Signature Luxury Travel & Style
UNCHARTED WATERS
Recovery and calmer waters ahead for the cruise industry
If 1992 was The Queen’s annus horribilis, 2020 will surely be consigned to history as the cruise industry’s worst year ever. Battered by the ongoing storm of COVID-19 and a raft of negative publicity, this booming, multi-billion-dollar business went from full steam ahead to a dead stop in a few turbulent months.
As cruise lines scrambled to manage the global crisis, voyages were cancelled, passengers sent home, crews laid off, and ships held at anchor waiting for the tempest to abate. Not since World War II have cruise ships sailed in such perilous and uncharted waters.
But the industry is resilient, and there are positive – albeit tentative – signs that calmer waters lie ahead.
Buoyed by unwavering consumer loyalty, a forward-thinking approach to solving public health challenges, and a dogged determination to set sail again, cruise lines are now working together for the common good. And the results are starting to show.
While the 2021 cruise calendar remains fluid as global COVID cases fluctuate, advance bookings for 2022/23 are on the rise and, in some cases, breaking records.
Consumer confidence suggests a significant pent-up demand for a return to cruising as soon as it’s safe to do so. Indeed, a recent survey of readers by Signature Media revealed that almost half of all respondents would book a cruise once travel restrictions are lifted.
Far from lying idle, many ships have returned to their home ports, offering cruises to local markets to help keep vessels operating, attracting a new generation of passengers and, most importantly, providing cruise lines with the opportunity to adopt and test stringent new health, safety and sanitation protocols.
Other vessels are isolating in COVID-safe ‘bubbles’, notably in the South Pacific, in readiness for international borders to reopen, and the industry itself has been working with governments around the world on new measures to protect future passengers on board, and on shore.
The Healthy Sail Panel – formed in June 2020 by Royal Caribbean Group and Norwegian Cruise Lines Holdings, along with many leading medical and scientific experts – has delivered 74 ‘best practices’ to protect the public health and safety of guests, crew and the communities cruise ships visit. Cruise Lines Industry Association (CLIA) has also announced significant steps forward in the industry’s global response to COVID-19, with the adoption of mandatory measures to support a phased-in, highly controlled resumption of cruise operations in key regions in the United States, the Caribbean, Mexico and Central America.
The measures – including testing of all passengers and crew prior to embarkation, the mandatory wearing of masks, social distancing and fresh air ventilation – have been submitted to the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
CLIA Managing Director Australasia Joel Katz says this will help guide discussions on the resumption of cruising in other parts of the world, including Australia and New Zealand. “These initiatives are part of a response that goes far beyond the measures of other industries and involves stringent protocols covering the entire cruise experience from booking to disembarkation,” he says.
Major cruise lines are watching developments closely and also making plans for a carefully phased regional return
to Australasian waters, subject to the lifting of travel restrictions.
Regent Seven Seas Cruises will deploy Seven Seas Explorer in the Asia-Pacific region at the end of 2021 for a summer sailing season. She will be joined Down Under by Seven Seas Mariner, to offer a range of all-inclusive itineraries in early 2022. The luxury cruise line has also broken booking records for the second consecutive year, this time for its 2023 ‘World Cruise’ aboard Seven Seas Mariner.
Oceania Cruises’ Regatta and Insignia will also sail in Australian and Kiwi waters for the 2021/22 season with a series of immersive cruises from November 2021.
Building on its existing collection of Australian and New Zealand voyages for 2021, Silversea recently launched its most extensive Antipodean program to date, setting sail between October 2021 and April 2022 with 12 close-to-home voyages on Silver Muse and new-look Silver Shadow, as well as in-depth expeditions on Silver Cloud and Silver Explorer in the Kimberley region and further afield.
With comprehensive COVID-safe protocols already in place, Ponant has resumed cruises in Europe, the Arctic and French Polynesia and completed 50 voyages since July 2020. The company is also working with authorities to secure the presence of two small ships once they can re-enter Australian waters, with a planned 16 expeditions in the Kimberley from
May to September 2021. The 180-guest Explorer ship, Le Lapérouse, is currently located in New Caledonia, while Le Soléal is in Papeete ready to sail when permitted.
Ponant’s sister company, Paul Gauguin Cruises, has itineraries planned in French Polynesia, Fiji, Tonga and the Cook Islands throughout 2021, while Norwegian Cruise Line’s newly refurbished Norwegian Spirit will sail in Australia and NZ waters during her 2021/22 summer season, joined by Norwegian Sun in Asia in 2021.
Further afield, the new MS Roald Amundsen and MS Fridtjof Nansen, along
“Advance bookings are on the rise and, in some cases, breaking records”
with the refurbished MS Fram, will lead Hurtigruten’s expedition fleet in the Arctic, visiting Greenland, Iceland, Svalbard, the Northwest Passage and Alaska. All three vessels will explore Antarctica on freshly minted itineraries for the 2021/22 season.
New ships are also on the horizon. Seabourn Venture is set to launch in December 2021 with an inaugural winter season of luxury expedition cruises in Norway, while new cruise line Tradewind Voyages will debut Golden Horizon, the world’s largest square-rigged sailing ship.
Despite the ongoing virus, cruise lines remain buoyant. “While the current situation has certainly presented a unique set of challenges, we know that luxury travellers cannot wait to sail again,” says Steve Odell, senior vice president and managing director for Oceania Cruises and Regent Seven Seas Cruises Asia-Pacific.
“We are using this time to develop and implement industry-leading standards that will meet or exceed all requirements, to give travellers the confidence to return to the seas. We are excited to welcome our guests back on board as soon as the time is right.”