Costa Cruises announced on 3rd August that the 75,166gt/1996 built Costa Victoria will leave the Chinese market and return to Europe for Balearic Islands itineraries as from late March 2018. At that same time the 53,015gt/1991 built Costa neoClassica is to leave the fleet. The Costa Victoria will take over the Costa neoRiviera’s cruise program, while the 48,200gt/1999 built Costa neoRiviera will take over the neoClassica’s programme. The Costa neoClassica is the oldest ship in the Costa fleet but her buyer has not yet been named.

Disney Cruise Line has decided to further expand its fleet by adding a third vessel to its order book. The first two vessels under the company’s next phase of expansion were ordered in March 2016 from the Meyer Werft shipyard in Germany. The new ship will also be constructed by the same yard. The ship names, design plans and itineraries are still in development. The three new 135,000gt ships will be powered by LNG and will offer 1,250 guest staterooms.

Fred. Olsen Cruise’s 28,613gt/1972 built Black Watch returned to Rosyth for another cruising season from 14th August with a sevennight Lochs of Scotland sailing. In total, the company offered eight cruises from Rosyth between August and 14th October, an increase of one turnaround call compared to 2016. New to the Rosyth itineraries this year were two river cruises, German Waterways and French Rivers. The Black Watch has benefitted from an extensive multi-million pound refurbishment, and now offers guests improved facilities on board, including a new informal dining area, Brigadoon, and the creation of a new speciality dining restaurant, The Black Watch Room, as well as an upgraded Glentanar main restaurant and new 3D-enabled Marina Theatre. In 2018/19, Fred. Olsen will be reinforcing its commitment to Rosyth by introducing the 45,437gt/1988 built flagship, the Balmoral, which will make her debut at the port in May 2018.

One Ocean Expedition is to expand its capacity by 40-50% in 2019 when another vessel is chartered to operate alongside the Akademik Ioffe and Akademik Sergey Vavilo, a pair of Russian research vessels. The RCGS Resolute is better known as the 8,378gt/1991 Hanseatic (above) of Hapag-Lloyd Cruises. The Canadian operator is chartering the ship with options extending through 2028. The ship will debut for One Ocean Expeditions in the Antarctica market in November 2018 having concluded her final Hapag-Lloyd Cruises season in September 2018. The RCGS Resolute was ordered in 1989 for Society Expeditions for a June 1991 delivery as the Society Adventurer, with a second ship planned to follow a year later. The ship was never delivered to her intended owner and was then saleslisted, finding a charter with Hanseatic Tours of Germany in March 1993. The ship was renamed Hanseatic and Hanseatic Tours was purchased by Hapag-Lloyd four years later.

P&O Cruises announced on 1st August that it had become the first British cruise line to be able to conduct same sex weddings at sea, with the first ceremony to be held in the Caribbean in January 2018. This follows a recent Supreme Court ruling enabling same sex marriages in Bermuda, where all the ships in the fleet (except the Southampton registered Britannia) are registered. The first wedding will be held aboard the Azura in the Caribbean in January 2018. The wedding ceremony will be performed by the ship’s Captain and the marriage license will be issued by Bermuda. The company also has a public naming completion underway for the new ship to be delivered in 2020. Boaty McBoatface will not be one of the options, nor anything similar!

Poseidon Expeditions is reportedly progressing towards confirming a new ship in time for the 2020 Arctic cruise season. The ship should have a capacity for 150-passengers but, for the time being, the company charters the 4,200gt/1991 built Sea Spirit from SunStone. The company started out as Poseidon Arctic Voyages in 1999, offering charter voyages on icebreakers to the North Pole and Russian High Arctic. The Sea Spirit ventures south to Antarctica for the winter, running a longer season than most operators, starting in early November.

TUI Cruises’ 69,472gt/1996 built TUI Discovery (formerly the Royal Caribbean Cruises ship Splendour of the Seas) will be based in Southampton during September 2018 offering itineraries to Northern Europe including the Norwegian Fjords. The ship will also homeport at the Port of Tyne in 2018 and will cruise to Norway, Iceland and the Baltic.

Victory Cruise Lines has announced that it has acquired the sister ship to the Victory I, to be named the Victory II, to launch a service in Canada/New England in May 2018. The Victory II will undertake her inaugural voyage from Boston, Massachusetts, on 20th May, the first of a series of seven-night Canada and New England cruises. The itineraries between Boston/Gloucester, Massachusetts, and Halifax, Nova Scotia, will call at the most popular ports along the coast. The Victory II was launched as the Cape Cod Light in 2001, having been built by Atlantic Marine in Florida. Both the Victory I and Victory II were each built at a cost of $30 million and entered service in 2001 for Delta Queen Coastal Voyages, a subsidiary of American Classic Voyages. The ships were designed to resemble the classic coastal steamers of the late 1800s and entered service with itineraries throughout the Great Lakes, Canadian Maritime Provinces, the East Coast and the South. Powered by Caterpillar diesel engines, the vessels had a cruising speed of 13 knots when new and the order originally included three more sisterships.

Viking Cruises has extended its 2018/19 season due to the new 47,842gt Viking Sun being scheduled to leave the shipyard in October, a few weeks earlier than expected. Six new itineraries have been released, along with additional departure dates.