booze cruise

English

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Noun

booze cruise (plural booze cruises)

1. (British) A brief trip from Britain to France or Belgium in order to buy alcohol (or tobacco) in bulk quantities without paying excise duty.
2. (US, Australia) A recreational trip on a cruise ship or boat usually tailored to young people, with the expectation of heavy consumption of alcoholic beverages.
   • 1998 November, Queen City Chronicle: Wedding Belles, Cincinnati Magazine, page 13,

     I was still a little tipsy, see, because Tony proposed to me on a booze cruise. You know a booze cruise? That′s where they take a fishing boat and wash all the fish guts off of it at night and turn it into a party boat.

   • 2004, Joseph D. Oliver, Nancy E. Oliver, On the Rebound, page 108:

     “Goddamnit, Petey, you know I hate booze cruises at the best of times. A bunch of drunken assholes that make a piss-up at home look like a Tupperware Party.”

   • 2009, Larry McDonald, Patrick Robinson, A Colossal Failure of Common Sense: The Incredible Inside Story of the Collapse of the Lehman Brothers, page 185:

     They told us the corporation had taken their top salesmen to the Bahamas on a luxury liner booze cruise. Actually it had been a themed booze cruise, under the banner “The Best Damn Mortgage Company. Period.”

Related terms

• booze cruiser