Island and Coral Princess...why only 2 of this type of ship?

[tripman]

We are making some initial considerations of Alaska for next year. I've read nothing but good things about the Island/Coral Princess. But my question is, why are there only 2 of these ships? There are 7 Grand Princess type ships with another on the way.

 

Is it purlely a money making issue, more people on a ship = more money?

 

Because it seems to me that just about everyone loves the Island or Coral Princess. Why aren't there more?

[OrlEngr]

I believe its a money making thing ... Locations like the Caribbean it is more cost effective to put as many people on board as possible. But realizing there is demand to see and go thru the Panama Canal ... Some Ships this size must exist ...FYI .... The Coral/Island is the largest size ship that can fit thru the Canal

 

Having been on the Coral ... I can highly recommend it!:)

[mii]

I ask that myself every single time I plan a cruise that does not involve the Coral/Island. I have been on the Coral twice and as far as I am concerned it is the best for size available. I would imagine the only reason they are making the behemouths is to put as many passengers on those big ships. In other words money, money. Give me the Coral anydayto sail on. And by the way if it was me going to Alaska I would sail the Coral. I plan to do a b2b on her in 2008.

 

Marilyn

[cruiserjanet]

I would love to see another Coral/Island size ship. Maybe they will plan one after the Emerald. ;) We took the Island to Alaska and Hawaii and would do so again if the opportunity presents itself.

[LisaH]

We are booked on the Island next July for Alaska - in one of the bump-out mini suites. We have cruised on the Sun Princess 3 times and the Ocean Princess once. I have been told that the Island and Coral are the closest to the Sun class ship - and we loved those.

 

Can't wait for next July. Would have been nice this summer to escape the hotter and drier than normal Dallas area.

[spongerob]

I seem to recall that Princess had options to build two more ships in the Coral class. I know that the Coral's delivery was delayed which caused Princess to cancel some cruises at the last minute. That costs a LOT of money. I also seem to recall that Island Princess was delivered on time, but still needed some work. As a result, Princess was not happy with the shipyard and did not pick up the option for the other two ships.

 

It's also possible that Princess decided to simply go with the larger ships to increase ROI.

 

I suspect that the final decision not to build the other two Coral class ships is a combination of both.

 

I think a ship along the lines of HAL's Vista class would be quite suitable. That is a Fincantieri design, so it should be quite adaptable to Princess.

[Mully too]

We cruised on the Island through the Panama Canal in April 04. We love the size of this ship. We are now booked on the Coral for Alaska in August,07. Can't wait.

 

We really enjoy the smaller ships.

 

Jan

[CruisinMaterial]

I seem to recall that Princess had options to build two more ships in the Coral class. I know that the Coral's delivery was delayed which caused Princess to cancel some cruises at the last minute. That costs a LOT of money. I also seem to recall that Island Princess was delivered on time, but still needed some work. As a result, Princess was not happy with the shipyard and did not pick up the option for the other two ships.

 

It's also possible that Princess decided to simply go with the larger ships to increase ROI.

 

I suspect that the final decision not to build the other two Coral class ships is a combination of both.

 

I think a ship along the lines of HAL's Vista class would be quite suitable. That is a Fincantieri design, so it should be quite adaptable to Princess.

 

Well said! You hit the nail right on the head. The shipyard that designed both vessels and constructed them couldn't keep up with the scheduled delivery and this forced all sorts of cancellations on the Coral Princess. As a result, Princess lost money and they took it out of the Shipyards hide!

 

They managed to deliver the Island Princess on-time but as you mentioned, it wasn't completely finished. The crew onboard the Coral Princess were irritated because portions of the cew area, including some A/C units were not installed when they handed over the ship to Princess.

 

Ultimately I read somewhere that because of the unreliability of the shipyard to produce a quality product that they weren't exercising the options for the remaining vessels in the fleet. I sailed the second cruise out on the ship and it was incredible but the ship had TONS of problems. The aft lounge with the revolving stage had all the motors put in backwards so of course they didn't work right! The engineers were on our sailing fixing tons of things, you wouldn't have noticed it so much if they weren't constantly around. It didn't detract from my cruise though. I still enjoyed it and the production esepcially designed for the Vista Lounge was put on the last night of the cruise so we didn't miss anything at all!

 

Again, well said and I totally agree with your assessment based on what I read elsewhere and saw with my own eyes just after Coral's delivery.

 

~Jake

[flamomo]

Having sailed on both the Coral (Panama Canal) and the Island (Hawaii), and on the Sun, I must say I totally agree. Although the Sun was a nice ship, we really love the Coral and the Island. We are disappointed that, in 2008, when we repeat the Hawaiian itinerary, it will be aboard the Diamond. I'm sure it's a lovely ship, but we also understand that it is larger (with many more Pax), and we don't know how we feel about that.

We do book our cruises for the itinerary, not the ship, so I guess we'll have to be flexible. Maybe we'll love it.

[Franknca]

Having sailed on both the Coral (Panama Canal) and the Island (Hawaii), and on the Sun, I must say I totally agree. Although the Sun was a nice ship, we really love the Coral and the Island. We are disappointed that, in 2008, when we repeat the Hawaiian itinerary, it will be aboard the Diamond. I'm sure it's a lovely ship, but we also understand that it is larger (with many more Pax), and we don't know how we feel about that.

We do book our cruises for the itinerary, not the ship, so I guess we'll have to be flexible. Maybe we'll love it.

 

We've sailed on both the Coral and Island too plus many Sun and Grand class ships and I agree, the Coral and Island are our favorites. It is too bad the shipyard had those problems as I wish there were more Coral/Island cruises to choose from. After the Coral, we like the Sun class. And lastly the Grand.

Frank-in-CA

[Druke I]

Coral and Island were built by Chantiers, France, and truth of the matter is that Princess is less than enamored with the quality of work done in France.

 

The majority of Princess ships have been built by Fincantieri, Italy.

 

Princess gets a "better price" in Italy than it does in France.

 

I for one would love to see a new series of ships, somewhere in the neighborhood of 50,000GRT 1200PAX, but I won't hold my breath.

[GloriaF]

Too bad Princess can't figure out how to give us what we want. As spongerob mentioned, HAL's Vista class ships are a similar size and built by Ficantieri also, so Princess should be able to work something out if they were motivated to do so.

 

The Regal is also a lovely ship! We are booked on the Sun Princess Nov 30th and are looking forward to experiencing this class ship. I hope the Sun class is similar to the Regal.

[FredS]

For my money I like the Royal/Regal size ships. We do not need all the "extras" that the bigger ships provide; do not use them. We spent 21 days on the Royal and had no problems finding things to do. That being said; having been on the Diamond/Shapphire I did not find that I felt it was croweded. People were spread out, except around the pools, so you did not notice the great number of people. In some ways I enjoyed the way HAL's MS Amsterdam had the lounges set up and the way traffic flowed better than the Princess ships.

[Tom O.]

I too love the Island/Coral ships and I wish they had more of this size around. But I must admit that I don't think the "bumped out" sections of the ship were a good idea. It is great if you are in one of the bumped out sections, not so great if you are not.

Ships this size can be built at any major shipyard. It is just a matter of Princess ordering them.

It was mentioned here that Princess can make more money on larger ships. But another way to look at it is this: If larger ships are more profitable, then Princess can offer cheaper fares on these large ships. In other words the profit can be passed down to the passengers.

As much as I love the smaller ships, if I am faced with paying substantially more for a cruise on a small ship, I would opt for the large one. I have a tight budget, and need for my cruising dollars to go as far as possible.

If the difference in price is small, then I would opt for the smaller ship.

[terrierjohn]

I seem to recall that Princess had options to build two more ships in the Coral class. I know that the Coral's delivery was delayed which caused Princess to cancel some cruises at the last minute. That costs a LOT of money. I also seem to recall that Island Princess was delivered on time, but still needed some work. As a result, Princess was not happy with the shipyard and did not pick up the option for the other two ships.

 

It's also possible that Princess decided to simply go with the larger ships to increase ROI.

 

I suspect that the final decision not to build the other two Coral class ships is a combination of both.

 

I think a ship along the lines of HAL's Vista class would be quite suitable. That is a Fincantieri design, so it should be quite adaptable to Princess.

Have cruised on both Coral & Island and loved them, but not yet cruised on a Grand class, like many other CC'ers I don't like the idea of sharing the sun bathing areas and the public rooms with 600-1000 more passengers.

Not certain I agree that a Vista class would make a suitable alternative though. We have sailed on P&O's Arcadia and the lack of a large Coral style atrium was very dissappointing, also it only has one theatre and only one dining room spread over 2 decks. Even the new Cunarder, Queen Victoria, follows most of these features, so maybe changing the design is not an easy option.

John.

[dazee8]

Tom,

 

You are right in that on a larger ship you do get the advantage of more choice of cabins and probably a lower rate on your stateroom. Both of these points are very important to us too when we are trying to get the most out of our "cruising dollar."

 

We always look at the pros and cons to any cruise we are looking to take, but I have to say the smaller ship does win out most of the time. Big hoards of people is not really our cup of tea, but we can deal with it if need be.

 

:) Dazee

[Franknca]

Have cruised on both Coral & Island and loved them, but not yet cruised on a Grand class, like many other CC'ers I don't like the idea of sharing the sun bathing areas and the public rooms with 600-1000 more passengers.

Not certain I agree that a Vista class would make a suitable alternative though. We have sailed on P&O's Arcadia and the lack of a large Coral style atrium was very dissappointing, also it only has one theatre and only one dining room spread over 2 decks. Even the new Cunarder, Queen Victoria, follows most of these features, so maybe changing the design is not an easy option.

John.

 

Probably the main two items I don't like about the Grand class is the lack of privacy on balconies and the limited elevator service to the traditional diining room.

Frank