Author Archives: Rick Deutsch

ByRick Deutsch

Venice doubles down to stop rude behavior of visitors

We have spoken a lot about Venice.  Read our July blog that focus on moving the gigantic ships away from the islands with berthing at the mainland. Tenders will bring folks over from huge ships.

Step 2 is a beginning of a limit to the number of visitors allowed. Before they put in turnstiles, they are trying to be nice about it. BUT—> Tourists are ruining the place. It’s a cute town – but it’s not Disneyland. The locals are moving out to regain their sanity. At the end of WW2, 175,000 lived there. Today, all but 55,000 have left.

Venice tourist area

28 million tourists visit each year. For comparison, our most popular National Park – Great Smokey drew 11 million.

While you’d think the businesses love it – they do – but the quality of life has gone way down. People stay for a few hours, spend little money, put graffiti on the Rialto Bridge and dump trash like they are at home.  They enter St. Mark’s in flip-flops and hot pants.

City fathers are starting to clamp down. They are promoting rules in 10 languages.

1. It is forbidden to litter or throw refuse in public areas, or places open to the public
2. It is forbidden to be bare-chested or wearing swimwear. Men or women.
3. It is forbidden to leave food wastes anywhere in the city.
4.  Bicycles are forbidden in the City Center.
5. It is forbidden to lie on benches, or stand at any time with camping equipment.

Our recommendation is to get there now – I’ve been 3 times on cruises.  YOU can to. See it while it’s still pseudo pristine.

Drop us a line with your experience if you have been there – or ask us anything about Venice.

ByRick Deutsch

Testimonials do our hearts good. Feedback from clients makes it worthwhile.

We work hard to get our clients up to speed on how to successfully apply to the cruise ship speaker agencies. We offer our series and “intellectual property” for the give-away price of $200. But we continue to take an interest in our graduates. MANY have gone on to land many free cruises.

Some have done up to four a year! Personally, I only want to do two. But when a student sets a goal to be a speaker, it’s hard work. Getting the proper topics and honing your speaking skills takes time. AND the hours/days developing the actual talk. Some graduates do nothing; we don’t give diplomas and the class will not get you a raise at the bus company. They just fade away. Sad.

One of our stellar graduates is Fred Reggie. We worked with him – it was easy as he was open-minded to apply what we were telling him to do.  He originally wanted to give talks on Mardi Gras.  We felt this was too narrow a topic and would not apply worldwide.  He knew his stuff and was deeply involved in putting on the New Orleans Mardi Gras.

But do people really want four talks on that?  I suggested maybe a theme of festivals world-wide.  There are a lot of them and that would work anywhere.

A successful presenter on many ships – Fred Reggie

After spinning our fidget a while, I learned that he knows a LOT about famous crimes and the trials that followed the arrest. Wow – what a winner. He’s now carved out a niche that ships love. He’s filling up his day-timer with trips. FREE for him and his wife.

He recently sent us this testimonial. We’re proud to share it.  Thanks Fred. Join the team of SpeakOnCruises graduates. Hit the high seas.

And a message to our other graduates: jump into the pool. There are a lot of openings – Europe, Caribbean, Australasia and points north.

READ MORE Testimonials

“Rick Deutsch knows the ropes.  With his guidance, I recently landed three incredible Celebrity Cruises for 2018 – Panama Canal, Iberian Peninsula, and Greek Isles/Israel. Engaging Rick and Speak On Cruises was the best decision I ever made to enhance my career as a speaker and expand my world of travel.”

Thanks Fred.