Poop Decks and Gimcrackery, Revisited
Extinguishing the flickering embers of the Monterey Bay cruise ship controversy, once and for all
By Joe Livernois
The debate about cruise ships on the Monterey Bay appears to be a thing of the past, but I’d like to put a fork in it for the record.
The controversy ended after the Monterey City Council voted in February to stop operating the tenders that shuttled tourists from the ships to the shore. So now ship operators will be forced to toss their customers into the water with life preservers and waterproof maps if they insist on including Monterey as a land excursion.
More important, the council decision sent a message that cruise ship operators have no business here, that they are as welcomed as chowder bowls at a five-star restaurant. As expected, representatives from the region’s hospitality industry and the multinational cruise ship empire expressed bitter disappointment. Cruise ship customers drop serious coin while in port, and the local hospitality industry says Monterey is missing the boat. So to speak.
I was ambivalent about cruise ships in Monterey for many years. I didn’t mind seeing big boats out there; they looked sort of grand out there. On the other hand, I understand why folks might think they’re a menace to the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. It didn’t help when one of the first big cruise ships allowed to drop anchor off Monterey many years ago dumped its load of human sewage into the bay. Aside from the gasping alarm from the cruise ship alarmists, I recall a lot of poop-deck jokes.
(Personally, I wasn’t all that alarmed. Have you ever witnessed the excremental output of Monterey’s resident sea lions? I’ll bet it wouldn’t take more than a handful of healthy adult sea lions to out-crap an entire 600-passenger cruise ship in a single day. And sea lions dispense their poop directly into the pristine waters of Monterey Bay.)
Critics also point out that cruise ships encourage merchants of schlock, brokers of cheap trinkets and purveyors of mediocre seafood. Because, as well all know, cruise ship tourists are enthusiastic consumers of shlock and bad fish. The critics believe that the last thing Monterey needs is more gimcrackery, and I mention this only because the word “gimcrackery” isn’t used often enough.
So while the cruise ship controversy is history, the staff and management at Monterey Neighbors & Friends believed it was important to learn first-hand how the city might benefit from a cruise ship infusion. The City Council has made its decision, but you never know; the hospitality industry might someday manage to get their pawns elected to the City Council and the whole thing might be a thing again.
Even during its peak, the tourist ships appeared on Monterey Bay waters maybe once or twice a month, the proverbial camel’s nose under the tent. But what if they showed up more often, like every day or two?
Someone had to do the research and it might as well be us. So we recently booked passage on a big fancy cruise vessel for a tour of the Aegean/Marmara seas. The big boat floated us around Turkish ports and Greek islands. We joined thousands of other voyagers who were dumped daily into the best touristy ports in the region. These ports — with names like “Heraklion” and “Kusadasi” and “Istanbul” — were built thousands of years ago, presumably so that Athenian ships could ferry overworked mythic gods to distant islands for well-deserved rest and relaxation. The ports continue to operate to this day.
We witnessed first-hand what cruise ships can do to a town the size of Monterey.
Admittedly, our empirical research on the matter is limited only to what we saw with our own two eyeballs. But we are confident that we have made a valid determination on the matter of whether the Monterey City Council should reconsider its decision.
Our conclusion: Nope. No way. No how.
Gimcrackery be damned!
Photo: Cruise ship off the Coast Guard pier in Monterey, 2019