Carnival Corporation Axing Three Ships

[tring]

Just heard this was announced in their most recent report.  Apparently two are to come from the Costa fleet, but no mention where the third one is to be from.  Seems they just made it known they are getting rid of some older, less efficient, ships in favour of their new big ones, surprise surprise!

 

Sounds like a fingers crossed moment to us, since we have three cruises booked on Aurora over the next three months, though must admit we did feel she was in pretty good condition when we were onboard her in November/Dec, so not being run down and she is still very popular of course. 

 

Hopefully the third ship will come from another fleet, there are a few other options including other lines getting new ships.

 

 

 

Edited December 23, 2022 by tring

[tring]

58 minutes ago, tring said:

Just heard this was announced in their most recent report.  Apparently two are to come from the Costa fleet, but no mention where the third one is to be from.  Seems they just made it known they are getting rid of some older, less efficient, ships in favour of their new big ones, surprise surprise!

 

Sounds like a fingers crossed moment to us, since we have three cruises booked on Aurora over the next three months, though must admit we did feel she was in pretty good condition when we were onboard her in November/Dec, so not being run down and she is still very popular of course. 

 

Hopefully the third ship will come from another fleet, there are a few other options including other lines getting new ships.

 

 

 

 

I meant to say our three booked cruises are over the next nine months, the first being, late June.

 

[wowzz]

Speculation on the Princess forum is that the third ship will be one of the following:

 

1996: Carnival Sunshine - 3,002 pax

1997: POAU Explorer - 1998 pax
1998: Carnival Elation - 2190 pax

1998: Carnival Paradise - 2,124 pax

1998: Grand Princess - 2,590 lower berth pax / 3,100 max

1999: HAL MS Volendam - 1,432 pax
2000: HAL MS Zaandam - 1432 pax

2000: PO Aurora - 1,878 pax / 1,950 max

 

The "favourite" to go is Explorer,  with the two HAL  ships also being mentioned.

 

[paulatsea]

Please not Aurora ! 
2 booked for next year.

[Josy1953]

I hope that it's  not Aurora but realistically she must be considered due to her age.

 

[Tablelamp]

I hope P & O realise that the Aurora is their most popular ship.  PROPER SAILING!

[terrierjohn]

8 minutes ago, Tablelamp said:

I hope P & O realise that the Aurora is their most popular ship.  PROPER SAILING!

With less than 2000 passengers and sailings averaging 15 nights plus, that's 24 cruises a year with 50,000 passengers, probably less since many will do more than one cruise a year. If Iona sails full she will do 36 cruises a year totally 180,000 passengers.

Aurora may be the most popular ship on this forum, but we are not representative of the average cruiser.

Edited December 23, 2022 by terrierjohn

[Josy1953]

19 minutes ago, terrierjohn said:

Aurora may be the most popular ship on this forum, but we are not representative of the average cruiser.

I agree.  I think that most of us are probably a little older than the passengers that Carnival would like to attract to P&O. 

Most of us have done many cruises and no longer spend much on board.  I can't remember when we last purchased anything on board other than drinks or meals in the speciality restaurants.  I think that the newer, younger cruisers with children are P&O's preferred demographic now.

We only look at P&O now for the winter months when Cunard and Princess are no sailing out of Southampton and this winter we have not found any of the P&O appealing to us.

[thedriver23]

my money is on Carnival Paradise - she was my first cruise - and she was tired back then.

[paulatsea]

1 minute ago, thedriver23 said:

my money is on Carnival Paradise - she was my first cruise - and she was tired back then.

🤞🤞

[Josy1953]

4 minutes ago, thedriver23 said:

my money is on Carnival Paradise - she was my first cruise - and she was tired back then.

Carnival Paradise and Aurora are similar age so either of them could be target's.

[jeanlyon]

My October 2023 cruise on Aurora is sold out and has been for a while now.  Not sure that means anything though, as someone else said, it's a 19 night cruise to Greece and the Med and there aren't many of those.  The big ones can't get into most of the ports.

[majortom10]

I know 3 ships are to be retired from Carnival with 2 named but don't think that will be the end of the retirement of older ships in the near future. Moving to cheaper to run and more profitable bigger ships is Carnival's future.

 

[Yorkypete]

57 minutes ago, majortom10 said:

I know 3 ships are to be retired from Carnival with 2 named but don't think that will be the end of the retirement of older ships in the near future. Moving to cheaper to run and more profitable bigger ships is Carnival's future.

 

When that happens cruising will be very limited by the size of the ships and the ports they can visit. You can rule out much of Scandanavia and the Baltic. Venice is out as will be many ports which cannot manage floating hotels/resorts..Looking at all the new ships coming, especially those that will be based in America, the Carribean will be very crowded as most seem designated for the area.

Edited December 23, 2022 by Yorkypete

[tring]

3 hours ago, wowzz said:

Speculation on the Princess forum is that the third ship will be one of the following:

 

1996: Carnival Sunshine - 3,002 pax

1997: POAU Explorer - 1998 pax
1998: Carnival Elation - 2190 pax

1998: Carnival Paradise - 2,124 pax

1998: Grand Princess - 2,590 lower berth pax / 3,100 max

1999: HAL MS Volendam - 1,432 pax
2000: HAL MS Zaandam - 1432 pax

2000: PO Aurora - 1,878 pax / 1,950 max

 

The "favourite" to go is Explorer,  with the two HAL  ships also being mentioned. 

 

 

Thanks, I was wondering which older ships were in the Carnival Corporation fleet.    Ships have not been sailing for long Australia, so the perceived risk of cruising may be greater over there and may not take much for their government to come down hard again if a problem arises, and those HAL ships are the same class as the ones sold to Fred very soon after the pandemic hit and only have two decks of Balcony cabins.  I am feeling a bit better now, but I suppose it will depend on the overall "efficiency" that is mentioned, though I think they may just have meant to say "profitability" and got their words mixed up at the time...... 

 

I wonder how long it will be until we hear their verdict?

 

 

Edited December 23, 2022 by tring

[terrierjohn]

6 minutes ago, Yorkypete said:

When that happens cruising will be very limited by the size of the ships and the ports they can visit. You can rule out much of Scandanavia and the Baltic. Venice is out as will be many ports which cannot manage floating hotels/resorts..Looking at all the new ships coming, especially those that will be based in America, the Carribean will be very crowded as most seem designated for the area.

Apart from the passenger numbers which may be too much for some ports, then the newest ships will have no problem in the ports that can accept anything around the same size as Britannia, since the new ships have a very similar footprint, the only issue may be draught, although the bigger container vessels ca be 17m dr. which is a lot more than the Excel classes 11.8m.

[jeanlyon]

I noticed that Fred has got rid of the Braemar which was a lovely ship.  They now have Borealis and Bolette.

[tring]

40 minutes ago, Yorkypete said:

.Looking at all the new ships coming, especially those that will be based in America, the Carribean will be very crowded as most seem designated for the area.

 

We have just returned from The Caribbean after more than ten years.  I expected ports to be busy and also more commercialised, which they certainly were with newly developed port areas full of the usual shops and bars.  It was still notable that a lot of people were quite happy to just stay in that port area though - a good drinking session, some well priced jewellry along with some junk purchases seem to keep many people happy.

 

Aurora was still on her own in some ports and not as many ships as could be taken, but the effects of Wonder of the Seas and Celebrity Equinox in St Kitts was enough to send a number of our passengers back to the ship nippily, deciding not to go to the usual beach destinations there.  The really frightening thing though is that people on the islands were saying how the cruise calls have not yet returned to pre-pandemic levels, so we saw it way down in pax c.f. what it will be in a few years as you say!  The Med seems to be going the same way, but at least most of the ports are big cities, so fairly easy to get away from it all.

 

We only went for the better weather, given going East is still not really on the cards and we did get the expected sun, including two good Atlantic crossings.  Interesting to see it though.

Edited December 23, 2022 by tring

[tring]

10 minutes ago, jeanlyon said:

I noticed that Fred has got rid of the Braemar which was a lovely ship.  They now have Borealis and Bolette.

 

Yes they are the ex HAL ships.  He still has Balmoral as well, which is now his smallest ship, but his prices are high.

 

I fear cruising as we knew, with interesting ports, is over now, unless prepared to pay much higher prices for the so called luxury ships and even then the ports can be very monotonous.  I think we do not realise just how much Carnival probably save by going to the same old ports all the time - they probably have some good contracts for excursions etc. as well as with the airlines, enabling them to offer some reasonable priced fly cruises.  The old cruise model will be far more costly or quality just goes down and down.

 

[jeanlyon]

Agree.  We normally do the 18-19 nighters on Aurora and still have some great ports to look forward to in October.  3 in Greece and some others.  After that, cruising is not high on my wish list, although we might try a last minute Fred when his prices tend to drop.

[yorkshirephil]

36 minutes ago, tring said:

 

 

I fear cruising as we knew, with interesting ports, is over now, unless prepared to pay much higher prices for the so called luxury ships and even then the ports can be very monotonous.  I think we do not realise just how much Carnival probably save by going to the same old ports all the time - they probably have some good contracts for excursions etc. as well as with the airlines, enabling them to offer some reasonable priced fly cruises.  The old cruise model will be far more costly or quality just goes down and down.

 

I think the main problem for a lot of us older regular cruisers is that we have been spoiled, I remember our first cruise to the Caribbean 20 years ago and us saying it would be a one off cruise of a lifetime, now we go sometimes twice a year and for 35/40 nights at a time. We still do get the odd new port such as San Juan and Cartahena as on our recent Arcadia cruise but it is very samey, however our main aim is to get the warmer weather, in fact we now look at cruises with more sea days.

 

We booked Iona 2025, 35 nights whilst on board as that cruises to Tenerife on the way there and back (presumably to refuel with LNG), it also takes 4 days to get to Tenerife instead of the usual 3 days and has fewer ports than the usual 35 nighters. More time to get accustomed to the warmer weather, heading on a more southerly route than the Azores and the higher swells and cooler weather from the north Atlantic, fewer ports all of which we have visited previously, we are more than happy to sit out on deck reading for several hours before an afternoon Costa and cake then maybe a film, listen to a speaker or sit chatting. We have just completed our longest cruise of 40 nights on Arcadia and loved it and now considering a 65 nighter, what a great way to miss a large chunk of winter. 

[tring]

59 minutes ago, yorkshirephil said:

I think the main problem for a lot of us older regular cruisers is that we have been spoiled, I remember our first cruise to the Caribbean 20 years ago and us saying it would be a one off cruise of a lifetime, now we go sometimes twice a year and for 35/40 nights at a time. We still do get the odd new port such as San Juan and Cartahena as on our recent Arcadia cruise but it is very samey, however our main aim is to get the warmer weather, in fact we now look at cruises with more sea days.

 

We booked Iona 2025, 35 nights whilst on board as that cruises to Tenerife on the way there and back (presumably to refuel with LNG), it also takes 4 days to get to Tenerife instead of the usual 3 days and has fewer ports than the usual 35 nighters. More time to get accustomed to the warmer weather, heading on a more southerly route than the Azores and the higher swells and cooler weather from the north Atlantic, fewer ports all of which we have visited previously, we are more than happy to sit out on deck reading for several hours before an afternoon Costa and cake then maybe a film, listen to a speaker or sit chatting. We have just completed our longest cruise of 40 nights on Arcadia and loved it and now considering a 65 nighter, what a great way to miss a large chunk of winter. 

 

You have a point about Iona tracking a more southerly route for that one, though we would have concerns regards finding somewhere decent to sit out on deck, even Azura was a big problem regards that, given both main pool areas were very crowded as well as being incredibly noisy from the music/films screened there. 

 

We have booked the 35 night Ventura US/Caribbean cruise for Jan 2025 and were surprised how much further north the ship tracked, though apart from Cozumel and Cape Canaveral, the ports are all new to us, so decided it is worth doing .  TBH we had the same itinerary booked on her for 2024, but changed it when we were still able to do so without penalty as we saw a really good around Africa itinerary with Fred which clashes with it.  We thought we would like to keep an eye on that, perhaps with a view to doing just half of it, if it is split into a couple of sections at a later date.  As time has progressed though, we are not at all confident much of that itinerary will go ahead, even next year.

 

[Yorkypete]

9 hours ago, terrierjohn said:

Apart from the passenger numbers which may be too much for some ports, then the newest ships will have no problem in the ports that can accept anything around the same size as Britannia, since the new ships have a very similar footprint, the only issue may be draught, although the bigger container vessels ca be 17m dr. which is a lot more than the Excel classes 11.8m.

Bergen is one notable port that cannot be reached by the larger ships but Britannia can get there. It is not only size but the number of passengers the ports are able to accomodate that will prevent berthing at many ports.

 

[showingdiva]

The three names that keep cropping up on the speculation list across the web are Costa Magica, Costa Fortuna and AIDAaura

[terrierjohn]

1 hour ago, Yorkypete said:

Bergen is one notable port that cannot be reached by the larger ships but Britannia can get there. It is not only size but the number of passengers the ports are able to accomodate that will prevent berthing at many ports.

 

I did preface my comments with that very point, but these will generally be the smaller ports that don't have the current infrastructure to deal with 5000 plus passengers, but these will be a small minority, and their local councils will no doubt be as anxious to maximise their tourist revenue as most other cruise ports seem to be.