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LIFESTYLE:
CRUISES
High
Water Point
Wanderlust
has a new ring to it. It's the sea and the sun and cruise companies are
offering irresistible deals to attract Indians.
By
Natasha Israni
Gita
Murti is an enthusiastic vacationer. Hill stations, beach resorts, wildlife
sanctuaries, heritage sites- she's been there, seen it all. And never
got tired of it. Till three years ago when she agreed to go on a cruise
at a friend's insistence. The experience left her breathless. "It
was an experience of a lifetime," gushes the 30-something Murti.
What started as an experiment is now a "must-have" holiday for
her.
Murti isn't
the only one bitten by the cruising bug. The idea of sailing in a luxurious
moving city and seeing new lands has caught the imagination of many Indians.
As a senior executive from the cruising industry puts it, "The desis
have finally been hooked." And it isn't just the Ambanis or the Godrejs
who are taking these trips. Upper middle-class Indians with larger disposable
incomes and a desire to "live it up" are increasingly figuring
in the passenger list.
Gautam Chadha,
CEO of Discover the World Marketing (DWM), the Mumbai-based Indian arm
of the Royal Caribbean International, an internationally renowned cruise
company, says the profile of the typical passenger has changed tremendously
in the past decade. "When we started operations in India in 1994
the Indian cruiser was typically the British Airways frequent flier or
an American Express card holder ... confident individuals whose needs
were similar to any foreign tourist." In the first year, DWM found
only 197 passengers in India. But as incomes rose so did the aspirations
of upwardly mobile middle-class India. And a cruise gradually became an
important part of the holiday itinerary. DWM has handled 20,000 passengers
since then.
The potential
demand has encouraged cruise companies to focus on India, a market they
had ignored till now. Recently, Royal Caribbean decided to bring one of
its opulent liners to Mumbai. On December 15, the Legend of the Seas docked
in Mumbai port, the largest cruise liner ever to have docked there. It
had a 200-capacity casino, an 800-seat theatre, swimming pools, a sports
deck with a jogging track, an 18-hole mini golf course, a fitness centre
with a spa, a luxury lounge with a panoramic view, a video game arcade-there
was something for everyone. Over 2,000 passengers got on board for an
incomparable experience. And the price: Rs 4,560 a night for an inside
state room. Says Ritu Nanda, a regular cruiser who came to see off her
brother on his honeymoon: "It's the best holiday you can ever have.
You can do so much on these six-star floating hotels."
But just
like the MacAloo burger, the cruises are being tailored to suit Indian
tastes-and their not-so-deep pockets. If you can't afford the week-long
cruise to Alaska or the Bahamas which costs almost Rs 1 lakh, take a three-day
trip to Singapore and Bangkok for less than Rs 15,000. The destination
is not always the Caribbean or the Mediterranean but closer home in the
Indian Ocean and South-East Asian ports.
While Royal
Caribbean has only recently started looking towards developing special
Asian itineraries, it is really Star Cruises that has focused sharply
on the Asian traveller. Food is a crucial factor and the availability
of purely vegetarian food-especially aimed at the Jain community-contributes
to the popularity of liners like the SuperStar Virgo. Last year,
23,000 Indians travelled with Star Cruises. Another company, Indian Ocean
Cruise Line (IOCL), is concentrating on the Indian Ocean and offers 22
cruise options within South-East Asia including the Maldives, Andamans,
Lakshadweep, Singapore and coastal India. The first to offer cruise holidays
from India, IOCL hopes to make cruising in warm weather climes popular
in the winters. Cruise Vacations (India) Pvt Ltd also provides customised
cruise packages.
Seeing the
growing popularity of cruise vacations, large travel agencies like Cox
& Kings, Raj Travels and Thomas Cook have also entered the market
with a variety of cruise packages on offer. Says Sunil Gupta, head of
the leisure travel division of Thomas Cook India Ltd: "As the outbound
holiday market in India has been growing, so has the demand for cruises."
In 1999, an estimated 3.6 million Indians went on holidays and even if
a small fraction of these chose the oceans, it would still account for
a fair amount of cruising. In fact, Raj Travels claims that its revenue
from cruises has been over Rs 1 crore since 1998 and that this is growing
at 10 per cent a year.
But there
are several obstacles before this rising tide. Port infrastructure in
India is pathetically underdeveloped. In fact, many large shipping companies
prefer to avoid Indian ports for precisely this reason. Also, flights
to and from India are often tricky which is a major problem for the tourism
industry. Besides, Indian laws prohibit ships registered in a foreign
country from picking and dropping passengers between Indian ports.
But there
is hope yet. Increasingly, Indian companies are getting into the business
and many of them are focusing on the beautiful coastline of India. With
luck, Indians wanting to have a Titanic experience may be able
to do so when luxury liners like the Crystal Symphony, Aurora, Silver
Wind and Seabourn Sun drop anchor in an Indian port in 2002.
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