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It’s dreary outside and you find yourself dreaming of an escape to the Caribbean. You long for turquoise water and sugar-sand beaches, with plenty of activities to take your mind off work. Cruises offer the perfect smorgasbord of beaches, shopping, scenery, and fun things that you can’t do at home, all served up with a fruity, umbrella-topped beverage. But not every port lives up to the image in your dreams. To help you choose your next cruise itinerary — or rather, figure out which places to avoid — Yahoo Travel did some digging around and found the Caribbean ports with...

Wannabe jihadists are taking cruises to avoid security checks while traveling to Syria and IraqWANNABE jihadi fighters are increasingly booking tickets on cruise ships to join extremists in battle zones in Syria and Iraq, hoping to bypass stepped-up efforts to thwart them in neighboring Turkey, Interpol officials have told The Associated Press. This is one of the reasons why the international police body is preparing to expand a pilot program known as I-Checkit, which airlines use to check passenger information against Interpol’s databases - in hopes that one day the system could expand to include cruise operators, banks, hotels and...

MIAMI (CBSMiami/AP) — A Halloween cruise took a frightening turn as passengers were heading to Florida. The ship hit an unknown object, officials said, forcing it back to port. “All I know is that it just went black. The lights went completely out,” said passenger Sandra Douglas from Houston, Texas. “Then they came on for a second and then they went back out. And then the sirens started and they said this was the real thing. Then we had to go back to our floors to get the instructions and the life preservers and things like that.”

GALVESTON, Texas - A helicopter met up with a cruise ship with a Dallas health care worker aboard who is being monitored for signs of Ebola in order to take a blood sample for testing prior to the ship's arrival Sunday in Galveston. Carnival Cruise Lines released a statement Saturday which read, "Today we were advised by Texas health officials that they felt it was necessary for the health care worker currently on Carnival Magic to submit a blood sample for testing prior to the ship's arrival in Galveston tomorrow morning. As a result, a helicopter rendezvoused with the ship...

It's almost as if the administration is doing everything in its power to spread a panic (come to think of it, when is the last time there was any Ukraine civil war coverage, or ISIS for that matter?). While one of the big Ebola updates overnight, in addition to Obama being open to appointing an Ebola czar - because clearly the CDC is unable to handle the epidemic, best to have one on top of it all -is that some schools in Ohio and Texas are closed today after students’ potential exposure to a nurse with Ebola furthered fears of...

Update on the Texas nurse on the Carnival Magic cruise per Carnival social media updates. First, the nurse is showing no signs of Ebola. Good News. Second, though, Mexico refused the ship docking privileges in Cozumel, so the ship is returning to its home port of Galveston. Carnival is giving on-board credit to the passengers and a discount on a future cruise for their inconvenience, even though it is not Carnival's fault. So Carnival is doing its best to make things good for the passengers.

Reports tonight are that two individuals possibly infected with the Ebola virus are in Belizean waters. Local TV station Channel 7 monitored in the capital City Of Belmopan tonight, reported having credible reports that a couple from a Texas-based cruise ship presently anchored off Belize City, is on a ship tender, unable to return to the cruise ship, while being refused entry to Belize City to catch an air ambulance awaiting at the International Airport to take them to the their country of origin, the U.S.A. The television station in its broadcast tonight said Belize health authorities contacted tonight have...

The Belize coast guard is refusing to allow passengers from a cruise ship to come ashore because it’s carrying a Texas hospital worker who handled a lab specimen from the man who died of Ebola in Dallas, according to news reports from Belize. A White House official confirmed to the Associated Press early Friday morning that that the unnamed Dallas health care worker is on the ship and is “self-quarantined.” But the White House did not identify the country.

An ex-cruise ship worker admitted to a federal judge Monday that he brutally beat, raped and tried to throw a passenger overboard because he believed she insulted his mother. With no plea bargain offered, Ketut Pujayasa, 29, in a Miami federal courtroom changed his plea to guilty on charges of attempted murder and aggravated sexual assault.

Buried on page 40 of the Pentagon’s latest annual report on China’s military power is a brief mention of the YJ-12, a recent addition to China’s portfolio of anti-ship cruise missiles (ASCM). The report notes that, “The new missile provides an increased threat to naval assets, due to its long range and supersonic speeds.” True, but in an understated way. In fact, the YJ-12 is the most dangerous anti-ship missile China has produced thus far, posing an even greater risk to the U.S. Navy’s surface forces in the Western Pacific than the much-discussed DF-21D anti-ship ballistic missile. The arrival of...

Younger females are storming the North American box office to see The Fault in Our Stars, which took in a whopping $26.1 million on Friday for a projected $52 million-plus debut. That's a major victory for Fox 2000, which made the romantic drama for a mere $12 million. ........................................................ Fault in Our Stars is trouncing Tom Cruise's big-budget Edge of Tomorrow, a sci-fi epic that cost Warner Bros. and Village Roadshow at least $178 million to produce. The critically acclaimed Edge of Tomorrow did slightly better than expected at the Friday box office, earning $10.6 million for a possible $30...

The cruise passengers of the future won't have to worry about the wind in their hair whilst on deck, after a new vessel design was announced claiming to be 'the iPhone for the cruise industry'. MSC Cruise's has commissioned two new ships with wind deflectors so that passengers aren't troubled by sea breezes and a promenade deck at sea level so that they can enjoy the feeling of being 'at the seaside' on board. Costing a whopping £1.7billion to develop, the two ships will be smaller and wider than current supervessels, making it easier for them to visit smaller ports...

Norwegian Cruise Line announced it was canceling all future calls to Tunisia on Tuesday, two days after the North African country refused entry to Israeli nationals who were passengers on the Norwegian Jade. “We want to send a strong message to Tunisia and ports around the world that we will not tolerate such random acts of discrimination against our guests,” Norwegian Cruise Line CEO Kevin Sheehan said in a strongly worded statement. “We are outraged by this act and the fact that we were not notified in advance of this practice. We apologize sincerely to our guests who were affected...

A group of passengers suing Carnival Corp. for damages after sailing on the ill-fated Carnival Triumph cruise ship that drifted at sea for days are asking the company to pay $5,000 a month for the rest of their lives for ongoing medical and mental problems. The case stems from the February 2013 incident when a fire broke out in the ship’s engine room during a four-day cruise, leaving the ship without engine power and most of its electricity, forcing passengers to endure human waste running down hallways, limited water supplies, noxious odors and extreme heat. …

Received by email: B'nai Brith Canada has learned from Canadian Jewish tourists aboard a Norwegian Jade cruise ship that Israeli tourists have been denied the right to disembark when the ship dropped anchor at the Port of Tunis, Tunisia. As passengers began preparations to visit the country, Israelis on board were quietly told that they were not welcomed by the Tunisian Government and would have to remain onboard. According to some Jewish passengers no prior notice was issued, either in writing or by public announcement. The cruise line also failed to advise passengers in advance that Israeli tourists would...

Bayonne officials are planning to have several health officials on hand and local emergency services available tomorrow when a Royal Caribbean cruise ship which recently cut its trip short due to a gastrointestinal breakout overseas arrives at the Cape Liberty Cruise Port in Bayonne.

Tom Cruise has never been shy about expressing his beliefs, and in a recent deposition, the actor said he believed acting was as hard as fighting a war. Cruise sat with lawyers to be deposed for his case against Bauer Publishing for stories two of its publications printed following his divorce from Katie Holmes, articles that stated he had "abandoned" his daughter Suri. During the deposition, a lawyer questioned Cruise about remarks his camp had made equating his work and inability to see daughter Suri to fighting in Afghanistan. "That's what it feels like. And certainly on this last movie,...

A fifth U.S. warship steamed toward the eastern Mediterranean on Thursday to join four other cruise missile destroyers poised for strikes on Syria, as U.S. and allied military planning continued for a bombing campaign against Syria. U.S. intelligence agencies, meanwhile, continued to put the finishing touches on an assessment the Obama administration expects will conclusively link Syrian government and military leaders to the deadly nerve agent strike near Damascus Aug. 21. A defense official said the fifth destroyer, the USS Stout, would soon arrive in waters near Syria. The warship is armed with Tomahawk cruise missiles. Other officials familiar with...

BREAKING. @CBSDavidMartin: US naval commander orders warships to move closer to Syria to be ready for possible Cruise missile strike.