By
Rebecca Gibson |
Carnival Cruise Lines will expand its capacity on three- and four-day Bahamas cruises from Port Canaveral in the US by 34% in 2016.
Carnival Victory, currently based at PortMiami, will reposition to Port Canaveral to replace the smaller Carnival Sensation on the short Bahamas cruise programme in February 2016. The vessel, which will offer additional guest capacity, more onboard features and more than 500 balcony staterooms, will sail three-day cruises to Nassau and four-day voyages to both Nassau and Freeport. While in the Bahamas, guests will be able to visit beaches, shops and restaurants, and participate in various watersports including snorkelling, scuba diving, kayaking, parasailing and deep-sea fishing.
In October 2016, Carnival Victory will be replaced by Carnival Valor, which is currently based in Port Canaveral and is scheduled to undergo an extensive drydock to add Fun 2.0 enhancements next March. Carnival Valor will offer the cruises on a year-round basis and become the line’s only Fun 2.0 ship to operate three- and four-day cruises.
Carnival will also offer new year-round, seven-day itineraries from Port Canaveral next winter.
Repositioning to Port Canaveral in December 2016, Carnival Magic will offer an exclusive eight-day cruise, which departs on 9 December and calls at St. Maarten, San Juan in Puerto Rico, Amber Cove and Grand Turk.
The ship will then offer year-round, seven-day western Caribbean route featuring Cozumel, Mexico; Belize; Mahogany Bay (Isla Roatan); and Costa Maya. The ship will also operate a seven-day eastern Caribbean itinerary calling at St. Thomas in the US Virgin Islands; San Juan in Puerto Rico; Grand Turk and Nassau or Amber Cove.
Carnival Sunshine, which is the only ship in the Carnival fleet to offer all of the line’s Fun Ship 2.0 innovations, will continue to offer seasonal five- to eight-day Caribbean voyages from Port Canaveral.
“We are significantly ‘upping our game’ in Port Canaveral with the addition of these great new ships to the important and growing Central Florida market,” said Christine Duffy, Carnival’s president. “When these ships join the spectacular Carnival Sunshine, this dynamic trio of Fun 2.0 Ships will offer our guests and valued travel agent partners with the widest array of attractive and convenient cruising options from the Space Coast.”
Meanwhile, Carnival Sensation will reposition to Miami to offer year-round four-day cruises to Key West in Florida, US; Cozumel in Mexico; the private Bahamian island of Half Moon Cay; and Nassau in the Bahamas. She will also sail five-day cruises to Grand Turk in Turks and Caicos Islands; Ocho Rios in Jamaica; Grand Cayman in the Cayman Islands; the soon-to-be-opened Amber Cove in the Dominican Republic; and Freeport, Nassau and Half Moon Cay in the Bahamas.