Travelers wanting to explore small Mediterranean ports on an opulent yacht or be pampered during an exotic big-ship cruise visiting Asia are finding more and more of these types of luxury cruises becoming available. To help cruisers find their ideal luxury ship, itinerary or suite, Cruise Critic(R) (http://www.cruisecritic.com/), the world's leading online resource for consumer-oriented cruise reviews and news, today announced the launch of a new luxury cruise minisite.

"The launch of this minisite comes at a perfect time as the luxury cruise market continues to expand," said Carolyn Spencer Brown, editor in chief, Cruise Critic. "This expansion is a result of growth in all three areas of luxury cruising. These areas include small sailing or yacht ship experiences, expedition cruising to exotic locations and traditional big-ship luxury voyages, all of which are highlighted on the new luxury minisite."

Having all of Cruise Critic's luxury content and advice in one simple-to- navigate location (http://www.cruisecritic.com/luxurycruises), travelers can now learn about and plan the perfect luxury cruise vacation with greater ease than ever before. The new Cruise Critic minisite is organized into five key areas to help travelers find the luxury cruise that meets their needs.

Luxury Ship Reviews

Already the best place on the Web to read cruise reviews, Cruise Critic's new minisite has grouped all luxury cruise reviews together. Whether written by a Cruise Critic editor or member, all luxury reviews, from upscale expedition vessels to traditional luxury ships, will be available together on this portion of the site.

Features

Cruise Critic is expanding its coverage of the luxury market, adding to current features such as virtual cruise articles that take travelers on trips to Antarctica and the Middle East as well as port profiles of exclusive destinations such as the Caribbean's St. Barth's and Italy's Elba.

Luxury Cruise Forum

Because of the popularity of Cruise Critic's message boards, which are some of the most active in the world regarding cruising, this section of the minisite directly links travelers to the luxury cruise forum. Within this forum, cruisers can interact, converse and ask questions of one another about luxury cruising.

Luxury Deals

Travelers seeking a value-oriented luxury cruise can check out Cruise Critic's "luxury deals" section for daily hand-picked offers on vacations, ranging from traditional high-end voyages to expedition adventures.

Itineraries

From the exotic to the offbeat, and everything in between, this section of the luxury minisite highlights Cruise Critic destination-related features that will help travelers pick the perfect cruise itinerary.

About Cruise Critic

Launched in October 1995, by The Independent Traveler, Inc., Cruise Critic was the first consumer cruise site on the Internet. It is both an interactive online cruise guide providing ship reviews and editorially driven cruise- related features and an active community, where travelers can share opinions and experiences. Cruise Critic is ranked the number one cruise information Web site by Hitwise. In the last five years, traffic on CruiseCritic.com has grown 350 percent and it currently attracts more than five million visitors per year. In response to this burgeoning demand and worldwide growth, Cruise Critic launched its U.K.-based sister site CruiseCritic.co.uk, in January 2008. Cruise Critic and The Independent Traveler were acquired by TripAdvisor(R), LLC, the world's largest travel community and an operating company of Expedia, Inc. in May 2007.

Cruise Critic and The Independent Traveler are either trademarks or registered trademarks of The Independent Traveler, Inc. in the U.S. and/or other countries. Other logos or product and company names mentioned herein may be the property of their respective owners.

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SOURCE: Cruise Critic