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| THE FIRST CREW OF BELOW DECKS ABOVE DECKS |
Ever since I was very young I always wanted to run away to sea. I was born in Charleston, S.C. and love the ocean. I did finally join a cruise ship as a croupier and everywhere we sailed to, there were yachts. At the Cannes Film festival there were gorgeous yachts filled with beautiful Europeans. In the Caribbean the yachts moored in secluded coves too small for cruise ships. Have you ever been curious about what it is like to be part of the crew on a private yacht?
Now I have your answer. Bravo's reality show Below Decks is returning with its ninth season, and I have been cruising with them since the launch. In the pilot the show sailed out of Saint Martin which holds a special place in my heart because my future husband and I had our first date there. It is a beautiful island divided into a Dutch side filled with duty-free shops and a French side filled with fantastic restaurants. We both worked on a cruise ship, the best part of a cruise ship is that you have much more time off than the crew of a private yacht. They work with fifteen other crew members we worked with over six hundred. This season the crew will sail out of Saint Kitts another beautiful island in the Caribbean.
In the show the crew is on call twenty-four hours a day. The officers are trained professionals, but most of the cast is a group of attractive people doing essentially service and maintenance jobs; you won’t need your college degree here. But since the pay is all in tips and room and board is included what a great place to save up money to pay off those loans. The cost of the cruise can run up to $150,000 a week, and the average tip is between 10 to 15%v of the cost, so tips for each crew member averages between $1,000 and $2,000 a week. That being said some of the guests are very difficult, the chef has to change his menu on a guest’s whim, and the stewards might have to not only unpack but iron all the passengers’ clothes. You would think they would go on vacation to relax but to type ‘A’ personalities making demands and finding fault are part of a good vacation. Since most people bring their friends it is also a way to try to impress your mates with your importance. It really does show how hard the work is and that you have to have nerves of steel, to handle out of line comments such as ‘how great your tits are’.
Because this is a reality show, the focus is definitely on bad behavior. On their one day off a week it is all about getting pissed and hooking up. It was like that on a cruise ship we even had a crew bar, but we had some time off everyday, so when we got to port our major focus was sight seeing - and then getting pissed. As for shipboard romances, being a hopeful romantic I am all for them. I met my husband when we both worked on a cruise ship, and with no commute to work, or bills to pay for rent or food, it was a wonderful experience, a vacation from the real world. We computed everything in ships time, a week at sea is like a month on land for a new romance. The most fun part of every season is figuring who will hook up.
Every season has their issues. This is what I wrote about the first season. Sam hates Adrienne her boss because she is very demanding. CJ is upset because the captain keeps telling him to put his shirt back on. I can tell you if Sam was on a cruise ship she would have been booted off before the week was over for insolence. On a cruise ship an officer is to be obeyed. Only Captain Lee and Eddie Lucas are still cast members and they are the heart and soul of the cast.
This show will be interesting for anyone who loves to cruise. The setting is beautiful and there are facts to be gleaned between the cat-fights. The crew works hard and parties hard, but the work is the main focus for any crew. I just wish the show was more focused on the mechanics of the cruise world but alas the show is on Bravo not the Discovery Channel. I left cruise ships with wonderful memories and a Scottish husband, and thought not everyone can be that lucky. I am sure the crew of Below Decks will cherish this experience for the rest of their lives.
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Casino Queen (Night Hawk Casino Series Book 1) - Kindle edition by Bertoia, Cara. Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Kindle eBooks @ Amazon.com.
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Casino Queen by Cara Bertoia | NOOK Book (eBook) | Barnes & Noble® (barnesandnoble.com)
Cara Bertoia is the author of Casino Queen a new mystery novel that will be published by the Wild Rose Press on March 16th. It is based on the many true stories she lived through in her many years in the casino industry although the names have been changed to protect the guilty. Read the blurb here.
Caroline Popov, alone, heartbroken, and deeply in debt ends up in glamorous Palm Springs, California where Native casinos have just opened, offering employment to thousands. She lands a job at the Palm Oasis Casino and is mentored by the charismatic tribal chairman, John Tovar.
Embraced by casino culture, Caroline works her way up to casino manager of the Night Hawk, in the High Desert town of Joshua Tree. There, she is responsible for managing multicultural team members, satisfying the demands of challenging guests, growing revenue while rooting out corruption.
In the process of rediscovering her inner strength, she learns, you have to gamble like your life depends on it. Because it often does.rtoia is the author of Casino Queen a new mystery novel that will be published by the Wild Rose Press on March 16th. It is based on the many true stories she lived through in her many years in the casino industry although the names have been changed to protect the guilty. Read the blurb here.
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