After more than a year-long pause in operations, Iceland ProCruises is planning to begin sailing in July, according to 2021 Expedition Market Report by Cruise Industry News.

“We decided to cancel the whole season at the end of March 2020. We made that decision very early because we knew what was coming,” CEO and owner Gudmundur Kjartansson said.

Kjartansson said that luckily many passengers who booked for 2020 decided to rebook for 2021.

“And some of those we booked from 2021 we have now already rebooked from May-June – since we’re only starting in the beginning of July – into July, August or September. They have been rebooked twice, so they are very flexible,” Kjartansson said gratefully.

The cruise line, which runs Iceland circumnavigation voyages onboard the Ocean Diamond (a ship shared with Quark Expeditions), as well as a couple of Greenland itineraries, will be restarting with vaccinated crew members. Guests, at interview time, won’t need to be vaccinated to sail.

“We will accept those who have been vaccinated, of course, but those who have not had the vaccine, most likely – this has not been decided yet by the authorities – will have to bring a PCR test with them from home no older than 72 hours. Then, they will be tested on the border again, a second test. They will get their results the same day or next day and, if they’re negative, they can travel without any problems,” Kjartansson said.

Another news for the cruise line is the addition of the Seaventure to the fleet, which will be sub-chartered by Iceland ProCruises. The Seaventure, formerly known as the MS Bremen sailing for Hapag-Lloyd, will be deployed for Iceland ProCruises’ Greenland sailings from 2022.

“It’s at a good, similar-sized ship with 82 cabins, and we intend to take that into operation in 2022,” Kjartansson stated