Page 5 - Cruise Industry News Secondhand Market Report

Intro /

f the few new deals that have gotten done recently, many the ship to the new brand saw cost overruns, the end result was
Ohad asterisks on them. on time and more than doubled the company’s capacity.
Villa Vie Residences was busy preparing to launch its resi- Celestyal Cruises saw a new-to-them ship put into service earlier
dential cruising concept as this report was published in August, this year as the company has a completely refreshed fleet. The
but the start up was already 90 days behind schedule. The ship, company purchased the 1993-built Celestyal Journey, the former
bought for an estimated $12 million, is over 30 years old and Ryndam, in March 2023, and started operations in September.
needed much more work than anticipated and was still at a repair That was followed by the 2003-built Celestyal Discovery, which
facility in Belfast. was the former AIDAaura and was purchased in November when
Further south in Europe, Cruise Saudi was putting the finishing a previous deal Carnival had to sell the ship fell through. The
touches on its first ship for the Aroya brand, which had its launch Discovery entered operations in March. With the fleet refreshed,
pushed back to later in the year as the startup makes continued the 1992-built Crystal and 1982-built Olympia have been retired.
changes to the former World Dream. They picked up the ship at In China, Blue Dream welcomed the Blue Dream Melody, an ex-
an auction for $300 million in late 2022. AIDA ship. That start up has come at the expense of the company’s
One project that did go to plan was the former Costa Atlantica, other ship, the Blue Dream Star, which sits laid up in a Chinese shipyard.
which Margaritaville at Sea turned into their latest and greatest Meanwhile, a number of cruise ships continue to be laid up in
cruise concept, offering short cruises from Tampa. While multiple Greece that were bought by ferry operator Seajets. Plans to start
sources that asked not to be named noted that the conversion of their own cruise line in summer 2024 have been pushed back a year.

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 Celestyal has upgraded its fleet with more modern tonnage.

Cruise Industry News: Secondhand Market 1983 – 2024 5