Cruise Lines Navigate Shifting Tides and New Waves of Interest
Cruise West has added sailings through the Columbia River Gorge.
THE ships are newer and bigger. The onboard movies glow in 3-D, even lurch in 4-D. Massages and body wraps await in the spa. Yet the cruise may be cheaper than last year’s — or, at least, cheaper than you were expecting. Setting sail in a recession, cruise lines are not only slashing prices but also adapting to travelers’ economic nervousness by redesigning their itineraries with shorter trips, closer to home, to offer more attainable options.
Interest Guide
Norwegian Jade is Norwegian Cruise Line’s first ship operating permanently in Europe.
North American ports will be busier, and fewer ships will be setting out on multiweek voyages to faraway places like Australia. It’s all part of convincing travelers that cruises are still affordable vacations.
“We are talking more about value than we have in the past,” said Brad Ball, a spokesman for Silversea Cruises, a small luxury ship line, which added shorter cruises in the Mediterranean and Baltic Seas this year. “We are offering more seven- and nine-day options. With a seven-day cruise, you add in two days of travel time and are really only away from the office for about a week.”
At the same time, cruisers who want plenty of luxury and adventure, recession or no recession, will easily find it. Big new ships, ordered in palmier days, are hitting the waves equipped to serve the highest-paying passengers with lavishly appointed staterooms spacious enough for a small family reunion. Specialized itineraries continue to proliferate, giving travelers an intensive focus on topics from tennis to global warming. And many cruise lines are actively developing itineraries in Europe and the Middle East aimed at building a more international cruise audience.
Welcome to America
A Carnival Cruise Lines ship, the Carnival Liberty, was once scheduled for a summer of Mediterranean sailings but is now staying put in Miami and won’t go farther than the Caribbean. Some brand-new ships, like the Carnival Dream and Royal Caribbean’s Oasis of the Seas, will stick close to North America. It’s all part of a larger trend in cruising this year. Many ship lines are reining in deployments in Europe and far-flung destinations like the South Pacific and Australia, and itineraries closer to home are getting a new look.
Small luxury operators and big mass-market players alike are offering more trips that don’t last longer than a week. And some voyages that once began and ended in different cruise ports now operate out of one city round-trip, a change that cruise lines expect will trim passengers’ airfare costs.
“The exotic cruises are really suffering this year,” said Carolyn Spencer Brown, editor in chief of CruiseCritic.com, an online cruise magazine. “Everyone is pulling back. Australia and New Zealand is dying because it’s too far, too expensive and too long of a trip for the younger traveler.”
Passengers will see more options from ports easily reached from the Eastern Seaboard. Bermuda, with a new cruise terminal in King’s Wharf, will be getting sailings from Norwegian Cruise Line, which runs trips from five United States ports. Holland America will add Bermuda sailings in 2010.
Carnival is starting year-round service out of Baltimore in April. Trips of six to eight days will include stops in the Bahamas, the Turks and Caicos, and Florida. Celebrity Cruises, which canceled all its itineraries in Australia and New Zealand that had been scheduled for the end of 2009, is repositioning a ship to Baltimore in November to sail trips of 9 and 12 nights to the Caribbean. Fares start at around $700. Twelve-night voyages stop in St. Thomas, St. Croix, St. Kitts, St. Johns, Antigua and St. Maarten, while nine-night trips stick to the Bahamas and Key West.
In the fall, look for new itineraries to New England and Canada from Costa Cruises and Silversea. Silversea, which hasn’t sailed in this region in three years, is offering a 10-day trip in October from Montreal, starting at $4,936, with stops in Halifax and in Bar Harbor, Me. Costa will run trips out of New York and Quebec that stop in Newport, R.I.; Boston; and Bar Harbor.
A handful of new and larger ships are moving to the West Coast. For sailings to Mexico, Carnival is putting a larger ship in Long Beach, Calif., and Royal Caribbean is moving its 3,114-passenger Mariner of the Seas to Los Angeles for seven-day cruises starting this month. Cruise West added 18 departure dates for its eight-day Columbia River cruises out of Portland, Ore., that goes through the Columbia River Gorge and makes stops in places like Hood River, Ore., and Walla Walla, Wash.
Half of Carnival Cruise Lines’ fleet is on itineraries of five days or less, and this year the line is putting larger and newer ships in both New Orleans and Mobile, Ala. Ships out of both ports run a series of four- and five-day cruises; trips out of New Orleans visit Progreso on the Yucatán Peninsula and Cozumel, and include two full days at sea.
Even the adventure cruise line Lindblad Expeditions, best known for multiweek trips to Antarctica and the Galápagos Islands guided by on-board naturalists, is offering shorter trips in North America. It first offered four-night cruises last year and is selling those itineraries again on trips to Baja California, San Francisco Bay and the Pacific Northwest. A five-day trip in Baja California, out of La Paz, Mexico, starts at $1,990 in December, about $1,200 less than the eight-day itinerary.
Maiden Voyages
New ships, ordered in recession-free days, will emerge this year from all corners of the market — river cruise operators, small luxury lines and mass-market giants. In line with the trends of the past few years, when plusher and bigger were the rule, many of them will be huge and luxurious.
Royal Caribbean will introduce the 5,400-passenger Oasis of the Seas, said to be the largest cruise ship in the world, late in the year. Oasis of the Seas will have an 82-foot zip line, a hand-carved carousel and a new category of guest rooms called loft suites. The largest loft suites, complete with outdoor dining areas, sleep six and still have room for a baby grand piano. The ship will begin regular seven-night sailings out of Fort Lauderdale to St. Thomas, St. Maarten and the Bahamas on Dec. 5 — fares start at $1,739 but drop to $969 in January 2010.
For spa lovers, this will be a very good year.
Two new ships from Costa Cruises, the Luminosa, coming in May, and the Pacifica, coming in June, will have some staterooms that allow guests to access a spa via a private stairway or elevator. Two spa treatments are built into the cost of these rooms, along with meals at a restaurant serving healthy cuisine. This summer the Luminosa will be based in Amsterdam for Baltic and Scandinavian cruises while the Pacifica will sail in the western Mediterranean.
Equinox, a Celebrity Cruises ship taking its first cruise in August, will have AquaClass rooms, accommodations with upgraded robes and slippers, in-room aromatherapy and free access to the relaxation room and sauna of the ship’s spa. The ship starts sailings in Europe, stopping at ports in Israel, before heading to Fort Lauderdale in the winter for Caribbean cruises.
Carnival is also diving in, with the 3,646-passenger Carnival Dream in September. Its spa staterooms will come with priority reservations at the spa, free access to fitness classes and the steam and sauna of the thermal suite.
Even smaller ships are focusing on improving the spa experience. In June, the Yachts of Seabourn will launch the Seabourn Odyssey, the largest ship in its fleet, complete with an 11,400-square-foot spa and two private spa villas available for half-day rentals. “It is three times the size of our other ships but will carry only twice the number of guests, so it’s left us a lot of room to play with,” said Bruce Good, a spokesman for Seabourn. “We don’t have the space on the other ships for this kind of spa.” The two spa villas on the upper deck can be reserved by, for example, small groups for a half-day of massages followed by lunch and lounging on a private wraparound deck. The Odyssey will sail out of Athens, Venice and Istanbul in the summer and fall, before moving to the Caribbean.
In other new ships this year, travelers can expect larger staterooms and an expansion of premium offerings. Silversea’s Silver Spirit, launching in December, will be the line’s largest ship to date. It is adding more of its Silver Suites and will increase the size by about 100 square feet. The first cruise will sail in Europe, making stops in the south of Spain and Casablanca. It will then make a trans-Atlantic journey before embarking on a lengthy South American trip in early 2010.
In May, Viking River Cruises will introduce the Viking Legend, which will have two 310-square-foot suites that will be the largest guest rooms in its European fleet. Most cabins on the Legend will have balconies, an unusual feature for river cruise ships. The ship will travel on 15-day itineraries along the Danube, Main and Rhine rivers between Amsterdam and Budapest.
The ship within a ship — an exclusive area with upgraded amenities, extra service and private pools and lounges — is an increasingly common luxury offering. MSC Cruises will expand its MSC Yacht Club accommodations to a second ship, the new MSC Splendida, this summer. Yacht Club rooms include butler service, access to a special lounge and pool just for Yacht Club passengers, and special menu items. Princess Cruises is expanding its adults-only area called the Sanctuary, an outdoor lounge lined with massage cabanas, to seven more ships this year.
Norwegian is taking the premium service a step further, creating shore excursions aimed at travelers who book its Courtyard Villas, which have butler service. Options include dining in a private home in Tuscany. “You will never take a bus,” said Andy Stuart, executive vice president of global sales and passenger services at Norwegian Cruise Line. “These are exclusive tours and very private, upscale experiences.”
Back on board, cruise lines are moving to add a wow factor to entertainment. The biggest trend? The expansion of on-board 3-D movies. Disney Cruise Line recently began showing first-run 3-D movies on ships and plans to add special effects like fog and lasers this year. MSC’s newest ships go to 4-D: a wraparound screen with 3-D effects plus seats that move and vibrate during the show. Both Carnival and Princess are also expanding outdoor theaters to more ships this year, while Costa will introduce its own take on the 4-D cinema along with in-room PlayStation games available through cabins’ televisions.
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