The Love Boat has made something of a comeback in the zeitgeist thanks to its gonzo Ryan Murphy-produced successor, Dr. Odyssey. But while this shiny new cruise ship sets sail on a bright horizon, the real-life inspiration for the beloved ’70s series is languishing at the bottom of California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, according to a new report from The Los Angeles Times. The iconic vessel’s unfortunate demise is the end of a tale wrapped up in “all this nefarious dark stuff,” according to a cruise ship historian interviewed for the piece.
The L.A. Times tracks the history of the MS Aurora from its birth as a passenger ship out of Germany in 1955, later becoming “one of the first modern ships to bring cruising to the Aegean Sea.” The boat was one of many that employed Jeraldine Saunders as a cruise director, inspiring her memoir Love Boats that became the basis for the TV show. The ship changed owners many times over the years, at one point bought by a religious group intending to make it a “Christian relief ship” but ultimately ended up becoming a home for squatters in Los Angeles and later a drug den in Alameda.
Many owners over the years seemed to dream of restoring her to the former glory that made her the star of the James Bond film From Russia With Love. But bad luck and financial strife followed the ship to every port. After it ended up in the Delta, a sandbar formed that trapped the ship in place. Its last known owner, Chris Wilson, tried to turn things around by documenting his restoration online and had mild success in making the Aurora a viral sensation. But the odds against the boat were too high, and Wilson sold to an unnamed buyer in 2023. In 2024, the Aurora sank.
The worst part of the story isn’t that the Love Boat is still out there, rotting. It’s that the Love Boat is just one of many boats out there, rotting: “Boats of all kinds routinely get dumped here like so much trash. Battered by time and weather, they seep oil and other hazards, infuriating local officials and jeopardizing wildlife and the tens of millions of people who rely on Delta water for drinking and agriculture,” the Times report reads. When the Aurora sank, “crews removed 3,000 gallons of hazardous waste and 21,000 gallons of oily water.” Now, local officials are trying to figure out not only who the owner is, but also how to safely (and cost-efficiently) dispose of the ship. You can read the whole tragic tale here.