Carnival Cruise Ships

Carnival Cruise Ships, or Carnival Cruise Line, is probably the best known cruise line in the Americas. They've been around for nearly forty years, and their (somewhat annoying) ads have been a staple of daytime TV commercial breaks for seemingly that entire time. Carnival Cruise Ships can be seen from Alaska to Hawaii to the Caribbean and beyond, and they cater to all kinds of different vacations.

Of course, they made their name by catering to a crowd that was looking for shorter, more affordable cruises than those typically offered by competitors in the 1970s. Carnival cultivated a glitzy, young, Las Vegas-style atmosphere, and obviously it's paid off big for them. Today they operate dozens of ships, ranging from the smallish Holiday class (46,000 gross tons) to the gargantuan Splendor Class (113,000 gross tons). Currently they have two even larger ships - 130,000 gross tons - under construction. The first is due to be completed later in 2009, while the second is slated for 2011.

The home port for all Carnival ships is Long Beach, California, though the company's headquarters are located in Miami, Florida. They'll be opening a new headquarters in Southhampton, England as well. Because of certain legalities, most Carnival ships fly under either a Panamanian or Bahamian flag, rather than the Stars and Stripes.

However, this doesn't mean that Carnival Cruise ships refuse to recognize their United States roots. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, which ravaged the gulf coast and left thousands dead and hundreds of thousands homeless, three Carnival Cruise Ships were anchored off of New Orleans and provided housing to displaced citizens for months.

Of course, this itself turned out to be kind of a scam. The six months contract Carnival signed with the Bush Administration awarded the company $236 million. Not only was this more money than the company could have made by using the ships for cruises in their regular rotation, but the ships themselves were never full opeened up to the new homeless people of New Orleans.

There has also been some criticism of owner Mickey Arison's statement that Carnival won't be purchasing any new ships from American builders because of the value of the dollar. This statement came in mid-2008 at the start of the economic crisis, and Arison's taken some deserved flack for both his timing and his apparent cut-and-run policy.

The company's website is www.carnival.com.

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