Courtesy Carnival Cruise Line

On July 1, Carnival Cruise Lines announced that it had become the first cruise line to attract 1 million fans to its Facebook page. Almost 300,000 fans apparently decided to like Carnival during May and June alone, emphasizing the growing power of social media.

Facebook also played a significant role in the May 1 Venice, Italy, inaugural of the new Carnival Magic as a daylong social media event employed a series of 11 videos to review the ship’s launch and naming and provide viewers with full coverage of the day’s festivities. The 3,690-passenger Carnival Magic is now employed in a series of seven- to 12-day Mediterranean sailings from Barcelona, calling at other ports in Spain and in France, Monaco, Italy, and Croatia.

This fall, the ship will be repositioned to Galveston, Texas, to assume a schedule of seven-day cruises on Nov. 14 to Cozumel, Mexico; Grand Cayman; and Montego Bay, Jamaica, with occasional alternate programs featuring such ports as Key West, Fla.; Nassau and Freeport, the Bahamas;, Belize; and Mahogany Bay, Isla Roatan, Honduras. Not only will Carnival Magic be the largest ship ever to have its home port in Galveston, but group leaders in Midwestern and south-central states will now have an opportunity to plan cruises aboard a brand-new, state-of the-art vessel without the need for a trip to Florida or the East Coast.

Year-round from New York City
In related news, sister ship Carnival Miracle will begin a year-round series of eight-day cruises from New York City in April. Eastern Caribbean and Bahamas sailings will alternate from April through November, and a Bahamas-Florida itinerary will be featured from November through April. Those will constitute the line’s first year-round program from the “Big Apple.”

Carnival’s next addition to its fleet, the 130,000-ton Carnival Breeze, is scheduled to enter service in June 2012. After a summer of 12-day Mediterranean voyages, similar to those now offered by Carnival Magic, the vessel will head for Miami and a series of year-round six- and eight-day Caribbean departures.

Those who have cruised on Carnival previously will be familiar with the whimsical “towel animals” that greet guests as they return to their staterooms each evening. The line has now published its fourth edition of “Towel Creations,” filled with step-by-step instructions for making 40 different towel animals at home, everything from frogs, swans and elephants to monkeys, scorpions and rabbits.

One dollar from the sale of each $14.95 book will be donated to the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital through Carnival’s Care to Play program, which has a goal of raising $3 million over a three-year period.

And finally, effective Dec. 1, smoking will be banned in all Carnival cruise line cabins. Guests with a tobacco habit will still be able to light up on most balconies and in designated public areas.

www.carnival.com