Olivia's Cruise Page

Welcome to my Facebook page! My name is Debbie however I am known as Olivia by my colleagues and customers. I thought it may be interesting for you to know a little bit about the person that you are either thinking of, or have already booked their cruise with.

I am extremely fortunate to have visited many interesting countries. My last cruise as a teenager, was on a 3 week Caribbean cruise on P&O’s Oriana (1st model) and it was during this cruise that I decided that I just had to make travel my career. So, I left school, got a job with a lovely independent travel agency who specialised in cruises and long haul, tailor-made holidays, where I stayed for 23 years, until the owner retired. I then worked for a High Street travel agency as assistant manager and cruise specialist for another 3 years, before my partner and I decided that we would like to try something completely different.

I think we shocked all our friends and family, when we told them of our plans to up roots and start a new life in Austria. After lots of visits to the country, doing research on all of the holiday resorts that we visited, we finally made an offer on a house just a few minutes from a lovely ski area right on the borders of Italy and Slovenia. We spent 6 months renovating and converting rooms and loft areas, to enable us to accommodate 24 guests.

We spent a wonderful 6 years running our own ski chalet, but boy, it was hard work! Plus, as the years went by, it got harder and harder to say goodbye to our friends and family, each time they went home after spending a week or two with us. So, in August 2012, we returned to the UK, to be nearer to our 2 children, and our granddaughter who is now 5 years old and our newer addition, Grandson Peter, who will be 2 in 2016.

I introduced my partner to cruising back in 2010 – I should have remembered an old saying that we used to say years ago in my first travel agency: Cruising should come with a government health warning, because once you’ve tried it, you can’t give it up!