Cruise Hive is your go-to supply for main cruise developments and breaking cruise information. On this week’s cruise information replace, we’ve obtained protection from Carnival Cruise Line, Cunard, Royal Caribbean, Norwegian Cruise Line, and the Bahamas.
Cruise Information Replace
It’s time to get rolling with this week’s high cruise information tales from Cruise Hive. We now have full protection in regards to the famous person who will christen the brand new Carnival Jubilee, a brand new tax cruise strains should pay the Bahamas, Cunard growing its gratuity costs, a restaurant proprietor who took her complete workers on a cruise, tough climate forcing Carnival Magic to depart from a port with out all visitors onboard, and Norwegian Cruise Line deploying a ship to Jacksonville, Florida.
Gwen Stefani to Function Godmother to Carnival Jubilee
Famous person singer-songwriter Gwen Stefani, a three-time Grammy Award winner, will function godmother to Carnival Cruise Line’s latest ship, Carnival Jubilee, throughout a festive naming ceremony in Galveston, Texas, on February 24, 2024.
Identified for her many philanthropic contributions to charities and foundations, the soloist and lead singer of the band No Doubt joins different notable girls who’ve served as godmothers for Carnival Cruise Line, equivalent to artist Queen Latifah, who named Carnival Horizon, and tv host and singer Kathie Lee Gifford, who christened Carnival Celebration.
The naming ceremony for Carnival Jubilee, home-porting in Galveston, can be partly dwell streamed on the Carnival Cruise Line Fb web page beginning at 3:30 p.m., CST.
Ship christenings are time-honored, maritime traditions that usually contain the smashing of a champagne bottle into the vessel’s hull. The ceremony is claimed to carry good luck and secure passage to the ship and people who sail aboard her.
Carnival Jubilee, with capability for six,500 visitors and 1,750 crew members, entered service on December 23, 2023 and is the road’s third Excel-class vessel. The ship sails 7-day Western Caribbean cruises with calls at Cozumel and Costa Maya, Mexico, and Mahogany Bay (Roatan), Honduras.
Bahamas Provides VAT to Cruise Line Non-public Island Income
Cruise strains can be required to pay a ten% value-added tax (VAT) on items and providers offered to visitors visiting their personal islands within the Bahamas, efficient on March 1, 2024.
The brand new tax coverage is designed to stage the taking part in area between the favored cruise line retreats and native Bahamian companies, Simon Wilson, an official of the Bahamas Ministry of Finance, instructed an area media outlet.
Beneath the revised tax plan, cruise strains must pay VAT on nearly any transactions happening on their islands, equivalent to these for meals, drinks, spa therapies, cabana leases, and leisure actions.
The Bahamian authorities is accepting suggestions from the cruise strains till February 16, 2024, and there may be certain to be some, since operational prices will spike as soon as the coverage is enacted.
The query is: Will the cruise strains cross on the VAT to visitors?
Non-public island retreats are wildly well-liked with cruisers. Among the many locations within the Bahamas are Disney Cruise Line’s Castaway Cay; Royal Caribbean’s Good Day at CocoCay; Norwegian Cruise Line’s Nice Stirrup Cay; MSC Cruises’ Ocean Cay Marine Reserve; and Carnival Company’s Princess Cay and Half Moon Cay.
Cunard Line Cunard Set to Increase Each day Gratuity Charges
A second Carnival Company cruise model introduced it’ll increase every day gratuity charges for lodge and eating providers, beginning in late April 2024.
Cunard is a luxurious, UK-based line that operates three ships, Queen Elizabeth, Queen Victoria, and Queen Mary 2, and can quickly debut its fourth, Queen Anne, set to launch in Could 2024.
The road at present costs $14.50 per particular person, per day for visitors in Britannia staterooms, and $16.50 per particular person, per day for these in Queens and Princess Grill suites.
Efficient with departures after April 25, 2024 on Queen Elizabeth, and after April 27, 2024 on Queen Victoria and Queen Mary 2, the costs will rise to $16 per particular person, per day for visitors in Britannia staterooms and to $18 per particular person, per day for these in Queens and Princess Grill suites.
The every day service costs are routinely utilized to visitors’ onboard accounts, and are divided amongst crew members who present varied providers, equivalent to cabin stewards and wait workers.
One other Carnival model, Holland America Line, introduced in mid-January that it’s going to increase charges beginning February 14, 2024, to $17 per particular person, per day for non-suite staterooms and to $19 per particular person, per day for suite visitors.
Restaurant Proprietor Treats Staff to Caribbean Cruise
The workers of Pier 16, a well-liked seafood restaurant in Tybee Island, Georgia, not solely work collectively, they cruise collectively too, because of the generosity of their boss, eatery proprietor Natalia Navon.
Navon reveals her appreciation to her workers by closing the venue for every week and rewarding employees with a bunch trip annually. This 12 months she handled them to a 5-night crusing aboard Royal Caribbean’s Mariner of the Seas.
The group, which seems to be about 20 individuals, traveled from Georgia to Port Canaveral, Florida, the place the three,100-guest Mariner of the Seas is home-ported. The January 6, 2024 itinerary known as at Costa Maya and Cozumel, Mexico, and featured two days at sea.
Pier 16, a family-owned operation that opened in 2020, has loyal patrons who help the eatery and applaud Navon’s trip custom.
Among the many adventures that Pier 16 workers had the chance to take a look at onboard Mariner of the Seas are the Good Storm waterslide, the FlowRider browsing simulator, and Sky Pad, a digital actuality bungee trampoline, amongst different actions and leisure.
Carnival Magic Collides With Pier in Jamaica
A drama performed out onboard Carnival Cruise Line’s Carnival Magic on the morning of February 6, 2024, when excessive winds and massive swells brought on the 130,000-gross ton ship to hit the pier the place she was docked at Ocho Rios, Jamaica.
A video of the incident reveals a part of the dock cracking and crumbling beneath the stress from the ship’s impression. There was no fast indication of any injury to the ship.
No accidents had been reported, however sea situations and the chance of hitting the pier once more prompted the ship’s captain to take the vessel out to sea. Sadly, some visitors had already departed the ship for shore excursions, and had been briefly left behind.
Nonetheless, the cruise line’s shoreside groups and native companions taken care of these visitors, who had been capable of return to the ship after she docked at one other, close by pier later that day.
Carnival Magic left Miami on February 4, 2024 to sail a 6-day itinerary that included calls at Bimini, Ocho Rios, and Grand Cayman. In actual fact, hostile climate introduced the ship to Ocho Rios a day sooner than scheduled, and ongoing tough seas pressured the ship to cancel her name at Grand Cayman on February 8, 2024.
The Dream-class ship, which launched in 2011, is on her method again to Miami, the place the cruise will conclude on February 10, 2024.
Seasonal Ship Headed to Jacksonville in 2025
Norwegian Cruise Line will deploy its Norwegian Gem to Jacksonville, Florida, in November 2025, working a collection of seasonal cruises to the Bahamas and Jap Caribbean. The house-porting is the results of a three-year settlement between the road and the JAXPORT Board of Administrators, and alerts a significant enlargement of the port’s cruise operations.
Beneath the pact, Norwegian Gem will sail from Jacksonville between November and April via 2028. The two,400-guest ship joins Carnival Cruise Line’s 2,000-guest Carnival Elation, which is predicated at JAXPORT year-round.
The addition of Norwegian Gem is predicted to be an financial boon to the northern Florida metropolis, which is inside driving distance of some 98 million residents within the southeastern US. In a examine from pre-pandemic 2019, the cruise trade in Jacksonville supported some 800 jobs and contributed an annual financial impression of $187 million to the area.
The Jewel-class Norwegian Gem, which entered service in 2007, will provide brief and lengthy voyages, together with two 11-day and three 12-day sailings to the Jap Caribbean.
Scheduled port calls embrace Nice Stirrup Cay, the cruise line’s personal island within the Bahamas; Dominican Republic; St. Thomas and St. John, US Virgin Islands; Antigua; St. Kitts; and Puerto Rico, amongst others.
Shorter, 4- and 5-day choices will function Nice Stirrup Cay, and Freeport and Nassau, Bahamas. Bookings will open on February 15, 2024.
Extra Cruise Headlines
These had been simply among the information tales Cruise Hive lined up to now week. For extra developments, examine Cunard’s large reserving spike in January, the ‘love boat’ cruise line welcoming a particular Valentine’s Day visitor, Margaritaville at Sea updating its Heroes Sail Free deal, Carnival Company making strides on its emissions-reduction targets, and an thrilling new Carnival Cruise Line itinerary from Seattle to Sydney.
