As this MONA LISA/KUNGSHOLM Decked! is revisited eight years on, the lovely liner is dead-headed to Piraeus to destore fittings prior to being sold. It appears that two attempts to bring the ship to Sweden (the first to her former home port of Gothenburg and the second, to Stockholm) have officially collapsed. The ex KUNGSHOLM, [...]
Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth will be naming Cunard’s latest vessel, the QUEEN ELIZABETH in Southampton on Monday, October 11, 2010, just prior to the ship’s maiden sailing on October 12. This will be the fourth Cunarder named by Her Majesty, who launched the SS CARONIA while still a princess in 1947. She also christened the [...]
August 30, 2010 UPDATE: The MAESTRO is now officially beached behind the remains of WINNER 5 (ex AUSONIA). MAESTRO will be cleared for breaking in a couple weeks, allowing WINNER’s demolition to be completed. Once that occurs, she will be dragged closer to the shore, stripped and cut down. Meanwhile, another Japanese-built ferry has arrived [...]
The 1955-built mini-liner MV WAPPEN VON HAMBURG, after a long life and years of neglect, is about to embark upon a new life along the San Francisco waterfront as the MV AURORA. Part one of this Decked! feature details this handsome ship’s history from German coastal liner to pioneering cruise ship and Christian accommodation vessel [...]
Carnival Corporation has ordered the seventh new ship for its German-based AIDA Cruises subsidy in the past six years. The 71,300 gt cruise ship will carry 2.192 passengers and will be constructed by the Meyer-Werft yard in Papenburg, Germany. The line’s goal is to have 10 “club” ships by 2013. The new vessel, due in [...]
Join Peter Knego on his latest Sea Trek aboard the 1955-built MV AURORA (ex WAPPEN VON HAMBURG, DELOS, PACIFIC STAR, POLAR STAR, XANADU, EXPEX, FAITHFUL) as she is towed from her recent moorings at Rio Vista in the Sacramento River Delta to her new home, Pier 38 on San Francisco’s revitalized waterfront. Click here to [...]
Paul Motter, editor of top-notch cruising website CruiseMates.com, was one of a few hand-selected journalists recently invited to Fincantieri’s Monfalcone shipyard for a tour of the newbuilding QUEEN ELIZABETH nine weeks before her scheduled completion. He has provided his readers with a detailed preview of the ship’s myriad features as workers scurried through a beehive [...]
Writing the first portion of this post from the starboard forward suite (now called cabin 107) on board the lovely little AURORA (ex WAPPEN VON HAMBURG, DELOS, XANADU, etc.) as she is towed by the 1936-built former research vessel ROBERT GRAY. We departed Rio Vista, CA in the Sacramento River Delta at 03:00 this morning [...]
Princess Cruises’ 116,000 gt, 2004-built MV SAPPHIRE PRINCESS had a second encounter with a whale, this time a 43 foot adult female humpback, between Juneau and Ketchikan at approximately 6:00 AM Wednesday, July 28. The 2,670 passenger ship had to stop south of Douglas Island so the carcass could be removed from the bulbous bow [...]
Kristina Cruises has announced today that its 1960-built MV KRISTINA REGINA (ex BORE) may be sold to a newly-formed Turku-based company, Oy S/S Borea Ab for use as a floating hotel and museum. The handsome twin funneled, 4,295 gt liner, which was originally steam powered, will be forced out of service this autumn due to [...]
