Welcome to the Royal Caribbean Blog podcast, a weekly look into the world of Royal Caribbean cruising.

I'm your host, Matt Hodgeberg, and this is episode number 306.

Believe it or not, there's a lot of people out there that love cruising so much that it has changed their lives.

I certainly fall into this category, having started Royal Caribbean Blog as a result of falling in love with a cruise vacation.

And this week, we get to chat with someone that literally wrote the book on how a cruise can change your life.

Author Paul Thornton recently wrote a book that looks at bloggers, influencers, godmothers,

and everyone else in between that has had part or all of their lives shaped by cruising.

Here we go.

You know, we all go on cruises for different reasons.

I think we all started cruising for very different reasons,

and we continue to cruise for even other varied reasons.

And today's guest actually got to think about why.

Tried to get, dig into the why behind the how and the whatnot.

And it's actually joining me on today's show is Paul Thornton, who's the author of

The Joy of Cruising, Passionate Cruiser's Fascinating Stories.

And Paul interviewed a number of people in and around the cruise industry, including

myself. I am prominently featured ahead of Scott Sanders. So thank you very much. Paul,

welcome to the show. I'm glad to be here. Well, it's a pleasure to have you in here. And

this was a really interesting book. I know you approached me with this. When did you start this project?

It's been a while.

Well, I started, I guess my first words were put to paper in March of 18.

I had booked a cruise for Christmas of 18. I booked it right for Christmas of 18.

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