MOBILE, Alabama — Tourism officials are looking to fill hole left by departure of Carnival Elation.

View full sizeThe Carnival cruise ship Elation leave the Alabama Cruise Ship Terminal along th Mobile River Thursday Sept 15, 2011 in Mobile, Ala. (Press-Register/John David Mercer)

MOBILE, Alabama – Mobile Bay Convention and Visitors Bureau Director David Randel, who had a 30-plus year career with Marriott before taking his current position, said he understands the economics behind Carnival’s decision to move its cruise ship Elation from Mobile to New Orleans.

Still, he said, “it hurt.”

The Miami-based company shocked city officials last fall when it abruptly announced that it was leaving, saying that it could command higher prices in New Orleans.

The 2,052-passenger Elation and its predecessor, the 1,452-passenger Holiday, consistently left Mobile full of passengers for their four- and five-day cruises.

“We had a very good relationship with them for seven years and basically they told us on very short-term notice that they were going to be moving the ship to New Orleans based upon a business decision,” Randel said.

The last Elation cruise left out of Mobile in mid-October, and its departure left a big hole one that tourism officials are trying to fill.

It wasn’t just cruise passengers filling hotel rooms and spending money at local stores and restaurants, it was also crew members, Randel said.

“They had over 900 employees that would go out and utilize our restaurants, go to Walmart and The Gap,” he said. “They spent a lot of money.”

A tourism industry study, Randel said, attributed 15,000 room nights a year to Elation’s presence.

The city, meanwhile, is trying to find a new tenant for the Alabama Cruise Terminal, on which it still owes about $22 million. Parking revenue from cruise passengers had been used to make payments, which must now come out of general revenue.

Randel said the No. 1 objective of the local Cruise Task Force, of which he is a member, is to regain a major cruise ship as soon as possible.

“It could be a couple of years or it could be sooner than that,” Randel said. “I can tell you that the governor has told me that he would love to see a cruise in Alabama.”

Randel said he and fellow task force members believe that the $52 million GulfQuest maritime museum right next door to the terminal will go a long way toward convincing a cruise company to set up shop in Mobile.

From unique food, historic architecture and thriving arts communities, visitors to coastal Alabama and Mississippi find a whole world of delights they did not expect.

View full sizeCrawfish boils are a common sight in downtown Mobile throughout the spring. Here, Todd Henson of Cafe 219 boils up a batch on Thursday, April 19, 2012. (Victor Calhoun/The Press-Register)

MOBILE, Alabama – When Calgary native and world traveler Clarice Seibens and her companion drove from New Orleans to Gulfport to visit one of Seiben’s cousins recently, the cousin, a longtime south Mississippi resident, suggested that they take scenic U.S. 90 rather than Interstate 10 from Bay St. Louis.

Seibens was amazed, saying she had no idea that the Mississippi Coast had beautiful beachfront homes, ancient oaks, and quaint downtowns filled with artist shops and restaurants.

“I’m coming back, and bringing my sister with me,” she said. “I just didn’t realize all of this was here.”

Seibens is not alone.

Besides the obvious — casinos and beaches in south Mississippi and beaches in south Alabama — there is a whole world of lesser-known attractions along the Gulf that, while they may not be the reason people visit in the first place, could be the reason they come back.

“When people think of the Mississippi Gulf Coast they think of resort-type attractions, not necessarily of the cultural heritage — the creative enterprises, artisans and crafts,” Mary Beth Wilkerson, director of the tourism division of the Mississippi Development Authority, said.

When people explore, for example, the artsy communities of Bay St. Louis and Ocean Springs that bookend the Mississippi Coast, it expands their whole experience, adding heritage and culture to a rich mix that already includes gaming, top entertainment, golf, ecotourism and fishing, she said.

And those communities’ less esoteric neighbors have been enhanced as a result of Hurricane Katrina, with grant money going toward preservation and enhancement of the history of downtowns in Gulfport and Pascagoula, for example.

In Biloxi, there’s the Ohr-O’Keefe Museum of Art, designed by world-famous architect Frank Gehry, and all along the Coast, many of the historic structures ravaged by Katrina have been either replaced or restored.

Mobile, meanwhile, boasts an array of unique events that showcase the city, said David Randel, director of the Mobile Bay Convention and Visitors Bureau. They include traditional ones like BayFest music festival and the Senior Bowl football showcase, and newer traditions such as the Moon Pie Drop New Year’s Eve celebration downtown.

This is in addition to the attractions such as the USS Alabama Battleship, Bellingrath Gardens & Home, and the Gulf Coast Exploreum Science Center.

Speaking of downtown, this time of year is the perfect time for visitors to see what the city has to offer, Randel said. Arts festivals abound, he said, with the recent Arts Alive event drawing thousands to the lower Dauphin Street district in tandem with other arts related events such as ArtWalk.

Restaurants and bars expanded their hours that weekend, he said, and filled their cash registers.

Many in the downtown area also offer free crawfish on certain nights throughout the season, which has become a hot draw.

“The city is going in the right direction with the effort to make Dauphin Street an attractive, vibrant area,” Randel said. A priority right now, he said, is adding a few well-known national chains to the growing downtown restaurant mix.

Tourism officials in both states tout their coasts as unique foodie destinations.

Besides seafood and crawfish as local favorites, Croatian, Vietnamese and French influences on local cuisine may come as a pleasant surprise to visitors in south Mississippi . The Alabama Tourism Department recently celebrated the Year of Alabama Food, including among its features Lulu’s Homeport Marina in Gulf Shores, Panini Pete’s in Fairhope and downtown Mobile, Wintzell’s Oyster House, and Chef Wesley True of Mobile.

John Gaffney, owner of Round Island Divers in Pascagoula, answers five questions for Gulf Coast Business.

John Gaffney owns Round Island Divers in Pascagoula. (Press-Register, Bill Starling)

Q: What prompted you to open Round Island Divers?

Gaffney: I started diving in 1978, and by ’81, I became an instructor. From ’81 to ’07, I was an independent instructor. In 2005, of course, Hurricane Katrina came. With a lot of loss of property in my family, I realized that if you don’t live your dreams today, tomorrow may be too late. At that point, I began making plans to open this shop. What got me spurred into scuba diving in general was growing up watching shows like “The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau,” which opened my eyes to what the ocean is all about.

Q: Describe your customer base.

Gaffney: I cater to everyone from the baby boomers down to 10-year-olds. It’s not

only a single person sport, but it’s also a family sport. We have families now who don’t just take their kids to the aquarium, they put them inside it. My shop has a lot of customers who come from the local area, that being from about Saraland, up to Hattiesburg and to the Louisiana line. We also get a lot of tourists from the Northern states, where people are taking diving lessons and decide to come here to complete their training. My business is probably 80 percent local and 20 percent tourists.

Q: What effect did the Deepwater Horizon/BP oil spill have on your business?

Gaffney: It impacted us very much. We saw around a 25 percent drop in business that year. But by the next year, it started recovering and we started bouncing back. During that time, we were still able to get people certified. But then we started changing our business model a little and started offering more travel and started completing certifications in freshwater environments, such as DeFuniak Springs and Ponce de Leon, Fla.

Q: How are things now, and what’s your industry outlook?

Gaffney: Our tourism segment is on the rise right now. I think tourists realize the Gulf Coast has a lot to offer and that the situation is not as bad as they perceived originally when the oil crisis happened. They are starting to come back into the area, and they’re finding that it’s economically better than traveling farther distances. We’re back into a growth period now, and I think it’s going to continue growing. I think that’s simply because people have been hanging onto their money so tight and have been afraid of the economy for so long. You’ve eventually got to get a little relief and do something to escape. Diving is such a stress-reliever. When you’re underwater, you don’t hear anything and your mind opens up. It’s so relaxing that it gets your mind off your problems.

Q: How large a role does travel play in your business?

Gaffney: I’ve been organizing trips since before I opened my shop. Travel is a natural part of the business, and you really have to make it available to your customers. When I first opened, we did one trip a year, but we started seeing those trips sell out. Now, it has grown into two trips a year, and a typical trip will sell out within the first month of announcing it. For example, we took a group of 24 people to the east end of Grand Cayman and stayed at a resort. The package we arranged had condominiums, rental vehicles and all diving excursions planned out. They were basically on auto-pilot when they got there. They truly got a relaxing vacation. This year, we’re going to the island of Bonaire, which is famous for shore diving and beautiful coral reefs, in mid-June. In late September, we’re doing a dive aboard a sailboat trip with Blackbeard’s Cruises in the Bahamas. We will live, sleep and eat on this sailboat.

The owner of Round Island Divers answers five questions for Gulf Coast Business.

View full sizeJohn Gaffney is the owner of Round Island Divers, which caters to scuba divers and is located in downtown Pascagoula. (Gulf Coast Business/Bill Starling)

Q: What prompted you to open Round Island Divers?

Gaffney: I started diving in 1978, and by ’81, I became an instructor. From ’81 to ’07, I was an independent instructor. In 2005, of course, Hurricane Katrina came. With a lot of loss of property in my family, I realized that if you don’t live your dreams today, tomorrow may be too late. At that point, I began making plans to open this shop. What got me spurred into scuba diving in general was growing up watching shows like “The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau,” which opened my eyes to what the ocean is all about.

Q: Describe your customer base.

Gaffney: I cater to everyone from the baby boomers down to 10-year-olds. It’s not only a single person sport, but it’s also a family sport. We have families now who don’t just take their kids to the aquarium, they put them inside it. My shop has a lot of customers who come from the local area, that being from about Saraland, up to Hattiesburg and to the Louisiana line. We also get a lot of tourists from the Northern states, where people are taking diving lessons and decide to come here to complete their training. My business is probably 80 percent local and 20 percent tourists.

Q: What effect did the Deepwater Horizon/BP oil spill have on your business?

Gaffney: It impacted us very much. We saw around a 25 percent drop in business that year. But by the next year, it started recovering and we started bouncing back. During that time, we were still able to get people certified. But then we started changing our business model a little and started offering more travel and started completing certifications in freshwater environments, such as DeFuniak Springs and Ponce de Leon, Fla.

Q: How are things now, and what’s your industry outlook?

Gaffney: Our tourism segment is on the rise right now. I think tourists realize the Gulf Coast has a lot to offer and that the situation is not as bad as they perceived originally when the oil crisis happened. They are starting to come back into the area, and they’re finding that it’s economically better than traveling farther distances. We’re back into a growth period now, and I think it’s going to continue growing. I think that’s simply because people have been hanging onto their money so tight and have been afraid of the economy for so long. You’ve eventually got to get a little relief and do something to escape. Diving is such a stress-reliever. When you’re underwater, you don’t hear anything and your mind opens up. It’s so relaxing that it gets your mind off your problems.

Q: How large a role does travel play in your business?

Gaffney: I’ve been organizing trips since before I opened my shop. Travel is a natural part of the business, and you really have to make it available to your customers. When I first opened, we did one trip a year, but we started seeing those trips sell out. Now, it has grown into two trips a year, and a typical trip will sell out within the first month of announcing it. For example, we took a group of 24 people to the east end of Grand Cayman and stayed at a resort. The package we arranged had condominiums, rental vehicles and all diving excursions planned out. They were basically on auto-pilot when they got there. They truly got a relaxing vacation. This year, we’re going to the island of Bonaire, which is famous for shore diving and beautiful coral reefs, in mid-June. In late September, we’re doing a dive aboard a sailboat trip with Blackbeard’s Cruises in the Bahamas. We will live, sleep and eat on this sailboat.