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Tips: Cruise dinner conversation starters

Formal diners

Let’s create the scenario. You’re on a cruise by yourself or with a travel pal, both hoping to meet someone new and interesting. Tonight you’re all spiffed up and looking your absolute best for the main dress-up dinner, so this may be your opportunity.

You’re assigned to a table of ten, and you’re in luck. The person sitting next to you is very good-looking, about your age, so you cleverly come up with sparkling questions, all great conversation starters.

1. Is this your first cruise? This can get some reaction, especially if that person is actually on a first cruise. You can now reveal all of your great knowledge of cruising. Even if this is your first cruise, too, you’ve studied up so you can be an authority on features of the ship, entertainment schedule, spa, pool, best places for food and booze, and which shore excursion is the very best.

2. What’s your hometown? Whatever town your soon-to-be-friend names, you have something pleasant to say about it. For example: Oh, so you’re from Lancaster, Pa. I’ve been there many times. Love the pretzels and family-style restaurants. New York City? I go there every year for the Rockettes show at Radio City. If the answer is Newark or Cleveland, you’ll have to think hard, but clever you will come up with something nice to say about any hometown.

Travel industry hurting, so prices should drop

Las Vegas skyline with caption

Vegas may be in the most financial pain

The hotel industry is in what one executive calls a “survival mode”. A major hotel in Las Vegas shuts down. Average nightly hotel occupancy throughout the U.S. this year is close to 70%, and 50% or less in Vegas. This could be the worst hotel occupancy year since the Great Depression.

What can we frequent travelers do about it? Many of us are seniors, and the economy hasn’t affected our travel plans too much. If pension and Social Security checks keep coming in, we’ll still do our annual cruise, summer week at a beachside resort and occasional visit to Sin City.

Corporate travelers still must meet sales needs of their companies and attend conventions and seminars. However, with the growth of video conferencing and other instant electronic communications, for sales reps to be on the road and annually in Vegas has been greatly reduced in recent years. Anyhow, business travel budgets are tight and getting tighter all the time.

What can seasoned travelers do about it? First, consider how you can help the travel industry by not cutting back on your schedules. If it means staying at cheaper hotels and flying coach, do it. You’ll know you’re supporting an important business sector of the American economy. Further, if you know the hotel, resort or cruise where you’re booking is only half-filled, and a price is quoted, say our magic words: I know you can do better than that.

Tips: How to save money in Las Vegas

Las Vegas hotel

The Paris Resort in Las Vegas lights up the night sky

Some people who've been there too many times may advise that the best way to save money on a Las Vegas vacation is to stay home. After all, the primary reason Sin City exists is to induce people to come and lose money on the gambling tables and slot machines in the casinos. However, that said, and if you keep it in mind when you visit, there are a great many ways to have a very enjoyable, inexpensive vacation in Las Vegas. Here are some tips:

1. Las Vegas hotels, including the most luxurious ones on the famous Strip, are considerably lower-priced than those in almost any other similar-quality resort or major city in the world. While a luxurious suite at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas charges $100 a night, a suite in any upper-level New York, London, Paris or Tokyo hotel costs at least $400. At almost any time of the year, if you check internet ads and with a travel agency, many of the less posh, but just as comfortable, Las Vegas hotels have specials offering rooms for $50 or less a night.