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Latest News...Holland America Line has named Zuiderdam as the next vessel to receive a major refit under the company’s multi-year Holland America Evolution program, the largest fleet update in its 153-year history. The ship will follow Oosterdam as the second of six vessels scheduled for extensive enhancements that introduce new stateroom categories, refreshed accommodations and expanded public spaces...
Five of the ships will be built in Italy at Fincantieri and the other four will be built at Meyer split between the yard in Germany and the recently acquired Turku yard in Finland.
They did not specify which brands would get these new builds which are scheduled for delivery between 2019 and 2022.
These are on top of the current new buildings which includes two for AIDA, two for Carnival, two for Holland America and one for Princess and the recently delivered new ship for P&O.
All of the new ships are large ships so I am excluding smaller brands like Seabourn which also has a new build.
HAL Cruises still operate a number of oldish cruise ships, compared with the rest of the Carnival group companies, although two of their present fleet will shortly be transfered to the fleet of P & O Australia Cruises.
I wonder if P & O Australia will ever get a new cruise ship as over the years it has always been the old passenger ships of the UK P & O Cruises fleet which came under the management of P & O Australia.
One of the most popular ships there was the 1961 built ' ss Oriana ' which was nick named ' The First Lady of the Sea ' and had a song written about her, with that title, by the ' Sir Deuce ' group who regularly played on board while she was on Australian cruises. ( I have a copy ! )
The ' ss Oriana ' also held the records for the fastest crosssings of both the Indian and Pacific oceans which has still not been beaten by another cruise ship !
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The other factor counting against newbuilds for Australia is during winter, the only real cruising destinations from Eastern Australia are Queensland or the Pacific Islands around New Caledonia or Vanuatu. These places do not have many ports large enough to accept anything much bigger than Spirit class and it is likely the newbuilds at Carnival will all be over 120K tonnes.
Cunard and HAL are becoming more niche operations and unlikely to get anything from this agreement. HAL is already getting two new ships and maybe a third sister ship of the Koningsdam. Additional S Class ships are forsale or maybe headed to Australia. Australia is seen to be doing well with the hand-me-down tonnage plus requires stronger ships than the traditional Carnival Caribbean ships, ie remember the problems with Tropicale and Holiday in Australian waters.
[ 04-01-2015: Message edited by: SSTRAVELER ]
quote:Originally posted by Neil - Ex P & O & PRINCESS CRUISES:had a song written about her, with that title, by the ' Sir Deuce ' group who regularly played on board while she was on Australian cruises.
The United States had several songs! Most people know "Queen of the Seas" but my personal favorite was "I like Harry and he likes knots!" which they struck up on the maiden voyage after she smashed the Queen Mary's speed on the Atlantic and claimed the passenger ship record for round trip on the Atlantic. She of course also had the highest margin increase in speed over any previous record holder in the history of the record and it was all achieved without operating at her top speed! Harry of course was a reference to Harry Manning, Commodore of United States Lines.
A lot of ships had songs though. When I sailed with Royal Viking we had the "Royal Viking Waltz" which was played especially when we sailed each port.
The Royal Viking Sun adopted Here Comes The Sun and Oh What A Wonderful World as her songs as well.
Swedish America and Norwegian American I believe also had company songs that reflected their national heritage.
QE2 also became famous when she had a dispute with the Soviet authorities. As she turned and sailed off triumphantly someone (likely a member of the cruise staff) blasted out Rule Britannia over the loud speaker system much to the delight of her passengers (and the captain although for political reasons he could only smile politely and say he did not know who had done that)!
quote:Originally posted by SSTRAVELER:Additional S Class ships are forsale or maybe headed to Australia. Australia is seen to be doing well with the hand-me-down tonnage plus requires stronger ships than the traditional Carnival Caribbean ships, ie remember the problems with Tropicale and Holiday in Australian waters.[ 04-01-2015: Message edited by: SSTRAVELER ]
Depending on the success of the S class, it is possible that more will head to P&O Australia. They are strong ships suitable for Australian waters.
It was Jubilee that became Pacific Sun not Holiday, but your comment is valid.
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