• 6 min de lectura
• 6 min de lectura
Fiona Noone, marine planning and port operations manager, Marella Cruises, shares her cruise industry firsts.
June 8, 2026
Hmm, I don't know if it was my first 'sight' of a cruise ship, but it's certainly my first recollection of looking at a cruise ship and considering it – or in this case, dismissing it as a future career path. I was in my early 20s, still trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. After working seasonally on sailing yachts for a few years, I was helping the Tall Ships Youth Trust deliver a yacht to the Canaries, but the weather through the Bay of Biscay was so foul (mid-January) that, due to time constraints, we only made it to Lisbon. The skipper had been talking to me about career options as a navigational officer and mentioned the Merchant Navy while we were looking over at a cruise ship. At the time, I didn't realise cruise ships were part of the Merchant Navy; I naively thought it was just cargo ships, so didn't think any more on the matter. It was only later, when I googled 'jobs at sea', that a post appeared on joining the Merchant Navy as a cadet, showing all the possible ships you could work on, that I realised the skipper had introduced me to a new world on the water.
Coincidentally, when I joined my first cruise ship as a deck cadet in the Canaries, while ashore enjoying a couple of hours 'off' and trying to grab a glimpse of the Six Nations Rugby on a TV outside a bar, I bumped into that same skipper (while he was jumping up and down cheering for Ireland). I reminded him of our conversation the year previous, for which a friend of his found it hilarious that I had taken career advice off a 'drunken sailor.'
I joined Island Escape as a deck cadet with Thomson Cruises, and it was straight into the deep end – or should I say the top end. I flew to Tenerife in the evening and, after an initial safety brief, went to the bridge for departure, in the dark. It felt like I was on a spaceship with all these coloured lights and buttons on the consoles, looking through so many windows at all the little lights outside. It felt alien – or should I say I felt like the alien – but as the days and weeks went on, I soon became accustomed to working in the dark, listening to every radio message and fitting into the routines of ship life.
I worked hard throughout my cadetship, spending the majority of my sea time on Thomson ships, and was very proud to be awarded the John Milner Navigation award in 2012, which still sits pride of place on my shelf. Although I moved to other companies to gain experience on different ships, I came back into the fold of TUI, rebranded as Marella Cruises in 2018, where I began my shoreside career planning itineraries and port operations.
I am lucky enough to visit our ships fairly often to discuss future itineraries and review past seasons, so I get a 'snippet' of what our passengers experience every time I'm onboard. However, I was able to do a last-minute cruise to the fjords with my mum not long after I moved shoreside. Given her age and mobility issues, it was perfect that we were able to board in Southampton and set sail for the Baltics. Marella/Thomson has been able to retain many of its wonderful crew over the years, which was wonderful to see given I was now working in the head office and was recognised by lots of the crew from when I had been a cadet. All those years since I had first joined Island Escape showed me how Marella is a fantastic family where people stay because they enjoy what they do.
I have worked with many inspirational people up to now, but one captain sticks in my memory for a few reasons – firstly for 'handing me the ship' as a newly qualified officer, to hold steady as we queued behind the other cruise ships and ferries to get into Piraeus. Unfortunately for us, we were at the back of that queue, which made everyone rather hungry for breakfast, so I held the fort while they had sausage and egg muffins. I felt a lot of pressure to keep the ship in the 'right' position, keeping our place in the traffic, and was rewarded with a slightly colder but still tasty breakfast muffin.
The bigger reward was the responsibility I had been given and the confidence it gave me. This same captain became my 'boss' when I moved ashore and was always a font of knowledge, but most importantly, no matter how busy he was, he always made time – just as he had when we were at sea – to answer my questions and listen to me. It's something I have valued immensely and try to do the same: listening to people and giving them your attention no matter what else is happening.
Hamburg 2019 was a full-on, eye-opening experience of just how big and small this industry is. Big in that there are so many ports and tour operators to meet/learn about, but small in that the people that represent those destinations become so familiar because of the number of emails and calls you have made to them over time to make the operation work – it's like meeting up with your old friends again. I enjoy all the Seatrade conferences I attend because it really is like meeting up with my friends, obviously to talk business, but alongside these talks we connect about families, hobbies, interests, and I am always touched by people remembering small details we have shared in the past. It highlights how closely connected we are as an industry.
Fuente: sea-trade cruise
