molecrochip

No longer the case. When Arvia originally went on sale, the midships areas were restricted for quarantine. Therefore lots of people booked forward or aft. Now that the quarantine restrictions are no longer there, there is a lot of midship capacity. If you've marked to be upgraded then you stand a good chance of being moved to midship. If you're on an early saver, you may also have a good chance of acquiring a midship room. Expect these changes to occur before saver prices go on sale. Obviously you can bag yourself a midship cabin by phoning up and making the change however you pay whatever the difference was on the date of booking.

As suspected, not the oldest but one of the smallest and a sole remaining ship in her class.

Suggestions that there may be special arrangements for Madeira, being a reasonably easy port for the captain to dock at.

Obstructed cabin is generally view straight forward. re balcony light, you can turn this off - I’m fairly sure Britannia has switch by door but is usually obscured by the curtains.

Not even asked for the majority of cruises!

I understand that Iona safely offloaded the sick passenger in the middle of the Tegas River in Lisbon and is heading home again.

Re Volendam: Could be various reasons, dry dock uncertain, sale, schedule not yet agreed. QE didn’t go on sale for Summer 2024 with the rest of the fleet but she’s not being sold (afaik) but her Alaska voyagers we’re not yet finalised. I don’t see the ship going unless they have a plan to get rid of Zaandsm too as it’s expensive to only keep one ship in class. Re Costa Magica: It won’t be $200m to bring back in service but would be $200m to implement the Sunshine improvements. As all the same class ships with Carnival have had these improvements, I don’t see her going to Carnival. I agree Carnival may continue to receive ships from Costa to increase their net capacity but think Carnival will continue to exit their two smallest, fantasy class, ships. I agree Costa will continue to shrink. I think it will be fully part of CCL in five years. Either that or CCL will take the new Excel class ships and sell the rest (mainly Concordia class) to someone like SeaJets.

99% of the issue was Christmas dinner. There is ample dining capacity but it’s not all in a formal main dining room. That’s fine for a ship designed to operate in warmer climates where formal main dining is less popular. Come Christmas Day and New Years Eve, the demand for formal dining surges from circa 60% to circa 95%. This has to be managed onboard through using informal restaurants operating as main dining with waiter service however this was not as successful as desired on either Arvia or Iona this Christmas Day. This was the first time this has been tested with full ships and exposed learnings which are being worked upon ahead of tomorrow’s service. This won’t usually be an issue. Other issue is wifi, particularly through Biscay - appears to have been poor for Iona’s cruise also and is a coverage issue.

Iona’s cruise back from the canaries is full of incident. I have a person on the ground on this one. 1. Lisbon cancelled due to pilot strike. Replaced with stat extended overnight in Vigo. 2. Vigo cancelled due to extreme bad weather replaced with extended two day stat in Cadiz. 3. After leaving Cadiz a small boat came close to Iona. Due to it being night, it want possible to track by sight snd there was concern it got too close. Fast response ribs were deployed just after 21:30. Iona circled until incident over just after 22:00. Concluded with local coastguard that boat had moved on. 4. Medical emergency onboard. Headed for Faro but too rough to offload passenger. Medical staff boarded and Iona now headed for Lisbon harbour entrance / port (sea dependent) to offload. Crew doing wonderful job. Captain keeping ship informed.

A further point to consider, the longer a ship stays in lay-up, the more expensive it is to bring back into use. I really see no way back for the Costa Magica. CCL are not likely to spend $200m+ to Sunshine it. Volendam and Zaandam are likely safe in my opinion. They may be small but command premium fares.

No such thing as bed press! I will comment but am waiting til NYE is over to see if the problems have resolved.

I believe the plan is for POAU to end up with three Grand class ships, so that’s coming from Princess as I don’t see POUK giving up Ventura or Azura. I keep seeing comments about Carnival Sunshine however she had major work done in 2013 across all guest areas and on the ship equipment itself so I’d be surprised if Carnival would be pleased to drop her before say 2030.

There is a little of this, but generally the efficiency is by reducing from 24 to 20 knots rather than dropping to 15. It’s dropping from 4 to 3 engines on a four engine ship. The efficiency isn’t there to drop to two engines as you then work them too hard and create maintenance issues. Therefore this manifests as shorter calls rather than less ports, although I guess that could add up over a longer voyage.

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I don’t believe that either of those are missing because of cutbacks/fuel economy or being too big. A problem for the next two/three years is port availability of LNG. Once resolved some of the restrictions, such as Iona and Arvia having to cross the Atlantic via Tenerife will be resolved. The Tenerife route is also linger therefore slower therefore less port days.

Back in 2019, the plan had been for 2020-2024 capacity to increase by about 20% based on demand models. This was based on new ships brining 30%+ new capacity plus a few smaller ships leaving the fleet and reducing capacity by circa 10%. Covid hit, the result… new total demand forecasts now suggest 2%-5%. This gave Carnival a problem and an opportunity. Cancelling new builds wasn’t the answer. The big boys were under political pressure to go greener. Some steps could be taken with larger ships but small ships didn’t have the space to accommodate the equipment. A sudden buoyant market opened up for second hand ships with smaller operators keen to upgrade and Carnival keen to offload smaller, dirtier, less profitable ships. With these three disposals, Carnival are up to 22 disposals in three years. Some of these would have happened naturally but likely only 6-7. Carnival had a fleet of about 105 ships, were due to have a fleet of circa 120 ships by 2024 but will end up with around 100. However their capacity will still be around 5% higher. As a business, the smaller, newer, greener fleet has lower maintenance and operating costs. New build ship costs are spread over their life therefore don’t impact profit as much as you’d expect. There is another side to this discussion and that’s internal movements. CCL has seen a quick recovery due to its domestic US focus. Costa has struggled due to the rise of MSC in Europe and the prolonged closure of the China market. Therefore ship transfers are logical. What were to be temporary transfers look like becoming permanent as they are now formally being renamed. Princess has struggled outside of US & U.K. but they’ve been assisted by two of their ships transferring to P&O Australia. Holland America had lost four smaller ships in place of one new ship therefore could ride the recovery. Aida is a very holiday club style operation but has rebounded well for the domestic German market. Seabourn and Cunard have higher price points so could weather a slower recovery. Both were due new ships late enough in the recovery curved to not need disposals. This leaves P&O UK. I believe, as we enter 2023, that the fleet is the size it was always intended to be. I’ve said for some time, I expected Oceana to leave the fleet after Arvia’s arrival. Arvia was originally due May 2022, so that suggested Oceana gone by now. For me, there was an outside hope of her going adults only but only if overall demand kept rocketing. Of course, the ultimate hope for the business is demand increases quicker than expected. This pushes prices up as more people want the same fixed number of cabins. As to the future… ships will continue to leave as part of natural evolution of cruise ships. Generally 30 years is the estimated plan. With nothing in the order books past 2026, Carnival will be hoping for government support to incentivise/reduce the cost of shipbuilding. The bank rate movements across the world won’t help with that however what impact that has on the Italian & German export finance markets is unclear. The next big move is to see if Princess has excess capacity post their two new Sphere class ships. Will this give the P&Os a Grand or Royal class ship, will this mark the end of Aurora or Arcadia, or has Covid given them a lease of life into the 2030s?

Expect to hear about a program of guest service and general customer experience improvements in 2023 - the feedback has been noted. It’s already in development, was recently announced to staff at HQ but I don’t know the exact timescale.

Also re Costa... they are being resized for the European Market as the new joint venture with the Chinese State owned shipbuilder will generate its own brand with two new ships and two ex-Costa ships (already transferred). I expect that over time, we will see more Costa by Carnival and then just Carnival. As someone commented on the CCL thread, Costa has lost massive market share since the Concordia incident. Also people now want 4*+ cruising not 3*. This is all true. I also agree that Costa has been blindsided by MSC. I suspect that Costa as a separate brand wont operate in 2030 but that Carnival will have a bigger European presence. It also give Princess the opportunity to increase European presence.

That is my understanding. All by Spring 2024. I expect Elation and Paradise to be the first CCL ships to go as the rest of the class now has however they have been kept to serve smaller American ports. As numbers recover, Carnival Jubilee and the Costa ships join CCL, this probable sees them go but that could be 2025 onwards. Carnival Sunshine had a load of upgrades in 2013 when she was converted from Carnival Destiny so will likely hang on longer. POAU will probably exit Explorer as soon as Princess are ready to free up a Grand class ship to replace her. That is likely to be once Sun princess and Sphere 2 join the fleet in 2024 and 2025. Whether that also frees up a second Grand / Royal class ship to transfer to P&O UK remains to be seen. If it does, whether Aurora/Arcadia stay will depend on demand from the UK market.

So, Maiden tomorrow. She has been built in the most challenging of times with Covid and supply chain severely affecting the build. Whatever happens, even if there are bits and bobs to be finished or ironed out, the ship is the product of many people’s loving work. She is a lovely ship and a great addition to the fleet. Safe trips Arvia.

Arvia has officially been handed over and joined the P&O Cruises fleet. She soon sails for Southampton to embark guests for her Maiden cruise on 23 December. Welcome Arvia.

For March it will be pay in full. Enjoy your Christmas cruise.

P&O have now confirmed that cruises J301, N302 and R301 have vaccination/testing requirements different to all other cruises. Covers cruises to the end of February 2023.

Arvia officially joins the P&O fleet tomorrow at a handover ceremony in Germany. She will then sail into Southampton on Sunday morning, 18 December. She is expected to have the usual fireboat escort up Southampton water. Times are approximately: Portsmouth: 10:40am Gosport/Ryde: 10:50am Lee on Solent: 11am Cowes: 11:10am Calshot: 11:30am Warsash: 11:35am Hythe: 11:50am Ocean Cruise Terminal: 12:00 noon She aims to be berthed by 12:30pm, and will berth with her portside alongside (nose in). She will then stay in Southampton until she departs on her maiden cruise at 6pm on Saturday 23 December.

Now looking like Sunday morning arrival with fire ship escort.