Crocodile takes woman during night swim in Australia

Yahoo – AFP, 30 May 2016

Crocodiles are common in Australia's tropical north and they kill an average

of two people each year (AFP Photo/William West)

A woman is feared dead after being seized by a crocodile during a late-night swim at a beach in northern Australia as her friend struggled to save her, police said Monday.

The women went for a stroll on Thornton Beach on Sunday evening in the far north of Queensland state before making a fateful decision to take a dip in an area known to be infested with crocodiles.

"The woman was swimming with a female friend, also in her 40s, at 10.30pm when the incident occurred," police said in a statement.

Nine News cited witnesses as hearing the woman yell "A croc's got me, a croc's got me!"

Senior Constable Russell Parker said the women -- Australians visiting the area -- were in the water when one of them was grabbed, with her friend desperately trying to drag her to safety.

"They decided to take a swim in the ocean just in waist-deep water and at that point, we believe that a crocodile has taken one of the women, taken hold of her," he told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

"Her friend tried valiantly to drag her to the shore but unfortunately wasn't able to do so and the woman subsequently disappeared.

"Now her friend raised the alarm with a nearby business and they subsequently contacted the police."

Data on most commonly occuring animal-related deaths in Australia 

(AFP Photo/John SAEKI)

A rescue helicopter was sent up with thermal imaging equipment but was unable to find her.

Parker added that the surviving woman was "very, very shaken and shocked" but appeared to have escaped with only grazes.

The Brisbane Courier-Mail said Thornton Beach was next to a creek where croc-spotting tours were organised, and there were plenty of warning signs throughout the vicinity.

The attack is not the first in the area. A giant crocodile known as Big Jim took local postal worker Beryl Wruck in 1985 when she had a late-night swim about an hour's drive from Thornton Beach.

Crocodiles are common in Australia's tropical north and kill an average of two people each year.

Earlier this month, a desperate fisherman threw spanners and spark plugs to fight off circling crocodiles after his friend drowned when one of the animals overturned their small boat near Darwin.

Crocodile numbers have increased since the introduction of protection laws in 1971, with estimates putting the Northern Territory's population in the wild at about 100,000.

At sea, scientists drill into crater for dino clues

Yahoo – AFP, Yemeli Ortega, May 18, 2016

The L/B MYRTLE Offshore Support Vessel, a scientific platform in the Gulf
of Mexico (AFP Photo/Ronaldo Schemidt)

MYRTLE PLATFORM IN THE GULF OF MEXICO (México) (AFP) - Sharks swim around a platform off Mexico's east coast as scientists drill deep into the ocean floor, extracting the remains of the asteroid widely blamed for the demise of the dinosaurs.

Some 30 meters (98 feet) above the ocean floor, the researchers pull out cylinders filled with rocks that could unlock the mysteries of life and death caused by the cataclysmic crash in the Gulf of Mexico some 66 million years ago.

The remains of the space rock might even give them clues about the possibility of life on other planets.

The $15 million Expedition 364, an international team at sea since April, is the first to peer into the offshore side of the 200-kilometer wide Chicxulub crater. The crater is large enough to also straddle part of Mexico's Yucatan peninsula.

"One of the exciting questions is what caused the environmental changes that led to a mass extinction and what insights arise from biologic recovery in the Paleogene (period)," Sean Gulick, professor at the Institute of Geophysics of the University of Texas, told AFP in the first visit for journalists to the platform.

The search is like looking for a needle in a haystack because the asteroid was pulverized by its apocalyptic impact, which destroyed 75 percent of life on Earth.

A team of 30 geologists, paleontologists and microbiologists from the United States, Mexico, Japan, China, Australia, Canada and Europe are working on the platform, which is located 33 kilometers off the Mexican coastline.

The scientists are drilling 1.5 kilometers (one mile) below the ocean floor, seeking microfossils and remains from the space rock.

Sailors and workers load supplies for the the L/B MYRTLE Offshore Support 

Vessel -a scientific platform in the Gulf of Mexico (AFP Photo/Ronaldo Schemidt)

Life in other planets?

Wearing helmets and protective gear, the scientists communicate with hand signals or by screaming over the loud noise from the heavy machinery as they work around the clock on the L/B Myrtle platform, a flat, seagoing vessel that jacks up on three pillars.

As they removed dark rocks from a meter-long tube, Auriol Rae, a geologist from the Imperial College of London, could hardly contain his excitement.

"These are the rocks we expected, but 30 meters shallower than we thought it would be," Rae said, staring at the material that will later be cleaned, refrigerated and analyzed.

The rocks will be sent to Bremen, Germany, when the mission ends in early June, so that scientists can write about their discoveries.

For now, they know that the asteroid's impact was so powerful caused material to fly into orbit and fall back into Earth like fireballs. Later, ash covered the skies, turning the planet into a dark and cold place.

"This created a chain of extinction. Months later, the dust fell on the continents and oceans, changing the chemistry of the oceans," said expedition chief Jaime Urrutia, president of the Mexican Science Academy.

While there are still debates about whether the asteroid is solely to blame for the disappearance of dinosaurs, scientists agree that it caused great destruction and had a role in how life evolved after its crash.

The scientists of the International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) and the International Continental Scientific Drilling Program (ICDP) hope that Expedition 364 can provide more answers about how life was extinguished on Earth, and then revived following the asteroid's crash.

They have extracted thin and clear or black and shiny rocky material, as well as yellowish or green sediment.

The research aims to find evidence of the origin of the universe and the

evolution of life on Earth (AFP Photo/Ronaldo Schemidt)

Each layer corresponds to a moment in time between the Cretaceous -- the last period of the dinosaurs -- and Paleogene periods, said Ligia Perez, of the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

The crater has a circle of mountains known as the "peak ring" that are up to 500 meters high. The Myrtle platform's three pillars stand on top of one of those peaks.

"There's so much fracturing of rocks inside the peak ring that you think hot fluids rushed through it, that we might anticipate that there's a great place for microbial life to occupy," Gulick said.

"If it turns out that impacts are great places for life then maybe that's why we should be looking for microbial life in other planets," he said.

Joanna Morgan, a British scientist, said that before the impact the ocean's microorganisms were diverse, large and complex.

But they became "much smaller and simpler" immediately after the asteroid's hit.

Drilling angers fishermen

Scientists may be excited about their work on the platform, but local fishermen are not pleased with the presence of the foreign object in their seas.

A scientific mission studies the Chicxulub impact crater on the Gulf of Mexico, 

created after an asteroid crashed 66 million years ago (AFP Photo/Ronaldo Schemidt)

Guadalupe Alvarez, leader of a fishing cooperative, said the drilling noise has scared away fish such as red or yellowtail snapper.

"In places we used to catch 100 kilos, now we catch nothing," Alvarez said.

The local government has agreed to pay 30 liters of fuel to each of the 1,000 fishermen because they have to travel farther to find fish.

But Urrutia said the machines were barely making any noise because the engines are on the platform.

A video taken by a submarine showed little fish swimming around the undersea drill as it perforated the soil.

Related Articles:

Guizhou radio telescope may pick up signs of alien life (China)

NASA discovers closest Earth-twin yet (USA)

Hawking launches biggest-ever search for alien life (UK/Russia)


"The Big Picture - You Are Not Alone" -  Feb 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll)

"Common Questions from Non-Lightworkers" - Feb 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll)

"... Question Three: Is there life on other planets?

Are you kidding? There's life everywhere. Everywhere! Right now, your scientists are searching for microbial life on all the planets and their moons in your solar system, and they will eventually find it. They expect to find it. They will eventually understand that the seeds of life are everywhere.

How much life might there be? How long has it been "out there"? When science starts to realize the scope of how long life has been in your galaxy, they will begin to see something counterintuitive to evolution - their own Human history. How old is your Universe? Ask your scientists and they will say about 13 billion years. That's OK. Let's use their numbers. How old is your own planet - 4 or 5 billion, perhaps? Correct. But how old is humanity? Why weren't you here with the dinosaurs? You think the earth wasn't ready? Do you think that perhaps that which controls evolution was a little too stupid to make a Human sooner, but the process could make a dinosaur? Have you ever thought about these things?

If you put the earth's entire history into a 24-hour clock, life itself only started in the last hour and humanity, all of civilization, happened the last few seconds. Isn't that odd to you? Therefore, in a Universe that may be 13 billion years old, you arrived in the last few seconds. Did you ever think maybe you're the newest ones on the block? Well, you'd be right.

If the Universe is really that old, do you think perhaps there are civilizations in your galaxy that might be a billion or more years older than you? If that's the case, do you think perhaps they have gone through anything you're going through? Do you think any of them might have had your DNA attributes? Perhaps they also went through what you are going through spiritually? Perhaps they even went into a quantum ascension status? The answer is dozens of them.

You already know them and you've listed them in your publications. The ones who directly seeded you are called Pleiadians. The ones who seeded them might be Octurian and the ones who seeded them may be even Orion. They're everywhere, and they're all here as well. They're looking at you, for you are the ones who are next, and you are passing this marker of the shift.

Oh, dear ones, it's going to be a long time before you really know any of these things to be your reality. The first step is peace on Earth. The next is a new kind of Human evolution that is going to increase your DNA efficiency to 100% and you're going to live a long time. Every time I say that, there are Humans in their intellectual mind saying, "Well, there is a geometric birth rate going on. We're not going to make it. It's going to over-crowd and we are going to run out of food. So what you're saying, Kryon, can't be a good thing. We're all going to be suffering and killing each other for food."

Let me address this, for if that is your thought, Human, you are assuming Humans are stupid and haven't figured out what's going on and why there's so much birth. You assume they can't control it because they haven't figured it out? I want to tell you, you're going to see something you didn't expect. You're going to see a decline in birth rate because Humans are smart and they're getting smarter. They're going to see that quality of life is linked to the number of children they have, and they're going to figure out the solution. It won't be how many children their church says they should have. They are going to do it intuitively. You're going to see it sooner than not.

You are going to see wisdom on the planet in many areas that no sociologist would ever have predicted. You will surprise them all, and it's going to happen without a government program. It's going to happen because you decide you want it. It's going to happen collectively, and you may even see it soon. Look for negative birth rates in first-world countries. Where Humans are able to see a larger picture and have freedom of information, the situation will not be what you have predicted.

Is there life on other planets? The scientists are saying, "It's going to be a long time before we get to the stars, you know? We have to get in this little metal can and put air in it, and then travel in it for years and years before we ever get to the next star." Meanwhile, a Pleiadian can do it in the blink of an eye! What do you think is going on there? Do you even believe me?

Not long ago, if you wanted to communicate to someone far away, you sent a letter. It was carried by a horse. It took a month to get a response. Now you communicate instantly!  Why is this so unbelievable to you about travel?

I will tell you, as long as you stay in 3D, you'll still be getting in little metal cans and air suits and going to planets. As soon as you begin the quantum age, however, you will simply wish yourself there, because you will be entangled with everything and can go with intent. If you don't believe this now, you will later, for what I give you is true. It may be lifetimes and lifetimes from now, but the group that is before me is the group that is going to come back over and over and over. The difference is that you're done coming back in an old energy. This is a new energy. ..”

"The Biggest Filter" - July 18-19, 2015 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) - (Text version)

“..  Physics - Sticking To The Known

Physicists are among the kinds of scientists who expect change through discovery, and who absolutely know that they are unaware of how everything works. It comes with the territory of being a physicist. Yet the mistakes they make in their bias are the same as the computer scientist. They take their truth from known absolute physics in 3D and then apply this truth to everything they don't know.

I point to the revelation and the discoveries of astronomer Vera Rubin. When she found out that stars that orbit the middle of your galaxy don't behave within the gravitational laws of Newton or the laws of planetary motion from Kepler, it was a major discovery. Your solar system moves around the sun in highly definable 3D laws of motion. The objects that are further away from the sun go slower. The ones closer to the sun go faster. However, her discovery showed that stars orbiting the galaxy had this reversed! The stars that are further away from the middle go faster. What she discovered was that all of the stars go the same speed in relationship to the middle, like they were pasted on a plate, all revolving together around the center. They do not follow the rules of the physics that you know.

So, what did the physicists and astronomers do with this major new information? Instead of seeing a brand new paradigm, they instead used Newton's laws and computed what would have to be "out there" to make this happen. Dark matter! It had to be mysterious, invisible matter that was creating this very strange and enormous new Newtonian attribute. Instead of looking at this and saying, "There is a new law of physics happening here that we don't yet know about," they kept it within the Newton box and renamed it, "Altered Newtonian Physics". That's funny! That's like a situation when you discovered the earth was round and called it the "Altered Flat-Earth Principle"!

Newton's name is still attached, but his 3D laws have nothing to do with anything Ruben discovered. Dark matter does not exist! It's a made-up energy to satisfy an old law that doesn't apply! Instead, there is a new law of physics that you haven't seen yet. It's a multidimensional law having to do with modified entanglement. Modified entangled objects are created because of what is in the middle of the galaxy. The immense push-pull twin energy at the middle of each galaxy is not simplistic like your sun is to your own solar system. It does not have Kepler rules, since it's not mass that's just orbiting naturally. Yet, you think it is, since it looks similar: The galaxy has stars circling it in space. Someday, you'll slap your heads in revelation of what you did with this, and you will change the rules.

Now to esoteric astronomy: Look what you've done with the idea that you came from the Pleiadians. There are some scientists laughing right now who smugly say that the mythology of the Pleiadians being your seed biology is simply not possible. It's not possible because of astronomical history, and what they now know about the constellation itself.

Pleiadian Connection - Mythology?

Let's talk about the Pleiadian system, the Seven Sisters. Let's talk about the truth of it, and then let's discuss what science says is the mythology of it. We will tell you what you don't see and don't comprehend, simply because of your existing knowledge.

You call this constellation the Seven Sisters [M45]. The physical facts are that there are hundreds of stars in this Pleiades group. Circling these stars is a nebula (dust particles and gas). This creates a wonderful blue tinge that you can see in the heavens on a clear night. With distance and atmospheric attributes against you, the naked eye can only perceive what appears to be seven stars (or clusters), hence the name Seven Sisters. However, there are actually nine when you use a telescope. Each of the nine have been identified with names, but again, there are actually hundreds of stars.

The Seven Sisters are approximately 440 light years away. From the viewpoint of astronomy and distances, that's close - very close! Now, here's what science says is wrong with your mythology about the Pleiadians: The constellation is way too young! The whole system of the Pleiades is far too young to have developed life. It's only approximately 100 million years old - a baby! The galaxy is four billion years old [according to your science] and your planet is at least a billion of that. Yet, the Pleiadians are only a tiny fraction of that, only 100 million.

So here is what science says: The mythology has most of the ancients of this planet claiming the Pleiadians as their seeds. However, this is impossible due to the age of the stars. The suppositions and logic are applied this way: What you saw on earth happens everywhere in the galaxy. That's incorrect, and quite humorous! Your bias is that life develops only a certain way, based upon the way it developed here. Not only is that incorrect in general, but the possibility has never even been broached that perhaps, just perhaps, the Pleiadian life as you think it exists was actually implanted there! How about that? Perhaps it didn't evolve from there at all! So to dismiss a possibility completely due to only the knowledge of what you have here may result in a totally illogical conclusion. Then there is the question, "How did those Pleiadians get so advanced so quickly?" [Wink]

These are just little vignettes of possibility, which I throw to you this evening to give you things to think about. The Pleiadians who are here are smiling, and they know you so well. You may be the new kids on the block because life just developed on your planet, but the Pleiadians had an entirely different scenario from what you had. To become an ascended planet, they needed certain kinds of pushes from certain other kinds of planets. They had their own seed biology! Dear ones, it's important to start thinking out of the box of your knowledge and open up to possibilities that are not what you've seen here.  ….”

"FUTURE AND PHYSICS (#)" - May 16-17, 2014 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) - (#) New major Discoveries (This channel will become a historical channel in the future, prove that Kryon is a real communication from the Creative Source/God to Humanity - 'Óur Family') - (Text version Physics)

1 To see and measure multi-dimensional/quantum physics, instrument (super-cooling quantum plasma lens)

2 Two more laws of multi-dimensional physics revealed: explanation of dark matter & acknowledgement of free energy (controlling mass)

3 God in the atom. God has - provable - part in physics. Intelligent/benevolent design. (Will bring religion and science together.)

4 Human Consciousness is an attribute of physics. (Pleiadians - Humans ancestors / Humans free choice only planet in the Milky Way Galaxy. Other galaxies have their own spiritual systems and physics)

5.Coherent DNA. Multidimensional DNA coherent between dimensions will give Enhanced DNA

"Earth, the only planet with free choice in the Milky Way Galaxy"

"The Quantum Factor" – Apr 10, 2011 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Galaxies, Universe, Intelligent design, Benevolent design, Aliens, Nikola Tesla (Quantum energy), Inter-Planetary Travel, DNA, Genes, Stem Cells, Cells, Rejuvenation, Shift of Human Consciousness, Spontaneous Remission, Religion, Dictators, Africa, China, Nuclear Power, Sustainable Development, Animals, Global Unity.. etc.) - (Text Version)

"Recalibration of the Universe"– Jan 25, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) - (Text Version)

“… The entire galaxy revolves as one plate, in a very counter-intuitive way. The stars and the constellations do not orbit within the rules of Newtonian physics that you are used to seeing all around you in your own solar system. For the stars and clusters in your galaxy, distance from the center does not matter. All the stars rotate as one. This is because the galaxy is entangled with the middle of itself. In that state, there is no time or distance. The change of consciousness on this planet has changed the center of the galaxy. This is because what happens here, dear one, is "known" by the center.

It's interesting to us what your reaction to all this is scientifically. You saw that the "creative event" of your Universe is missing some energy in order for it to have formed as it did. In addition, the unusual way the galaxy rotates, as I just stated, was also noted. So you have calculated that for all this to be in place, there has to be missing 3D matter, and you have given it a name - dark matter. How funny! Did you ever think that there could be a multidimensional effect going on that you now can observe and calculate - that has immense power, but can't be seen? It's not "matter" at all and it's not 3D. It's quantum energy.

Let me tell you something about physics. Yet again, I'll make it simple. Everything your scientists have seen in physics happens in pairs. At the moment, there are four laws of physics in your three-dimensional paradigm. They represent two pairs of energy types. Eventually, there will be six. At the center of your galaxy is what you call a black hole, but it is not a single thing. It is a duality. There is no such thing as "singularity". You might say it's one energy with two parts - a weak and a strong quantum force. And the strangest thing is it knows who you are. It is the creator engine. It's different in other galaxies than this one. It's unique.

The very physics of your galaxy is postured by what you do here. The astronomers can look into the cosmos and they will discover different physics in different galaxies. Could it be that there's something going on in the other galaxies like this one? I'm not going to answer that. … “

"The Physics of Consciousness - The Future Revealed" - June 29, 2014 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) - (Text version)

Israel divers find ancient marine cargo in Mediterranean

Yahoo – AFP, May 16, 2016

Artefacts from a merchant ship that sank off the ancient Mediterranean port of
Caesarea 1,600 years ago are presented to the press by Israel's Antiquities Authority
on May 16, 2016 (AFP Photo/Jack Guez)

Caesarea (Israel) (AFP) - Israel's Antiquities Authority on Monday displayed cargo from a merchant ship that sank off the ancient Mediterranean port of Caesarea 1,600 years ago, including rare bronze statues and thousands of coins.

The find, happened upon by two divers a few weeks ago who then alerted the authority, consisted primarily of "metal slated for recycling" borne on the ship from Caesarea in the late Roman period, IAA experts said.

But a storm at the entrance to Caesarea harbour crashed the large ship into the seawall and rocks, the IAA said, spilling the cargo into the sea and preserving the "exciting finds".

Artefacts recovered off the ancient Mediterranean port of Caesarea in Israel 

includes thousands of coins in two lumps weighing around 20 kilogrammes bearing

the images of Constantine the Great and of Licinius (AFP Photo/Jack Guez)

"Metal statues are rare archaeological finds because they were always melted down and recycled in antiquity," Jacob Sharvit, director of the Marine Archaeology Unit of the IAA and his deputy Dror Planer said in a joint statement, noting such a trove hasn't been found in Israel for 30 years.

The artefacts include "a bronze lamp depicting the image of the sun god Sol, a figurine of the moon goddess Luna, a lamp in the image of the head of an African slave (and) fragments of three life-size bronze cast statues," the IAA said.

There were also "objects fashioned in the shape of animals such as a whale (and) a bronze faucet in the form of a wild boar with a swan on its head," the statement said, noting the sand protected the statues which were "in an amazing state of preservation."

Items, which the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) estimate to be around 1600 

years old, are displayed after it was recovered from a merchant ship in the 

ancient harbor of the Caesarea National Park May 16, 2016. Reuters/ Baz Ratner

The find includes thousands of coins in two lumps weighing around 20 kilogrammes (44 pounds) bearing the images of Constantine the Great and of Licinius, an emperor who ruled the eastern half of the Roman Empire and was a rival of Constantine.

Fragments of drinking jars were also found, as well as iron anchors, apparently cast from the ship in the vain hope of preventing it crashing in the storm.

The discovery comes a year after the exposure of a record trove of some 2,000 gold coins in the same area, with Sharvit crediting the abundance of divers with the growing number of finds.

According to Sharvit and Planer, the finds reflect the "economic and commercial stability in the wake of the stability of the Roman Empire," a period in which "Christianity was on its way to becoming the official religion of the Roman Empire."

US woman rushed to hospital with shark stuck to arm

Yahoo – AFP, May 16, 2016

Nurse sharks which can grow to up to 10 feet in length are normally peaceful
creatures (AFP Photo/Greg Wood)

Miami (AFP) - A woman in the US state of Florida was rushed to a hospital after being bitten by a shark -- with the whole animal still clutching on to her right arm, local media reported.

The small nurse shark, which was about two feet (61 centimeters) long, was killed by a beachgoer soon after the attack on Sunday, the Palm Beach Post reported.

The victim was an unidentified 23-year-old woman who was bitten while bathing at a beach in the coastal city of Boca Raton, city fire-rescue spokesman Bob Lemons told the newspaper.

Lemons said the woman was rushed to the city's regional hospital with the shark still attached to her right forearm.

"I have never seen anything like it," Ocean Rescue Captain Clint Tracy told the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. "Never even heard of anything like this."

Nurse sharks, which can grow to up to 10 feet (three meters) in length, are common along Florida's Atlantic coastline, and are normally peaceful creatures.

This shark does not understand the concept of catch and release. A 23-year-old

 woman was brought to the hospital in Boca Raton, Florida on Sunday after a 

2-foot-long nurse shark bit her arm and refused to let go.

But one witness told the Sun-Sentinel that before the attack he saw swimmers bothering the shark and holding it by the tail.

The victim was initially calm when she approached a lifeguard station at the Red Reef Park beach seeking help.

A male companion was holding the shark and there was little blood, Tracy said.

"It was barely breathing but it wasn't letting go of her arm, like it was stuck to her or something," witness Shlomo Jacob told the Sun-Sentinel.

As time went by and a crowd gathered, the woman became agitated and when paramedics arrived they gave her oxygen.

Then they used a board to support her arm and the shark, placed her on a stretcher and drove to the hospital, Tracy told the newspaper.

Swimmer Bitten By Shark Rushed To Hospital With It Still Attached 

To Her Arm

According to the Shark Research Institute, nurse sharks are nocturnal creatures, and are often found lying motionless on the ocean floor in rocky coastal areas during the day.

The sharks eat small fish and creatures like lobster, squid, and sea urchins -- not human flesh.

Most grown nurse sharks are less than 9.8 feet (three meters) long, but are known to reach 14 feet (4.3 meters) in length.

First US-to-Cuba cruise ship in decades docks in Havana

Yahoo – AFP, Hector Velasco, May 2, 2016

The first US-to-Cuba cruise ship in half a century glides into the port of Havana,
on May 2, 2016 (AFP Photo/Adalberto Roque)

Havana (AFP) - The first US cruise ship to travel to Cuba in half a century docked in Havana Monday, marking a new milestone in the rapprochement between the old Cold War foes.

A crowd of onlookers waved Cuban and American flags and filmed with their cell phones as the Adonia, a Carnival cruise liner, sailed into port in Havana after setting off Sunday from Miami, the heart of the Cuban diaspora in the United States.

The ship had 700 passengers on board, some of them Cuban-Americans returning to the communist island for the first time in decades.

A crowd of onlookers waved Cuban and

 American flags and filmed with their cell 

phones as the Adonia, a Carnival cruise

 liner, sailed into port in Havana (AFP

Photo/Adalberto Roque)

Yaney Cajigal, a 32-year-old dancer, could barely contain her excitement as she waited for her niece to disembark.

"This is incredible for me, this is very exciting," she told AFP.

"We're welcoming them with the flags of Cuba and the United States so everything will be unity, peace and tranquility."

The voyage is the first of what Carnival says will become week-long cruises to Cuba twice a month, with the goal of promoting cultural exchange between the two countries following a warming of ties that began in December 2014 and led to the restoration of full diplomatic relations last year.

The "cultural exchange" aspect is key, since ordinary tourism to Cuba is still banned under a US trade embargo, which remains in force despite the diplomatic thaw.

For the time being, Americans can travel to Cuba only for cultural, academic, sports-related or religious events.

Carnival is the first cruise line company to win permission from both governments to offer trips, which ended after the Cuban Revolution in 1959.

The Adonia has scheduled cultural activities in its ports of call in Havana, Cienfuegos and Santiago de Cuba, including meetings with artists, musicians and business owners, as well as dance classes and guided tours.

The cruise "offers a truly historic opportunity for travel to Cuba: a chance to help build new bridges to a rich and vibrant culture that, until now, most US travelers have only seen in photographs," the cruise ship's web page says.

US President Barack Obama speaks with Cuban President Raul Castro during 

a Major League baseball exhibition game in Havana (AFP Photo/Nicholas Kamm)

Down to the wire

Uncertainty over whether the cruise would take place cleared up only last week, when Cuban President Raul Castro's government lifted restrictions for seaborne visits of Cubans to and from the United States, opening a door for Cuban-Americans born on the island to board the ships.

Carnival initially refused to accept reservations from Cuban-born customers because of restrictions first imposed when Havana feared landings by anti-Castro militants.

The cruise line's policy prompted charges of discrimination amid a firestorm of criticism.

Carnival, the world's leading tour ship operator, eventually relented and began allowing reservations from Cuban-born customers. But its conditions to start the visits were for Cuba to allow its citizens to sail freely.

Cuba ultimately backed down after intense negotiations as part of the normalization process, which culminated in President Barack Obama's visit to Cuba in March.

Carnival has permission from both governments to run cruise ships between

 Florida and Cuba, and said the first ship will leave Miami on May 1 (AFP Photo/

Karen Bleier)

'Always wanted to visit'

One of the Cuban-born passengers is Isabel Buznego, 61, who left the island when she was five and was returning for the first time.

"My dad wanted to come because he had never been able to come, but he passed away," she said. "So I'm coming in his name. That is why I have so many different emotions, but I am mostly happy."

Another passenger, Regina Patterson, 58, from Delaware, said she wanted to take the cruise because it was historic.

"And it is a place I always wanted to visit," she said. "I want to see how they live, the music, what they eat, and shopping, shopping, shopping!"

The cost of a ticket on the cruise ranges from $1,800 to $7,000 per person.

Regular flights from the United States to Cuba are expected to begin later this year.