Latest news with #Tauck
Travel Weekly
3 days ago
- Business
- Travel Weekly
No slowing down for river cruising: 2026 looks even better than 2025
River cruise lines say that despite economic uncertainty in the U.S., 2025 bookings remain strong and 2026 is already outpacing this year. Their success, the companies say, is a result of not just demand but smart marketing and adjusting to trends. Viking, which dominates the river industry and captures the market majority, saw $897.1 million in total revenue for the first quarter of 2025, a nearly 25% jump year over year. The line said it has effectively sold out its river capacity for this year, at 95%, and reported 28% of capacity already sold for 2026. With a fleet of about 80 river cruise ships, Viking is off to a "remarkable start" for the year, said chairman and CEO Torstein Hagen during the company's Q1 earnings call on May 20. As the largest river cruise company, and the only public one, Viking's earnings may not be representative of the entire sector. But several smaller, privately held lines said they are also thriving in 2025 and are expecting even better results next year. Tauck said 2026 bookings are pacing nearly 30% ahead of 2025 bookings, Riviera Travel said 2026 river cruise bookings are 42% higher than 2025 bookings were at this time last year, and CroisiEurope said 35% of 2026 capacity is sold out. Also, AmaWaterways, Avalon Waterways and Amadeus River Cruises all said that 2026 bookings were outpacing 2025, which is on track to be their strongest year ever. And while some lines, including Viking, have reported that much of their 2025 capacity was already booked before this year's economic turbulence, Cleveland Research found that bookings for river and luxury ocean cruises had picked up steam in late April and early May. Travel advisor Lisa Fitzgerald of Fitzgerald Travel, an agency that specializes in river and ocean cruising, said river cruise success is due in part to the lines adjusting to uncertainty in the U.S. economy, which is causing her clients not to pull back on bookings but is leading them to more thoughtful spending. Lisa Fitzgerald "The economy isn't stopping travelers from going on vacation, it's simply changing how they spend," Fitzgerald said. "River cruise lines are tuned into this and are adjusting with thoughtful promotions to attract both repeat guests and first-timers." She also credited lines for reacting to trends and "not standing still" by adding new itineraries and enhancing experiences, both on and off the ship. For example, she said, clients have inquired about shoulder season departures as they watch "where every dollar goes." Observing this trend and seeing a boom in demand, Avalon Waterways added more Christmas market sailings and harvest-time cruises for the offseason, said president Pam Hoffee. Avalon is on pace for a record-breaking 2025, and 2026 is "off to an exceptionally strong start," with bookings trending ahead of this time last year, according to Hoffee. AmaWaterways says 2026 sales are pacing double digits ahead of 2025. Pictured, the new AmaSintra in Portugal. Photo Credit: AmaWaterways Riviera is generating success by focusing on niche markets, such as amplifying its efforts to attract solo cruisers by waiving single supplement fees. This segment has grown "significantly," said Stuart Milan, Riviera's North America president, even outpacing traditional bookings. Amadeus is on track for this year to be its strongest yet, a spokesperson said, and early signs point to 2026 "being a banner year" and outpacing 2025. Amadeus' gains are in part tied to intentional efforts by the line to bring in industry veterans, invest in the travel advisor channel and amp up its marketing efforts, the spokesperson said. AmaWaterways chief sales officer Alex Pinelo said at the 2025 ASTA Travel Advisor Conference in Salt Lake City that the market is "at an all-time high." Last year marked the brand's best year on record, he added, and by the second week of 2025, the company's sales had already passed 2024 year over year. Looking ahead, 2026 sales are pacing "double digits" ahead of 2025, he said, and future demand will be met with 10 new ships being added to its fleet by 2027. Pinelo touted traveler desire to visit rivers outside of Europe -- like the Nile in Egypt, the Mekong in Vietnam and, most recently, the Magdalena in Colombia -- as one of the ways AmaWaterways has found success. Cleveland Research said these three rivers "are key itineraries to watch." Tauck reported "enjoying a very, very strong year across our entire river cruising portfolio," a spokesperson said. Tauck said it is "virtually sold out" for this year, with 2026 bookings pacing nearly 30% ahead of 2025 bookings year over year. CroisiEurope said it has seen similar numbers to Viking, with 90% of its 2025 capacity sold out and 35% of 2026 capacity booked.
Travel Weekly
4 days ago
- Business
- Travel Weekly
Tauck will offer glamping in the American West in 2026
Tauck will expand its North American land tours next year with a new collection of itineraries in the West, offering glamping for the first time. Guests booking Paradise Valley, Yellowstone & the Tetons will spend two nights glamping at Under Canvas West Yellowstone, which features safari-like tents near Yellowstone's west entrance. The eight-day trip starts in Paradise Valley in Montana and ends in Grand Teton National Park. The eight-day Wild, Wild West Family Adventure, which is part of Tauck's collection of itineraries for families, will include a three-night stay at ULUM Moab, an outdoor resort with suite-style tents that have king-size beds outfitted with heated mattress pads and Parachute brand linens. Western Horizons: Mesa Verde to Moab includes one night at Far View Lodge inside Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado. The new trip marks Tauck's return to Mesa Verde for the first time in more than 10 years. Highlights include riding the historic Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad and visiting Durango's hot springs over the course of nine days. Tauck CEO Jennifer Tombaugh said, "For 2026, we're thrilled to raise the bar and feature some truly fun and unique accommodations to help our guests connect more deeply to the places we visit." Tauck will offer stays at Under Canvas Yellowstone in 2026. Photo Credit: Tauck New tours in Mexico and Nova Scotia Tauck also is introducing Mexico City and Oaxaca, an eight-day trip that explores Mexico's history, art and cuisine. Itinerary highlights include a private visit at Frida Kahlo's Casa Azul, a trip to Teotihuacan's pyramids and visiting Xochimilco's floating gardens. A Week In … Nova Scotia will take travelers on an eight-day journey of the seaside Canadian province, including visits to Lunenburg and Baddeck and a whale-watching cruise on the Bay of Fundy. Tauck will operate 29 itineraries in North America next year, including four designed for families. The brand is expanding its Small Group journeys, which average 24 guests, and Even Smaller Group trips, which average 15 guests.
Boston Globe
20-03-2025
- Business
- Boston Globe
Vintage cars and vibrant culture: Inside a Cuba tour for US travelers
Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Having enjoyed a European tour with the company several years ago, from Prague to Vienna and Budapest, we were eager to try its Havana-based trip. And now, back home in Hingham, we find ourselves happily reliving our Cuban experience. Advertisement Our tour started in Miami. After a night in an airport-area hotel, we got to know others among the two-dozen passport-and-visa-bearing Tauck customers ready to make American Airlines' brief Havana flight. Also on our flight were many Cuban Americans, who can freely visit the island to bring supplies to family members there. (Cuba's economy continues to struggle, for a variety of reasons.) Once on the island, we boarded the coach our group would use throughout our visit, and met Cuban-based guide Hector, who would also serve at times as translator. On the trip's overall agenda were programs with community educational and arts organizations, an architectural walking tour, visits to an art studio, museums, historic sites, and a day-long trip to the island's scenic western province, known especially for its tobacco-growing. (Our Tauck tour director, Laura Nunez, advised that past Tauck trips had included stops in eastern Cuba, and said the company hopes to return there as economic conditions in that region improve.) Day One in Havana featured a delightful lunch at Cocina de Lilliam — a long-established 'paladar,' as the city's privately-owned, family-style restaurants are called. Our tour included nearly all meals, primarily at paladars, where the service is generally family-style. Featured were a variety of local fish and lobster, along with pork, chicken, and beef dishes. A dinner one evening was at La Esperanza paladar, occupying the first floor of a beautiful Cuban home where the owner lives upstairs. In both paladars and restaurants, live music featuring Cuban styles and rhythms kept us immersed in the rich culture of the island nation. Advertisement Roy Harris (green shirt) admiring architecture in Old Havana. Eileen McIntyre As we drove through Havana, heading for the hotel that would be our main base, we were struck by the many buildings with severely deteriorated facades, outnumbering well-kept-up structures on some city streets. (Access to imported materials, along with the economic conditions, make building-maintenance challenging.) Over the next several days we'd visit neighborhoods that included the sites of diplomatic embassies, and the 'Old Havana' historic area. While those areas were very well-maintained — we found them the exception. Our group stayed in Havana's Hotel Parque Central — a Hilton prior to 1959 — which is again privately owned and comfortably met our needs. (Tauck chose it both because it was not on the blacklist of hotels and other Cuban institutions maintained by the US State Department, and because it had a reliable generator to deal with rolling blackouts that are part of Cuban life — because of challenges in importing fuel for the generation of electricity.) Immediately catching our eye on the streets of Havana — and from our hotel's view — were the many vintage cars, mostly mid-20th-century American models, for which the country is famous. Hector explained that while importing more-modern cars is now allowed, most Cubans cannot yet afford them. An early visit on our tour was to a privately-owned auto-restoration business, where two near-mint-condition old American cars were on display. The owner, Raymond, proudly operates his business in a garage once operated by his grandfather. He also mentors car owners belonging to an antique-auto club. Such cars are often known as 'Frankensteins,' we learned, because of the variety of parts under the hood that keep them running. Advertisement 'We'll take this one!' The authors with a vintage car. Courtesy photo While our trip touched on expected topics associated with Cuba — like cigars, rum, salsa dancing, baseball, and Ernest Hemingway's time on the island — we were most touched by the hours we enjoyed at intimate programs involving community and cultural organizations. Among them: BEYOND ROOTS, a center for the Afro-Cuban community, where we learned about the importance of Santeria, a Cuban form of an African religion, in the country's culture; and HAVANA COMPAS DANCE, a dance company that mixes Cuban and contemporary dance rhythms with flamenco and other Spanish dance styles, and percussion drawing on the island's African traditions. We also came to appreciate important 20th-century Cuban artists at the beautiful galleries of Havana's National Museum of Fine Arts. And history came alive as we walked around Revolutionary Square — imagining the large crowds that once stood for hours to hear Fidel Castro. A walking tour of Old Havana, guided by a local architect, covered key aspects of the island's history as a Spanish colony, as well as the important restoration work on historic structures begun after a 1982 Heritage Law was passed. Because of Roy's ancestral history with tobacco farming in Colonial Virginia, we found our visit to western Cuba's rich agricultural Vinales valley, in the Pinar Del Rio province, of particularly interest. The beautiful valley — a UNESCO World Heritage site — is surrounded by stunning, rounded limestone hills, called mogotes. At a piece-work factory we saw how tobacco leaves are manually sorted, with the most-perfect leaves saved for use as outer wrappers of cigars, while less-perfect leaves are used for inner cigar portions. Broken or partial leaves get set aside for use in cigarettes. From a farm owner who showed us how to hand-roll a cigar, we learned that the tobacco season runs from seedbed in October to harvesting and processing in March. Farmers, we were told, are required to sell 90 percent of the tobacco they grow to the government. Advertisement Ernest Hemingway's Finca Vigia home. Roy Harris and Eileen McIntyre Another highlight: Hemingway's Finca Vigia home, about a half-hour drive from Havana. As the two of us years ago had toured the late author's home in Key West, Fla., we were pleased to learn about his life in Cuba — with rooms on view 'just as Hemingway left them,' the docent told us. Our time in Cuba touched us deeply and taught us much. And it also offered moments of exhilaration — including the fun we had being driven in vintage convertibles through the Havana Forest and along the coastline. If you go . . . Both a Cuban visa, and local medical-insurance, are required — along with a signed US affidavit regarding the 'People to People' nature of your visit. (A tour company like Tauck likely will handle such logistics, along with booking the flights and hotel.) Check on additional vaccinations you may want to get. (We visited a travel clinic for these, though they were not required to enter Cuba.) Depending on the time of year and your itinerary, you may want to bring mosquito spray, as Cuba and some other Caribbean nations have seen an increase in dengue fever. Visitors, as well as the Cuban people, can freely access the internet, but US telecommunications companies do not have direct service in Cuba for phone or text. The all-inclusive Tauck tour we booked has a current price of $5,990 per person. Finally, be aware that Americans are not allowed to bring back any Cuban cigars or rum. Roy Harris, a retired journalist who spent 24 years with The Wall Street Journal, is the author of Pulitzer's Gold: A Century of Public Service Journalism. His wife, Eileen McIntyre, a local history buff, is a retired corporate communications executive.
