arAdjusting to Cruising and Life in
the  'New Normal' world
  By Dallas Sherringham - Editor in Chief, CEO 
​Cruise Magazine

Steve McQueen once said : 'Motor racing is living, the rest of the time is just waiting".
These words  may well sum up the life of the  most cruise passengers. Life ashore is spent waiting for the next time we go cruising..and start living, again!
The Covid-19 and Delta strain pandemic and has been the longest wait of all . Most of us try to enjoy at least one cruise a year, many readers are lucky enough to do several. However, the last 20 months have been the worse time of our cruising lives.
I think it is time for cruising to return  in Australia. The Federal Government  needs to appoint a Special Minister for Cruising and get things moving.
There is no reason why, if we are all vaccinated,  that we can't start  cruising in Australia and bubbles like New Zealand.
In our magazine you will read about the many ways cruise lines have adjusted to the 'new normal' overseas and have successfully   relaunched their itineraries.
Crews have been vaccinated and ship life and food service  reworked to make it  safe as possible to cruise.
The cruise industry received a very bad coverage last year by the maniacal mainstream media, particularly Channel 9 and shows like 60 Minutes. That biased reporting shouldn't be allowed to cloud the judgement of the Government  in its plans for cruising to return.
The Ruby Princess is a beautiful ship that became embroiled in  the Covid-19 outbreak which deflected from the fact that the Government was allowing thousands of untested  visitors and returning citizens to pour in via flights.
Cruising unfairly became the convenient 'whipping boy' for media commentators and politicians including the NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard.
They failed, or refused, to recognise that this was a much bigger problem than one cruise ship. These people  also failed to consider the devastation the disappearance of cruising  caused to our island   friends in Vanuatu, New Guinea and Fiji.  And what about the billions of dollars it pours into ports like Sydney, Cairns and Brisbane? 
​Clean Cruising chief Dan Russell has been calling for the Government to get their act together and get cruising going again.
It is easy to arrange Australian and New Zealand  itineraries that  don't visit major ports. And there are plenty of deserted islands in New Guinea  and Vanuatu  to visit in a 'bubble' if locals are worried about Covid being imported.
Put  in some temporary docks and use the tenders to go ashore.
We all deserve a firm date  when it will start again  - and longest wait of all will be over.

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The ill fated Ruby Princess in Samoa, 2019

Time for the ships to return

Selected islands could be placed in a  cruise bubble.

Life on a deckchair sounds perfect to me