NO LEISURELY CRUISES FOR AMERICANS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 90, Issue 167, 22 July 1946, Page 8

NO LEISURELY CRUISES FOR AMERICANS

New York.- Americans who have been dreaming about a leisurely pleasure cruise to Europe might well forget about it until 1947. So *ay the shipping lines which catered to the tourist trade before the war. There are three reasons why transAtlantic travel remains out of the question. They are: (1) Luxury liners which plied the North Atlantic in peacetime still are fitted for transport of troops, war brides, and refugees—and the end is not in sight. i (2) The U.S. State Department is refusing passports, visas, and accommodations, except to those who 1 can prove urgent, essential business or persona] reasons for travel. (3) There is no assurance that housing or food accommodations may be obtained in the majority of Europe’s famine-stricken countries for months to come. The United States War Shipping Administration has retired the j nation’s largest pre-war shin, the America, but reconversion in time for 1947 summer travel is doubtful. She is in a Newport News shipyard, waiting for material and labour shortages to ease so that luxury furnishings Io accommodate socie 1200 passengers can be installed. A spokesman for the W.S.A. said that at least six months would be required to reconvert other liners, now hauling troops and war brides, after they are retired from Government duty. The Cunard liners Aquitama. Mauretania, and the Queen Mary likewise are catering to passenger lists made up by the British Ministry of Transport. Government officials and others fortunate enough to obtain Space on these ships sleep in the same steel bunks used by thousands of American soldiers en route to war. The waiting list for the Queen Mary exceeds 5000 would-be passengers.