Travel Maven Blog ...... David Molyneaux posts from TheTravelMavens.com

Romance on Oasis of the Seas cruise

Midnight at the Oasis, send your camel to bed. Shadows painting our faces, traces of romance in our heads. Heaven's holding a half moon, shining just for us. Let's slip off to a sand dune, real soon, kick up a little dust.

Or so I was singing (thank you writer David Nichtern), long about midnight, on the amazing new Oasis of the Seas.

Camels? Sand dunes? Dust?

No. But romance was in the salt sea air.

We were sailing off the coast of Florida. Most passengers had returned to their pillows, and the largest cruise ship ever --  a bustling, floating mall of bars, shops, restaurants, and sporty diversions such as a zipline -- grew quieter in the early morning, moonlit shadows, like a big city at rest for a few hours before the tumult of a new day.

Now, finally, the big ship was mine. And I went for a long walk.

CLICK for the rest of the story and pictures from Oasis of the Seas on TheTravelMavens.com

Oasis of the Seas, a Floating Island, says TIME

The $1.4 billion megaship--the largest passenger ship ever made, with room for 6,296 guests--is nearly half again as big as the last biggest cruise ship, RCL's Freedom of the Seas. She's as big as a supertanker or a container ship. Flatten the deck and you could launch F-18s off it. If you were sitting on the 20th floor of a high-rise next to the ship, you'd be able to talk to the sunbathers beside one of the pools.

via www.time.com

This is the best reporting on the cruise business I've read. If you wonder why the cruise industry keeps building huge new ships, such as Royal Caribbean's Oasis of the Seas, read on.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1945368-1,00.html#