Spoilers Ahoy!

This was a really good one! As with all of the other Winter Escape movies, it was set in a sunny clime in an exotic land.  And as the title implies, there was a cruise ship involved. Our hero Parker is accompanying his billionaire boss on a cruise around southern Italy. He is the boss’s top man and lawyer and is there to oversee the sale of Adam’s, the boss’s, sale of his cruise ship line to a group of investors. Accompanying Parker is his sister Emily, who I first thought was a more lightly than usual made up Hallmark star Taylor Cole in a cameo appearance. But as she hung around and started to have her own story line, I realized it wasn’t her. Parker is played by the always wonderful Kristoffer Polaha who is one of my very favorite Hallmark stars. Emilie Ullerup plays Kelly who works for a company that the investors hired to suss out any reasons why the cruise line would not be a good investment.

Parker is a little quirky which manifests itself in several ways but includes a penchant for wordplay and bad puns which might be called excessive if you have a low tolerance for that kind of humor. Kelly is friendly and likable. Although she is good at her job, she prefers to take handwritten notes throughout the day and upload them digitally at night rather than constantly uploading the details via her company’s App. Her boss, George, warns her that this unplugged approach is not acceptable this time and she needs to stay in constant communication as well as incognito. Uh Oh. I sense trouble on the horizon. Kelly knows who Parker and Adam are, but Parker does not know who Kelly is. Yet. Parker, Emily, and Kelly become friendly. On an excursion to a waterfall in Sicily, Parker and Kelly’s donkeys run away and Kelly and Parker miss the ship which waits for no man or woman. Even though Parker is the Ship’s Owner’s right hand man!

The rest of the movie was Parker and Kelly’s adventures trying to catch up with the ship which was very good at evading them, and falling in love. These include Parker throwing his back out, a worker’s strike which halts a train they have to take (Kelly talks the strikers back to work! -she’s pretty awesome), Parker going to a new age healer for his back, staying at a luxury hotel, oversleeping, and Parker leaving his passport behind. At that point, Parker sends Kelly ahead and she actually makes the boat, but turns around and goes back for Parker. She loves him and they kiss. Meanwhile, Parker’s sister Emily and Adam, his boss, are getting close as well. She is having a good influence on him and he regrets asking Parker to delay Kelly getting back on the ship and potentially screwing up the merger. Yes, that happened, but Parker refused to be so low down. When they finally make it back to the ship, Adam apologizes to Kelly for asking Parker to purposely delay her return to the boat (which he didn’t do). Kelly gets all mad at those spilt beans especially since she got fired for being incommunicado and not on the ship. In the last 15 minutes Kelly comes to her senses, Adam decides not to sell the cruise line after all, hires Kelly (and Emily!), and two happy couples sail off into the sunset (figuratively.)

So there you go. That’s the movie in a nutshell. If you didn’t see it last night, it is well worth catching. Kris Polaha has not missed a step, and he is as watchable as ever. Emilie is good as well and the two have some chemistry. The well-written banter is fast paced, bright, and amusing. And of course, the scenery. **7 1/2 stars**