{"id":142,"date":"2025-09-24T21:29:01","date_gmt":"2025-09-25T02:29:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/?page_id=142"},"modified":"2025-09-26T12:55:42","modified_gmt":"2025-09-26T17:55:42","slug":"about-mike","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/?page_id=142","title":{"rendered":"About Mike"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"alignright size-full\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Mike-Apex.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"500\" height=\"400\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Mike-Apex.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-143\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Mike-Apex.jpg 500w, https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Mike-Apex-300x240.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n<p>Mike LaMonaca has sailed on 60 cruises since 2007, and started CruiseStarter as a side-gig in 2012. He has sailed through the Caribbean, Mexican Riviera, Alaska, Iceland, Europe and the Mediterranean, South America, New Zealand and Australia, the Galapagos Islands, and about a dozen transatlantic crossings. He also enjoys non-cruise travel which have included unique places like Micronesia, Morocco, and South Africa. (Up next: Thailand, Cambodia, and United Arab Emirates!)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When he&#8217;s not traveling, Mike resides in Philadelphia and works as a Senior IT Project Leader for The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/instagram.com\/pennmike\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Instagram<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/philamike\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Flickr<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Photo by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jillphotography.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Jill Lotenberg<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mike LaMonaca has sailed on 60 cruises since 2007, and started CruiseStarter as a side-gig in 2012. He has sailed through the Caribbean, Mexican Riviera, Alaska, Iceland, Europe and the Mediterranean, South America, New Zealand and Australia, the Galapagos Islands, and about a dozen transatlantic crossings. He also enjoys non-cruise travel which have included unique<span class=\"dots\"> &hellip; <\/span><span class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/?page_id=142\" class=\"more-link\">Read more <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">&#8220;About Mike&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-142","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=142"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/142\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":149,"href":"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/142\/revisions\/149"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cruisestarter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}