Italy officially bans cruise ships from Venice effective August 1st

[ontheweb]

Sometime this week we received a cruise brochure from HAL. (We were on vacation so I picked it up today in the mail.) I happened to open it to a page at random and said to DW wow this looks like an interesting cruise. It started and ended in Venice and went as far as Istanbul (where we have never been). It had Athens which we were on for a cruise, but did not see the New Acropolis Museum because it was on a Monday a day it was closed.

 

There was a sailing that would have put us on the ship for our anniversary, and the next one is 45 and we have been doing special things for the ones that end in 5 or 0. But, now I guess it is out. Oh, well. Back to the planning board.

[chengkp75]

15 minutes ago, ontheweb said:

And now Carnival Corporation has sold off or sent to scrap the smaller ships on many of their lines.

But even Carnival's first cruise ship, the first Mardi Gras, is more than 25k gross tons.

[nocl]

2 hours ago, rkacruiser said:

 

There are those Alaska citizens, particularly those in the Southeastern part of the State, who view the arrival of tourist season as you describe.  

 

My Nephew who lives in Alaska has told me for some time that there is a "love-hate" view of cruise tourism.  

My relatives that live in a couple of the cruise ports feel the same way.  They have said that 10 years most of the business were owned by locals and served the community when it was not cruise season.  These days the businesses are increasingly owned by outside interests (often the same people that own similar ones in the Caribbean) that are strictly focused on the cruise business and close when it is not cruise season.  With most employees being non-locals, hired for the season.  The biggest local interests  that benefit from cruise business is the local ports and government (port fees and sales tax).

 

Now you can go into Skagway and Ketchikan and see that same outlets that you see in St Thomas. Owned and run by the same people.

 

Though you have some business that have been purchased and run by Alaskan Native Corporations.

Edited July 16, 2021 by nocl

[kazu]

57 minutes ago, ontheweb said:

And now Carnival Corporation has sold off or sent to scrap the smaller ships on many of their lines.

None of these ships were small enough to qualify under the new rules (and that includes my beloved little Prinsendam).  25,000 tons excludes a ton of cruise ships (pardon the pun).

[rkacruiser]

1 hour ago, nocl said:

Though you have some business that have been purchased and run by Alaskan Native Corporations.

 

I get a bit distressed when I read the posts on the Alaska Message Board about some CC posters who find Icy Point Strait "uninteresting, etc.".  Of all of the cruise ports in Alaska that I have visited, Icy Point Strait is the most "Alaskan" of them all.  Kodiak comes in second.  

 

Too many of our fellow citizens who visit Alaska fail to understand the concept of "America's Last Frontier".  Diamonds International and their cohorts are not part of that phrase.  

[ontheweb]

1 hour ago, kazu said:

None of these ships were small enough to qualify under the new rules (and that includes my beloved little Prinsendam).  25,000 tons excludes a ton of cruise ships (pardon the pun).

The smallest ship we sailed was the former Ocean Princess with less than 700 passengers. I realize it was sold prior to Covid, but its sister ship the Pacific Princess left the fleet after Covid. Were those ships small enough to qualify under the new rules?

[kazu]

11 minutes ago, ontheweb said:

The smallest ship we sailed was the former Ocean Princess with less than 700 passengers. I realize it was sold prior to Covid, but its sister ship the Pacific Princess left the fleet after Covid. Were those ships small enough to qualify under the new rules?

 

No, they weren’t.  Pacific Princess and Ocean Princess are around 30,000 tons IIRC but definitely over the 25,000 ton limit just as the Prinsendam was.

 

edited to say - and they were lovely ships 👍 

[ontheweb]

3 minutes ago, kazu said:

 

No, they weren’t.  Pacific Princess and Ocean Princess are around 30,000 tons IIRC but definitely over the 25,000 ton limit just as the Prinsendam was.

 

edited to say - and they were lovely ships 👍 

Then they really have banned pretty much every ship. The Ocean Princess was also such a friendly ship. The least friendly ship we were ever on was the NCL Epic. I think it was a function of how large it is.

[kazu]

11 minutes ago, ontheweb said:

Then they really have banned pretty much every ship. The Ocean Princess was also such a friendly ship. The least friendly ship we were ever on was the NCL Epic. I think it was a function of how large it is.

 

Yes unless you are on a yacht. Maybe a Seabourn. (I haven’t checked their tonnage) or a yacht club ship could go in but basically most cruise ships are out.

 

the Prinsendam could get into a lot of places the other ships couldn’t but this wouldn’t be one of them unless they change the tonnage rule I saw.  And I doubt that will happen.  Nor should it if they are going to truly protect Venice.

 

Ocean Princess was a lot like the Prinsendam.  They had their crew that knew you, wanted to take care of you and were just so excellent.  Both ships were a gem IMO 

[madera1]

3 hours ago, chengkp75 said:

But even Carnival's first cruise ship, the first Mardi Gras, is more than 25k gross tons.

We sailed on the Mardi Gras back in 1975...Our first cruise!

[kazu]

On 7/15/2021 at 7:11 AM, ski ww said:

Any thing from HAL yet on what will replace Venice as an arrival or departure port? 

 

I don’t know if this will apply for all Venice sailings or not, but for the October 18th sailing this year, it’s been reported that HAL will not be using Porto Maghera.

 

 

[ski ww]

What are some of the alternatives? We don't have to worry about it until next year. 

[ontheweb]

9 hours ago, kazu said:

 

Yes unless you are on a yacht. Maybe a Seabourn. (I haven’t checked their tonnage) or a yacht club ship could go in but basically most cruise ships are out.

 

the Prinsendam could get into a lot of places the other ships couldn’t but this wouldn’t be one of them unless they change the tonnage rule I saw.  And I doubt that will happen.  Nor should it if they are going to truly protect Venice.

 

Ocean Princess was a lot like the Prinsendam.  They had their crew that knew you, wanted to take care of you and were just so excellent.  Both ships were a gem IMO 

It does sound like anything bigger than a yacht or a sailboat will be banned.

 

One of my memories from the Ocean Princess was telling an entertainer how much I enjoyed his act, and he then invited me to sit down with him. It was such an intimate ship, and perfect for the British Isles cruise we were on her for.

 

The intimacy even continued after we left the ship as we took their excursion back to the airport that included a stop at Canterbury and among the very few on the bus were 4 we knew from our roll call, the other couple celebrating their anniversary on the ship and their 2 teenage daughters.

[puppycanducruise]

12 hours ago, ontheweb said:

Sometime this week we received a cruise brochure from HAL. (We were on vacation so I picked it up today in the mail.) I happened to open it to a page at random and said to DW wow this looks like an interesting cruise. It started and ended in Venice and went as far as Istanbul (where we have never been). It had Athens which we were on for a cruise, but did not see the New Acropolis Museum because it was on a Monday a day it was closed.

 

There was a sailing that would have put us on the ship for our anniversary, and the next one is 45 and we have been doing special things for the ones that end in 5 or 0. But, now I guess it is out. Oh, well. Back to the planning board.

That sounds like the cruise we were supposed to be on last year that was cancelled because of COVID.   It would have been for our 35th wedding anniversary. 

[ontheweb]

3 minutes ago, puppycanducruise said:

That sounds like the cruise we were supposed to be on last year that was cancelled because of COVID.   It would have been for our 35th wedding anniversary. 

The cruise we were supposed to sail on last summer was a Norwegian fjords cruise.

 

The cruise we did for our 35th was a Western Mediterranean that was very similar to our first cruise done on our 25th anniversary.

[Hlitner]

2 hours ago, ski ww said:

What are some of the alternatives? We don't have to worry about it until next year. 

There has been some discussion of this issue elsewhere and in Italy.  There are several alternatives which will all probably be used for the short term (lets arbitrarily call this 5 years).  Porto Maghera is a medium size commercial (which means ugly) port located on the mainland just opposite of Venice (about 3 miles distant).  This port would need some modifications to handle the really large cruise ships (it can currently handle medium size ships although there is no cruise terminal).    There would also need to be some effort to widen and deepen the current ship channel from the sea to Porto Maghara  Getting from Maghera to Venice may be accomplished via water (either tenders or some type of locally based shuttle boats)..or so we are speculating.  It would also be possible to bus folks to Venice, but this would create its own problems and likely trigger some local backlash.    The other options are to use 3 different ports, each of which is 2-3 hours from Venice (via train or bus).  None of these ports is a great option but Trieste will obviously get some ships and possibly be used as an embarkation/disembarkation port by some vessels.

 

In the long term the Italians need to build a new cruise port.  Porto Maghera is the logical candidate and the government is already supporting the idea of up to 5 piers to handle cruise ships.  Another oft discussed option would to build an entirely new port just outside the Venice Lagoon.  If this option were to happen it would likely take decades given Italy's history dealing with major construction/environmental issues.

 

The really sad thing about all these options is that none provide the wonderful experience of cruising in and out of Venice via the Giudecca Canal.

 

Hank

 

 

[kazu]

4 hours ago, kazu said:

 

I don’t know if this will apply for all Venice sailings or not, but for the October 18th sailing this year, it’s been reported that HAL will not be using Porto Maghera.

 

 

 

4 hours ago, ski ww said:

What are some of the alternatives? We don't have to worry about it until next year. 

 

Oops, sorry I had a typo this morning.  I must have been coffee deprived.

 

My post should read it’s been reported that HAL WILL be using Porto Maghera.

 

No idea how the not got in there and I didn’t see it.  Apologies

[VMax1700]

5 minutes ago, kazu said:

My post should read it’s been reported that HAL WILL be using Porto Maghera.

 

You really confused me too!  

I wonder will they use Marghera for ALL Eurodam cruises this summer?  

 

[kazu]

9 minutes ago, VMax1700 said:

You really confused me too!  

I wonder will they use Marghera for ALL Eurodam cruises this summer?  

 

Apologies for the added word.  I honestly don’t know where the not came from and sadly, didn’t see it until I returned to the thread 😔 

 

Regarding the question - Not sure.  I think the Maghera port is starting to show the scheduled ships from what I read.

 

[Hlitner]

We give Cruisemom credit for correcting many of us about the spelling of Porto Marghera!   While we should not get too hung up on misspelling everything, having a port name correctly spelled does a lot of good if one is searching on the Internet :).   I also plead guilty to sometime leaving out one of the "r" s.

 

Hank

[rkacruiser]

13 hours ago, ontheweb said:

It does sound like anything bigger than a yacht or a sailboat will be banned.

 

11 hours ago, Hlitner said:

If this option were to happen it would likely take decades given Italy's history dealing with major construction/environmental issues.

 

I again raise a point that I made earlier.  What's the practicality of the Italian Government's decision?  

[kazu]

1 minute ago, rkacruiser said:

 

 

I again raise a point that I made earlier.  What's the practicality of the Italian Government's decision?  

 

saving Venice.  It’s not hard for cruise ships to go elsewhere like Maghera or other ports and people travel / shuttle to get to Venice.

 

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again - if you really want to see Venice, visit it before a cruise, on a land visit, whatever.  You will NEVER discover Venice on a cruise stop.  JMO.

[d9704011]

5 minutes ago, rkacruiser said:

 

 

I again raise a point that I made earlier.  What's the practicality of the Italian Government's decision?  

I get the feeling you want a debate/argument.  The authorities are restricting navigation in the Giudecca Canal to help preserve the environment and for safet reasons.  Whether you agree with that (the practicalities) is your own POV on the matter(s).

[rkacruiser]

Just now, kazu said:

 

saving Venice.  It’s not hard for cruise ships to go elsewhere like Maghera or other ports and people travel / shuttle to get to Venice.

 

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again - if you really want to see Venice, visit it before a cruise, on a land visit, whatever.  You will NEVER discover Venice on a cruise stop.  JMO.

 

We are not in total disagreement.  Saving Venice is important.  A multi-day port stop does allow time to visit the city and its islands.  Was mine long enough?  No.  Starting or ending a cruise in Venice that allows a few days for a pre- or post-cruise visit is what would be best for the city and its environs as well as the visitor.

 

But, the practicality!  Long times to get from/to wherever a cruise ship terminal is located!  Transfers by how many different means of transport?   How many guests are going to be willing to put up with such transfer requirements to sail from or arrive at a Venice located port?  

 

Is Venice destined to be a city in Italy where cruise ship guests will no longer be willing to visit?  

[nocl]

4 minutes ago, rkacruiser said:

 

We are not in total disagreement.  Saving Venice is important.  A multi-day port stop does allow time to visit the city and its islands.  Was mine long enough?  No.  Starting or ending a cruise in Venice that allows a few days for a pre- or post-cruise visit is what would be best for the city and its environs as well as the visitor.

 

But, the practicality!  Long times to get from/to wherever a cruise ship terminal is located!  Transfers by how many different means of transport?   How many guests are going to be willing to put up with such transfer requirements to sail from or arrive at a Venice located port?  

 

Is Venice destined to be a city in Italy where cruise ship guests will no longer be willing to visit?  

Venice would probably be happier for it.