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Re: Cruises with ballroom dancing
Posted by belleofyourball
4/25/2010  12:42:00 PM
Costa cruise line is supposed to be having a cruise specifically for ballroom dancers sometime this year. I think you could contact them for more information.
Re: Cruises with ballroom dancing
Posted by Peter
5/20/2010  1:23:00 PM
Hey guys so how do you apply for the cruise ship dance instructor job, what I mean is do youl ike need an agent or you can do it somewhere? Reason I am asking I am not from USA si its kinda new for me :) Thanks for any info on that
Re: Cruises with ballroom dancing
Posted by dougbeards
9/1/2010  3:29:00 PM
Peter,
WE got connected with a travel agent who books dance groups on cruises through someone who had been on the cruise and suggested we contact the agent. She then booked us to go with her cruise and liked us enough that she has booked another cruise for us this year. We work for the travel agent and not the cruise line. However, the pay is free air fare and a cruise. We can make extra money by selling private lessons to the group. We are in need of additional hosts for a cruise Nov 28 - Dec 5. Hosts pay their own travel to Ft. Lauderdale but get the cruise free. It would be a good way to break in to the business. Contact me at dougbeards@gmail.com if you would like to explore this opportunity more. Thanks.
Re: Cruises with ballroom dancing
Posted by suzanne
12/1/2011  11:41:00 AM
Do not go to the agents who charge you to teach for them. You don't end up getting paid and you don't end up even getting your cruise free, by the time you pay them around 60 dollars a night for your cabin...,create your own agency. You won't get as many gigs, but the ones you do will be free! besides, the agents expect you to jump when they call you last min. very disorganized and things change at the last second. Sometimes you can be scheduled and they will rip the cruise away from you at the last min. Other times, out of nowhere, the agent gets dropped by a line and all the cruises you are scheduled to teach on, are cancelled. Do your own promoting and placing.,,you will be happier.
Re: Cruises with ballroom dancing
Posted by nloftofan1
7/18/2010  10:36:00 AM
We have cruised on both Royal Caribbean and Princess. Both have several lounges, etc., where you can dance, with a variety of music styles. (Sometimes the best music is in the place least well suited to dancing.) There are usually also some dance classes. Don't forget: Their mission is to start with absolute beginners and get them to DO SOMETHING on the dance floor right away. Don't expect more unless you are on a dance cruise. On one cruise we took, instead of hiring an outside instructor the cruise line had two of the professional dancers from the onboard shows teach the classes. They did a good job.
Re: Cruises with ballroom dancing
Posted by hanow
9/8/2010  11:14:00 PM
Dancing is my passion and I've done several cruises where I was a dance host. I've also cruised with groups of 50- 60 or more dancers from my favorite Florida ballroom studio.

Costa Lines has several ships sailing out of Ft. Lauderdale that ballroom dancers love--the Magica, Atlanta, Fortuna, Mediteranea, among those I've enjoyed. Each has unusually large main ballroom(s) and several excellent live music groups onboard. These musicians also entertain at several other venues onboard with wood dance floors (a caberet, latin lounge, piano bar). There is a disco, too (which we try to avoid).

I've heard more than a few dancers grumble that Costa should try to improve the quality of their food and dining room service. Holland American gets thumbs up there, but their "dam" ship's ceramic-surfaced dance floors are so small that, unless they're skilled dancers, 6 or 8 couples ends to overwhelm the space.

Re: Cruises with ballroom dancing
Posted by nloftofan1
12/5/2011  12:14:00 PM
All cruise ships I've been on have bands and places to dance (though the "dance floor" close to the best band may be marble). Some also have instructors. On one cruise the instructors were professional dancers from the show troupe; they did a good job. But remember the time constraints. The instructor tries to teach you something today you can do tonight. For more, you may need to arrange private lessons.
Re: Cruises with ballroom dancing
Posted by Roland Org
8/6/2013  10:04:00 AM
Hello:
My wife and I have been doing ballroom dancing for 30 years and tried most of the cruise ships that come to our town (San Diego) If we want to take a cruise from the East Coast, then Royal Caribbean has started to advertise that they are now offering Dancing at Sea cruises from Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
They seem to have a brass orchestra (brass is not generally good for ballroom dancing, particularly when it replaces wind/string instruments. If it is used with mutes or only occasionally, it is tolerable. But we don't like Royal Caribbean food, service, and care of passengers in general. The best cruise lines we found, 5 stars, are Holland-American. Cunard ships are good too, but expensive and only sail across the Atlantic to English or formerly English ports.
Holland American has some two or three member groups, who play some requests, but only of voyages of 14 days or more. There are also clubs, like "Dancers at Sea" and a few others, but they seem to want people,[who can probably dance better than they can] to take lessons from them on the ship. On the Holland American ship "Zaandam" they provided a DJ who only had hip-hop music and no dance floor. Not appropriate for older people (over 20.
I was so disgusted with the Bryant club from Phoenix that I flew home from Mexico as soon as the ship docked.
We took Princess Sapphire to Alaska from Seattle and they had the "Dancers at Sea" club giving lessons on the dance floor. They provide partners if you are single and want to dance. It was tolerable but not good. Brassy and no requests.
The best cruiselines for ballroom dancing, with a good uncrowded dance floor, and without noisy brass, we discovered is the Cunard and Celebrity ships. We took the Celebrity Century from San Diego to Hawaii a year ago, and they had 3 dance orchestras. Small, but very experiences and accomodating. The Filipino group,called: "Cielo" had an excellent singer, took nearly all requests, and even looked up "Never on Sunday" for me. They also played any latin favorites, and had tables with restaurant and bar service at tables next to the dance floor.
Re: Cruises with ballroom dancing
Posted by Terry Walker
9/14/2014  3:20:00 AM
I recently had my first cruise with the Fred Olsen line from the UK having previously been a P & O cruiser. On the latter their dance areas are very small and they do not provide dance hosts for the benefit of single passengers.
On Fred Olsen I found the dance floor about twice the size,even for such a small ship ( about 850 passengers) and they had 1 lady & 3 gents hosts. Each evening at 7.30pm, after 1st sitting, the resident orchestra played ballroom music for 45 minutes before the first show after which there was a further 45 minutes dancing to records. I am 82 & still love ballroom dancing and find it keeps me very fit. Being able to dance with a good partner made the holiday so enjoyable for me as a widower & I have booked 2 cruises for 2015.I have created a CD of my favourite ballroom music in the hope that they will use it on my voyage to Tenerife in the New Year.
Re: Cruises with ballroom dancing
Posted by pakarinen
9/15/2014  3:06:00 PM
My wife and I sailed on the Crown Princess two years ago with one of the ballroom cruise providers. Although there was no provision made for private ballroom dancing per se, a subgroup of us "took over" one of the lounges in the evenings. There was a quintet playing there after dinner who played nothing but ballroom once they saw there was a group of serious dancers who appreciated and actually danced to ballroom music. The floor was rather small but adequate if you kept your traveling in check.

Unfortunately, so many passengers came down with norovirus that the cruise was cut short and we returned to Lauderdale 3 days early after sailing almost to South America with no stops. (See "Princess Noro-Cruise to Nowhere" on cruise boards.)

Princess did give us a full refund and paid our airfare home, but that was our last cruise. It's not worth the risk to us of having a pricey vacation ruined being trapped at sea while our fellow passengers are vomiting in the hallways. And in the elevators. It can happen on land too, but there you can at least crawl to the beach to die.

The saving grace of the cruise was the dancing. Although one instructor got sick and we didn't see her at all after the second day, the remaining instructor was outstanding and he made up for a lot of the hassle.

Your experience may vary, of course...
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