On our calendar, it's 492 days until December 3, 2015. Can you believe there's a cruise that's sold out that far in advance…in fact, even further, because this isn't exactly "breaking news" as they say incessantly on CNN?
The Love Boat Cruise is sold out.
Billed as the "50th Anniversary Mexican Riviera" cruise, it quickly became known as the "Love Boat Cruise" cruise among Princess passengers and television viewers, because it will re-trace the wake left by The Love Boat when the popular TV show of the '70s that kick-started the cruise line's popularity.
Okay…some of the wake.
The anniversary ship will be the Pacific Princess, a namesake of the original Love Boat, so that's part of the attraction, too. It's small — 670 passengers — just like the original and its real purpose is to celebrate the cruise line's 50th birthday. That original ship 
from 1965 was called the Princess Patricia, leased from Canadian Pacific, and it survived less than a year, so ill-suited was it for warm-weather cruises.
The original Pacific Princess, on the other hand, lasted 27 years with the company and several more after she was sold. Included in that was a decade-long run as star of the TV show that introduced many Americans to cruising. Her hops down the Mexican Riviera were short (most times the ship never left California waters) and next year's unique cruise is not.
It lasts two weeks round-trip from Los Angeles, because that's how long the first-ever Princess cruise was, and ventures inland from the riviera. With six ports, it will give passengers a real taste of Mexico — adding Manzanillo on the Riviera and venturing inland to La Paz and Loreto on the Sea of Cortez to the traditional Big Three ports (Puerto Vallarta, Mazatlan, Cabo San Lucas).
Prices started at $1,699 per person, or about $120 a day). The date of departure, December 3, is exactly 50 years from when the cruise line launched the Princess Patricia.
Princess promises there will be "special guests" on board…Captain Stubing (Gavin MacLeod) himself, perhaps?
But here's the real question:
By selling out a year and a half in advance, won't Princess be tempted to run "Love Boat" cruises again…and again..and again…?
Today at Phil Reimer's portsandbows.com: Busy times in Galveston
Holland America Westerdam
7 nights
November 22, 2014
Fort Lauderdale (return): Grand Turk, San Juan, St. Thomas, Half Moon Cay
Inside: $499
Cost per day: $71
www.hollandamerica.com