My First Cruise Connections: Debbie Summers, Exec Director, ID New Zealand (2025)

Mary Bond, Editor in Chief

April 22, 2025

3 Min Read

First sight of a cruise ship: what ship, where and why you were in the location?

The Little Red Ship or as she was formally known as Explorer. She was always our first cruise ship of the season in fact I believe the first cruise ship to ever call in to the Falkland Islands maybe she even pioneered Antarctic cruise tourism. She also brought the mail!

The sight of her coming through the Narrows into our Harbour meant summer was here and we had our heartedly welcomed visitors back! I was there as that is where I was born and bought up, a wonderful place frequented a lot by expedition cruise ships in the beginning in the 70s pioneered by Lars-Eric Lindblad and now cruise ships of all sizes.

Quite unbelievably she met a perilous end in Antarctica the year I left the Falklands for New Zealand and an inbound company called ID Tours Ltd to further pursue my career in tourism in 2007, I was on the Golden Fleece yacht in the region when she sadly sank after striking an iceberg.

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First cruise ship or cruise-related company you worked on/for as a young professional and what was the role?

I have never worked on cruise ships bar the odd IAATO observer role where ships heading to Antarctica for the first time might swing by collect me for their first IAATO Member landings and then leave me in Ushuaia for me to catch another cruise ship back to the Falklands.

First cruise experience as a passenger?

Although it was really work, I developed the Falkland Islands Countryside Code and I spent a lot of time on expedition cruise vessels doing all the different landings in the Falklands. I learned so much from their strict environmental and educational standards. I saw things through the eyes of a passenger being lucky enough to eat on infamous Captains tables such as Captain Leif Skog whilst cruising the most incredible normally inaccessible places to visitors.

First cruise industry mentor or inspiration?

This is so hard as I literally have been surrounded by absolute legends my entire cruising focused career. In particular the Captains of the small hardy ice breaking expedition cruise vessels but I am literally too scared to just pick one out (haha) and also all of the inspirational expedition teams on board. Their knowledge and passion is astounding and the generosity in sharing these qualities unsurpassed. I then worked as a port agent and shore excursion provider named Sulivan Shipping Services and with their help developed many tours that still exist today in Port Stanley and destinations opened within the countryside there to cruise.

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First Seatrade Cruise event you attended, where, what year and a favourite memory.

My first Seatrade event was either Miami in 1998 or the Seatrade Cruise Academy in the UK which was a wonderful week-long residential course I will never forget. Most people that were starting out such as myself at that time are still in the business today, such as industry stalwart Marc Melville, the owner of CHUKKA.