TRAVEL + LEISURE NAMES TOP CRUISE LINES
This year’s choices validate what regular passengers already know
There is no red carpet, no lights, no breathless hosts to shout out names of the stars as they go by. Cruise awards are simply announced in publications or online.
When the companies that create awards — Travel + Leisure, Condé Nast Traveler, Cruise Critic and a few others — announce the winners, it may not sound like a big deal, but to the people who run the cruise lines, it is. And it’s a big deal to regular passengers on winning cruise lines because it validates their choices.
Travel + Leisure, one of the heavyweights with a circulation of nearly a million subscribers, just rolled out its red carpet after readers were polled for their favourite cruise lines. Participants were asked to vote under several headings with the main ones being: stateroom, food, service, itineraries and value.
My problem, as always, is with the ship categories: Mega- Ships, Large, Small.
I think at least two more categories are required. Luxury would be one and the other should be something between Mega and Large. I’m not sure what — Extra Large maybe? Mega should be only for ships with more than 3,600 passengers and currently it’s for anything over 2,200. These days, that’s hardly a “mega-ship.”
Let me give you an example of why it’s wrong. Crystal ships are listed in the Large category along with Regent Seven Seas. Those are luxury lines, but in this poll they are lumped in with Holland America and Celebrity, both mainstream brands, but not luxury. Two more categories would make the ratings more equitable.
Enough of my ranting; here are the 2015 winners:
MEGA- SHIPS:
1. Disney
2. Princess
3. Celebrity
4. Cunard
5. Royal Caribbean
LARGE- SHIP:
1. Crystal
2. Regent Seven Seas
3. Azamara
4. Oceania
5. Cunard
6. Princess
7. Holland America
8. Celebrity
9. Royal Caribbean
10. Norwegian
Several lines show up in more than one category because they have ships of different sizes in their fleets.
SMALL- SHIP:
1. Seabourn
2. Paul Gauguin (only has one ship)
3. Windstar
4. Regent Seven Seas
5. Silversea
RIVER LINES:
1. Viking
2. Uniworld
3. Tauck
4. Grand Circle (mainly American market)
5. AmaWaterways
How did your favourite line fare? Islands, airlines, hotels and other travel categories are ranked in this year’s Travel + Leisure Awards and you can find them all on the magazine’s website at travelandleisure.com/worldsbest/cruise-lines.
The best of the Islands all show up on cruise-line itineraries. Some included in the top 10 were Galápagos Islands, Bali, Santorini, Moorea, Maui, Kauai, Great Barrier Reef and Malta.
In the International Airport category, there were no winners from North America. You would think Vancouver International ( YVR), ranked by SkyTrax as the best airport in North America for five years running, might have found some international love.