Luxury prizes on offer with Celebrity Cruises’ new brochure promotion

Celebrity Cruises is offering agents the chance to win a luxury goody bag containing designer sunglasses, iTunes vouchers, a bottle of champagne and delicious Hotel Chocolat confectionary every day from now until 30 June. in addition, every week throughout June one lucky winner will also win an iPad 2, a designer watch and a digital camera. Courtesy of Celebrity Cruises, the luxury prize draw is in conjunction with the 2012 – 2013 worldwide brochure launch.

Summer 2012 will see five Celebrity Cruises ships in Europe, including the brand new Celebrity Silhouette, based in Rome from July, and Celebrity Eclipse based from Southampton for the third consecutive year. new itineraries include:

12-night Eastern Mediterranean & Greek Isles, Adriatic and Italy and Croatia sailings onboard Celebrity Silhouette14-night Canaries & Azores and Iceland & Fjords and 8 night Norwegian Fjords sailings onboard Celebrity Eclipse

Summer 2012 also sees the launch of the fifth Solstice class ship Celebrity Reflection, which will be operating two 14-night itineraries in the Mediterranean before sailing to Miami in November 2012 to operate seven-night Eastern Caribbean itineraries.

The 2012-2013 season will also see eight Celebrity Cruises ships deployed in the Caribbean with new itineraries including:

Seven-night Eastern Caribbean cruises from Miami onboard Celebrity ReflectionSeven-night Eastern Caribbean cruises from Fort Lauderdale onboard Celebrity Silhouette featuring calls at Cozumel (Mexico) and Falmouth (Jamaica)

Three ships will be operating itineraries in Alaska with a new seven-night Alaska roundtrip cruise onboard Celebrity Infinity available.

For a chance to win one of the luxury goody bags on offer, agents must create and confirm any new Celebrity Cruises 2012 booking between now and 30 June 2011.

Michael English, Head of Sales, Celebrity Cruises, explains:

“We’re excited to not only be adding fantastic new itineraries but also by the end of 2012 we’ll have two new ships in the fleet. Celebrity Cruises has grown significantly in the last few years to become one of the most loved cruise options for UK holiday makers. With free onboard credit and free parking at Southampton early booking offers, we’re seeking to continue this trend and reward agents who drive this growth.”

Key offers for 2012 – 2013 include:

Eight-night Norwegian Fjords cruise from Southampton cruise only onboard Celebrity Eclipse from £839.00 per person14-night Mediterranean Renaissance fly/cruise onboard Celebrity Reflection from £1,789.00 per person14-night Canaries & Azores cruise from Southampton cruise only onboard Celebrity Eclipse from £1,319.00 per person

For more information on the incentive travel professionals should visit www.cruisingpower.co.uk. to win, the new booking must be made by automation tools and include pre-paid gratuities. each new booking counts as one entry, so the more bookings made the more chances there are to win. Cruising for Excellence Online brand captains get two incentive entries for every booking made.

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Celebrity Silhouette squeezes out of tiny Dutch canals

This £500m, 319-metre luxury cruise liner was not built to navigate narrow canals - and that is the reason why it took 12 hours to complete a 26-mile journey.

At times there was manoeuvring room of only 5 feet as it slowly made its way from Meyer-Werft port in Papenburg to Eemshaven in Holland, but it was the first time Celebrity Silhouette - which weighs 122,400 tons, can sleep 2,886 passengers and is longer than three football pitches - has been seen on the water.

Captain Dimitrios Kafetzis earned his money for expertly guiding the huge, multi-million pound ship on tiny waterways on the Ems River yesterday, which will probably be the narrowest the liner will have to negotiate in its career.

There were plenty of tight squeezes and locks to edge through - in places the 36.88 metre wide ship passed though gaps of only 38.09 metres - and the huge vessel even had to travel on an aqueduct over an autobahn.

In order for Celebrity Silhouette - helped by tugboats and travelling at just 4mph - to complete the perilous journey, German and Dutch authorities had to remove a number of power lines and railway tracks en route.

The timing of the trip was important, too, as it had to take place at high tide in order that the hull would not scrape along the river bottom.

The Celebrity Silhouette, which took two years to make, is the fourth of a fleet of five Solstice Class ships to be built by Celebrity Cruises and will remain in the port at Eemshaven, bar some test trips in the North Sea, until it heads back to Germany, when it will be formally named, in Hamburg, on July 21.

The cruise liner boasts a number of exclusive new features, including the Lawn Club Grill - the industry's first outdoor, interactive grill.

On board there is also The Hideaway, a high-tech location reminiscent of a childhood treehouse for guests to relax inside, as well as The Alcoves - a luxurious, private cabanas overlooking the ship's lush lawn on the top deck amid immense views of the sea.

In addition there is and the Art Studio - a space where experienced and aspiring artists can participate in hands-on instruction from experts in drawing, beading, sculpting and painting.

The ship also features top-tier designer boutiques, exclusive restaurants and the hip Celebrity iLounge, offering guests classes on the use of iPads and iPhones, among other products, which also are available for sale through Celebrity's industry-first Authorised Apple Reseller status.

Celebrity Silhouette's official maiden voyage will be on July 23 when it will set sail from Hamburg to Rome (Civitavecchia).
The ship will be based in Rome, and conduct her journeys from there.

On offer will be 12-night round trip cruises to the Holy Land through the summer, which will set you back a cool £1,349 per person.

And, later in the year, there are 12-night Caribbean cruise round trips from Cape Liberty, New Jersey, beginning in November.

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Despicable Me' tonight's Dana Point Movie in the Park

Dana Point's "Movies in the Park" series continues at 8 p.m. Friday with "Despicable Me" at Lantern Bay Park, 25111 Park Lantern Road. Admission is free for the animated PG-rated film from 2010.
Candy, soda, bottled water, hot chocolate and coffee are available for purchase. All proceeds from concession sales will benefit a local school or nonprofit organization. The Dana Point Youth Board will be selling glow necklaces for $1 each as a fundraiser for its annual Adopt-A-Family program.

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Coke Zero 400: NASCAR fans beat summer heat

DAYTONA BEACH — The blazing sun, heat and humidity at Daytona International Speedway had NASCAR fans turning to their tried and true ways to stay cool.

Beer at a NASCAR event is a given, but one group from Brevard County found their own unique way to consume beer.

They call them "noodle bongs," a variation on a frat-boy's favorite accessory, the beer bong.
Bryan Schmidt of Cocoa Beach configured the bongs using the top half of leftover plastic soda liter bottles as the funnels and pool noodles as the tubes.

"Cheap. Easy. All you need to do is make sure it fits together and you're money," he said. "Could Albert Einstein have invented something like this?!"
The lineup of five bongs was getting plenty of use as several other infield fans stopped by for a chug over the last two days.

Doug Lambert and Joey Noble, two 21-year-old best friends from Merritt Island, were happy to demonstrate how well they work. "Everybody who comes by wants a hit from the noodle bong," Lambert said, who admitted to having about eight chugs that day.

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Penny Elliott of St. Cloud had the perfect place to stay cool, sitting in a lawn chair inside a kiddie pool under a tent.

It even had a shower. Her fiancé, Jon Chartley, forgot to bring a showerhead but they made it work by wrapping the end of a hose with duct tape, and poking a few holes, as their own homemade nozzle.

Chartley, also from St. Cloud, was prouder of their new viewing platform, situated 12 feet high and just inches from the fence near Turn 3, giving them a front-row view of the race.

It was decorated with their collection of NASCAR flags but the finishing touch, designed especially for the July 4th holiday, was an American flag made up of Christmas lights.

He and buddy John Bartosek nailed the string of lights to the platform and painstakingly re-arranged the red, white and blue bulbs into the flag design.

"It's so high up that you can see it from throughout the infield," said Bartosek. "Looks really great at night."

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It's hard to pass by the campsite for the Becker and Hunt boys without getting wet.

That's because the trio — 9-year-old T.J. Becker, his brother 6-year-old Matthew Becker and their stepbrother, 13-year-old Jakob Hunt — were engaged in an intense Super Soaker fight. Passersby were likely to get sprayed in the crossfire.

But the seemingly endless hours of water gun fighting in their pool kept the boys cool in the intense heat before the race start.

All worked well except for a few moments of roughhousing, like when T.J. tried to wrestle his little brother and Matthew became submerged.

"Don't drown him," was the stern warning from the adults, watching from a tent nearby.

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Brandy Irving spent hours on her hands and knees on the infield pavement but didn't mind the heat.

It's what the 15-year-old DeBary girl was willing to endure for her art.

The Mainland High School student had spent hours drawing with chalk on the black pavement. She sketched the NASCAR logo and the Rolling Stones lips logo. She also added two of her own designs — a pair of Japanese-anime-styled girl faces, complete with electric blue and neon pink hair.

"My hands hurt but I don't mind since I'm doing this," she said, kneeling as she added a palm tree to her design.

Already skilled with pencil drawings and computer graphics, Irving said she planned to enter a chalk-drawing contest soon and figured she'd have time to practice while she was at the track.

Her family has been camping at every July race and every Daytona 500 at the Speedway since she was a baby.

"Next time, I want to bring five boxes of chalk because I'm running out," she said.

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