About Me

My name is Danielle. I am an early thirty something (VERY, VERY EARLY) and I have a passion for not only cruise but holidays in general. If I am not currently on one then I am either planning one or sitting in my garden with a strawberry daiquiri dreaming about one.

I started in the travel industry working for a very well-known Irish airline in Stansted Airport and, I may be going against the grain of public opinion here but I absolutely loved it! I was young, got fantastic experience and travelled the world – well as far as Ancona in Italy anyway. I enjoyed the years I worked there and it gave me a fantastic start on my travel career.

From there I moved into a more traditional shop based travel career working in a shopping centre. It was a big change for me but I loved it. I got to help find and guide people’s holiday choices to try and achieve that perfect experience they have worked hard all year for.

I moved through the ranks from Travel Consultant to Assistant Manager to Branch Manager in six hard worked years. I loved my new challenge, but something was missing. I got bogged down by paper work and processes and forgot why I actually got into travel in the first place – to help people find their ideal holiday. So when the opportunity came to join cruise.co.uk, voted Europe’s Leading Cruise Travel Agent in 2012, I jumped at it.

During my first days with the company I realised I came to the right place. All the emphasis was put on the quality if information and advice you give your customers and the aim was to be the best out there at doing that.

So, this is me. Here I am. Honesty is the theme here on my blog. You will see true reviews, warts and all, as I feel to choose the right cruise for you, you need to have possession of the magic weapon – knowledge.

I have personally been on many cruises ranging from 3 star to five star – and Caribbean voyages to a quick sail around the British Isles. I have always travelled on my cruises with my sister who is in a wheelchair so you should expect to hear some very honest reviews on cruise companies disabled facilities – I promise to keep my rants to a minimum and lots and lots of photos of adapted stateroom bathrooms, it’s a bit of an obsession of mine.

Hopefully by visiting my blog you will hear interesting, and sometimes random, facts that I hope you will all add to. So feel free to read, share and add some tales of your own that may help some fellow cruisers.

I love city break breaks and Christmas markets in particular so you can imagine how much I loved the QM2 cruise in December 2014 to Bruges. We almost bought our weight in chocolate back for Christmas gifts.

bruges

2014 also saw me travel on my first River Cruise and what a fab time I had. Great ships, fantastic cities and the service on board was first class. I would definitely recommend them to anyone.

balcony

All work and no play would make Danielle a very very dull girl, so my life is not all cruise cruise cruise (although sometimes it does seem like it is). What are the things that I get up to in my free time I hear you ask??? Well below are a few photo’s of me enjoying myself in my down time from Work.

Every year we go down the road to Dublin to watch one of the Six Nations games. This year we have tickets for the game against the mighty Welsh and I am hoping it’s going to be the best game yet!! Irish Rugby

Caught here doing my favourite two things, having a weedrink and sitting in New York (your are not seeing things the beer really is green – it was St Paddy’s Day in New York). New York is my favourite city and I can’t wait to go back to it in May. Just a word of warning if you are thinking of going to New York for St Patrick’s Day – the parade is 6 hours long – YES 6 HOURS!!!! They don’t tell you that in the brochure!

Out door or indoor festivals and concerts are a must. I try and squeeze at least one or two a year. As part of the City of Culture 2013 we had the Radio 1 One Big Weekend in Derry in May and I was lucky enough to get tickets. But as with everything else in Ireland we are at the mercy of the weather and can sometimes end up looking a bit strange with all your layers on as we did at the Eminem concert in Bangor below – very fetching!!!

Out door festivals

R1BW

And last but definitely not at the bottom of my list is

David Beckham

Because everyone loves David Beckham, swoon swoon!!!

Qualifications

I firmly believe for my customers to have faith in the information and help I am giving them, I need to be kept up to date on all training courses for as many of the cruise companies that I can. This is important to cruise.co.uk as a whole and we are really focused on continuing our professional development and routinely complete as many training courses as we can. I am going to update this section whenever I complete one of these modules so you can keep up with all my new developments.

CUNARD – Commodore Status (highest level possible)

P&O – Commodore Status (highest level possible)

PRINCESS- Commodore Status (highest level possible)

Viking River Cruises

Fred Olsen Cruises

Ships I have been on

Thomas Cook
Carousel – This was the very first ship I ever set foot on. It was then a mid-size ship, it would almost look like a toy ship compared to the all singing all dancing ships now. I went on a 7 night ‘work’ trip sailing from Barcelona. Although no longer in service was Thomas Cook, it was a great way to get on-board with the idea of cruising.

ROYAL CARIBBEAN: Explorer of the Seas – I spent 11 nights on-board the Explorer of the Seas out of Cape Liberty in New Jersey. We sailed down to the Caribbean in March time after spending 4 fantastic days in New York over St Patricks Day. After all the sightseeing we definitely needed the relaxing cruise to recover

Independence of the Seas– I spent 10 nights on-board the Independence of the Seas and it was the largest ship I had ever been on. It was fantastic. The facilities for families and all of the different dining options were just fantastic. Everyone was taken care of so well, it was hard to think that there was over 4000 passengers.

Celebrity:
Eclipse – I was very privileged to be on the first voyage of the Celebrity Eclipse. It was a three day cruise around Jersey and Guernsey. It was a fantastic opportunity to see the brand new ship, and I fell in love with the day beds on the pool deck. I could imagine myself laying relaxing as it cruised the med. Four days were definitely too short.

MSC:
Fantasia – This one I was a bit apprehensive about. Was it more suited to the European market rather than UK? Would the standard of the ship compare to my last cruise on the Celebrity Eclipse? Would the on-board service be just as good as I had received before? Are the dining options really comparable to my previous cruises? I went with so many questions and got them all answered in the first day. Some yes, some no – but you’ll have to wait to my blog review to get the juicy gossip!!

Places I have visited

I’m a bit of a travel bug and if I don’t have a holiday booked I get really itchy feet, so I have a long list of places I have been to, either for few days or a relaxing fortnight, so they are all listed below. Some of them are ports in the many cruises we offer world wide, so feel free to call me or email if you have any questions on excursions or things to do.