. The captain lives on board. He never goes home. For fifteen years he’s lived on board.
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With that we ended the chat with me telling her a bit about myself and discussing her Captain America earrings. She’s an interesting, friendly, persona that’s a real inspiration. It was great meeting her and I hope to run into her again on another Royal Caribbean cruise. Thanks Kate!
