Carnival Imagination Photo Tour and Commentary

Between 1990 and 1998, Carnival Cruise Lines built eight nearly-identical ships known as the Fantasy class. When these ships entered service, they were among the largest and most modern cruise ships in service and were often referred to as “superliners.” As time has gone on, however, cruise ships have become much larger and have added more and more features. Consequently, the Fantasy-class ships are now often referred to as the “small ships” in Carnival’s fleet.
One by-product of the rapid evolution of cruise ships in recent years is that ships start to become outdated in the eyes of the cruising public before they reach the end of their useful lives as ships. This creates a dilemma for the major cruise lines. Do you sell these ships to other companies that operate in the secondary market or do you make the investment to upgrade them so that they remain competitive in the first tier of the market? On the one hand, these are perfectly good ships that could sail for another decade or more. On the other hand, even an upgraded middle-aged ship is not really competitive with a brand new ship.
Carnival Cruise Lines has chosen to upgrade. In a $235 million program called Evolutions of Fun - - much less than the cost of building one new ship - - it is upgrading the amenities, décor and features of its eight Fantasy class ships. While it may not make them the equal of the competition’s latest ships, they are in the same league. Moreover, it allows Carnival to be present in more markets including serving cities not served by other major cruise lines and to provide types of cruises such as short three or four day cruises which would not make economic sense for a new ship.
Carnival Imagination is one of the Fantasy class ships that has undergone the Evolutions of Fun upgrade. The result is a fresh looking ship with interesting features. Thus, while she may not have everything that one would find on the newer Carnival ships, the ship is able to offer a Carnival-style cruise. This makes her well-suited for providing an economical first taste cruise for newcomers and a good vehicle for short low-cost getaways for Carnival regulars.
My profile of Carnival Imagination is at http://www.beyondships.com/CarnivalImagination-Profile.htmland the photo tour and commentary begins at http://www.beyondships.com/CarnivalImagination-Tour-1.html

Inside Royal Caribbean's Independence of the Seas

Independence of the Seas has a lot going for it. She is currently the largest cruise ship in the world, a title she holds along with her sister ships Freedom of the Seas and Liberty of the Seas. She is full of entertainment and dining venues and has both traditional and innovative outdoor facilities such as a surfing simulator. Just as importantly, the crew is engaged in a near constant effort to entertain the passengers with parades, singing and dancing waiters as well as the usual set of shipboard activities such as trivia contests and bingo.

The ship follows Royal Caribbean’s style of cruising. This style was developed serving the American market. Consequently, the décor, the informality and the emphasis on activity all reflect the country where Royal Caribbean first achieved success.

Recently, however, Royal Caribbean announced that Independence of the Seas’ first summer season sailing out of Southampton, England had been so successful that the ship would be homeported there all year in 2010. What makes this so surprising is that the vast majority of passengers traveling on Independence have not been vacationing Americans but rather British.

When I was onboard Independence, I had the opportunity to talk with Captain Arnolf Remo, Hotel Director Darren Budden and Cruise Director Allan Brooks about Independence and her success in Britain. The resulting article appears at: http://beyondships.com/RCI-IOS-article-UK.html Also, to see what Independence of the Seas looks like, there is the photo tour beginning at http://beyondships.com/RCI-IOS-tour.html

Carnival Pride Photo Tour and Commentary

Carnival Pride and her three Spirit-class sister ships are like the high performance sports cars of the Carnival fleet. Longer but yet smaller than Carnival’s Destiny-class megacruise ships, Pride can whip through the water at 24 knots. Her azipod propulsion system makes her highly maneuverable although I must admit that the Destiny-class ships are surprisingly maneuverable with their traditional propeller system. In any event, her technological prowess carries over and gives the ship something of the same feeling of superiority that comes with owning a performance car.

While Pride is smaller than the Destiny-class ships, especially the latest evolutions of that design such as Carnival Splendor, she offers many of the passenger choices that Carnival features. Indeed, there is even a specialty steakhouse and a flexible dining option in the main restaurant.

Inside, Pride is flamboyant. Carnival designer Joe Farcus has made use of numerous reproductions of Old Master artworks in a tribute to the “icons of beauty.” There is probably not another ship afloat that makes such extensive use of the works of Raphael, Van Gough, Michelangelo, and other renowned painters. These are not lined up one after another as in a museum but rather are blown-up to giant proportions or blended into the décor in interesting ways. Not only does it create a fun, Pop-style environment but it leads one to look around at the detail work and say “Hey, isn’t that from . . . .”

Aside from the hardware, I was impressed by the friendliness of the crew during my recent voyage on Pride. Everyone was friendly and confident in what they were doing.

My profile of Carnival Pride is at: http://beyondships.com/CarnivalPride-Profile.html and the multi-page photo tour and commentary begins at: http://beyondships.com/CarnivalPride-Tour-1.html.

Pride is the 50th ship that I have profiled on Beyondships.com including 10 other Carnival ships, 8 Royal Caribbean ships, 8 Holland America ships, 7 Princess ships, four NCL ships, three each from Cunard, P&O Cruises, and Celebrity Cruises as well as individual ships from three other lines. There is a dedicated section on the website for each ship with a photo tour, copies of menus and daily programs and in many cases interviews with the captain and/or other officers.

Inside Emerald Princess --Talking with the Hotel Director

The senior officer with the most direct responsibility for the things that most directly affect a passenger’s cruise experience is the hotel director (also called the hotel manager or passenger services director). He has responsibility for the accommodations, the dining, the entertainment, the activities, the shore excursions and much more. Therefore, the hotel manager is in a unique position to discuss the type of cruise experience that one will encounter on a particular ship.

Tony Becker is a Passenger Services Director for Princess Cruises. He is from Australia and has had experience with major land-based hotels as well as with other cruise lines, NCL being one of them. Thus, he is able to see the style of vacation experience that Princess offers in perspective.

When I spoke with Tony, he was Passenger Services Director of Emerald Princess. She is one of Princess’ newest ships (2007) and is practically identical to Princess’ newest ship. As Tony said, she is “a beautiful piece of hardware.” But a cruise is not just about interacting with the hardware. What type of cruise experience does a passenger encounter on Emerald Princess? Who does the ship attract? What enables Emerald Princess to sail full even in difficult economic times?

Tony is a very straightforward person and he answered these questions. In addition, he pointed out some features of Emerald Princess that often fail to appear on guest’s radar screens. My conversation with Tony Becker appears at: http://beyondships.com/Princess-EP-art-Becker.html