RUMOUR - New addition to P&O Australia fleet

[Jean C]

2 hours ago, MMDown Under said:

Re P&O Australia ships, Are they well maintained?  I have cruised on a lot of old well maintained cruise ships, which are a joy to cruise on.

Hi, my experience with older ships is that maintenance workers are constantly, and annoyingly during a cruise holiday, chip  chop, chipping away at the rust. The other downside is that cabins, especially the bathrooms, aren't refurbished, other than bedding, and carpets and curtains when they reach a beyond acceptable condition. Pacific Pearl and Sea Princess are my references 🛳

[reeves35]

As I posted upthread, Carnival Corp write down their fleet over 30 years with a 15% residual though many are sold off before that depending on fleet needs.  Refurbs are depreciated over varying periods depending on how long Carnival think they will onto the ship. 

 

Any ship over 20 years would be classified as old.  Typically, by 20 years, the ship would have been through at least 2 major refurbishments over its life but there are always things that give away the ship's age with cabin bathrooms being top of that list.  Cruise lines typically just persist with this and either sell the itineraries at a comparative discount to the newer fleet members or operate the fleet out of lesser ports (eg Mobile AL) or with less important members of the corporation (eg P&O Aust) but , occasionally, they bite the bullet and do an even more thorough refurbishment that involves taking the cabins back to the metal and refreshing the ship bow to stern.  NCL has just done this with Norwegian Spirit at a cost of USD100M. 

 

Spirit was 20 years old when refurbished (ironically, she is basically the same age and size as Carnival Spirit)  and, given the extensive nature of her rebuild, she would be expected to operate for NCL for at least another decade. 

 

P&O Australia may do well to consider lobbying Carnival Corp to do a similar major refit with ships such as Coral Princess or Island Princess.  New ships are all now well over 140K tonnes which is arguably too big for many South Pacific and Australian ports.  A well-rebuilt circa-2000 build ship of around 90K tonnes with up-to-date amenities would be loved down here and able to successfully operate here until well into the 2030s.

 

Edited May 23, 2023 by reeves35
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[MMDown Under]

3 hours ago, reeves35 said:

As I posted upthread, Carnival Corp write down their fleet over 30 years with a 15% residual though many are sold off before that depending on fleet needs.  Refurbs are depreciated over varying periods depending on how long Carnival think they will onto the ship. 

 

Any ship over 20 years would be classified as old.  Typically, by 20 years, the ship would have been through at least 2 major refurbishments over its life but there are always things that give away the ship's age with cabin bathrooms being top of that list.  Cruise lines typically just persist with this and either sell the itineraries at a comparative discount to the newer fleet members or operate the fleet out of lesser ports (eg Mobile AL) or with less important members of the corporation (eg P&O Aust) but , occasionally, they bite the bullet and do an even more thorough refurbishment that involves taking the cabins back to the metal and refreshing the ship bow to stern.  NCL has just done this with Norwegian Spirit at a cost of USD100M. 

 

Spirit was 20 years old when refurbished (ironically, she is basically the same age and size as Carnival Spirit)  and, given the extensive nature of her rebuild, she would be expected to operate for NCL for at least another decade. 

 

P&O Australia may do well to consider lobbying Carnival Corp to do a similar major refit with ships such as Coral Princess or Island Princess.  New ships are all now well over 140K tonnes which is arguably too big for many South Pacific and Australian ports.  A well-rebuilt circa-2000 build ship of around 90K tonnes with up-to-date amenities would be loved down here and able to successfully operate here until well into the 2030s.

 

Do ships of around 90K have a promenade dreck where you can walk right around the ship?  Now that would be treasured Down Under.  After all Australia has the climate for the outdoors.  A treasured cruise memory is of my younger daughter and I sitting on deck chairs outside daily for high tea served from a trolley, by a waiter. 

[capriccio]

6 hours ago, MMDown Under said:

Do ships of around 90K have a promenade dreck where you can walk right around the ship?  Now that would be treasured Down Under.  After all Australia has the climate for the outdoors.  A treasured cruise memory is of my younger daughter and I sitting on deck chairs outside daily for high tea served from a trolley, by a waiter. 

Coral Princess (91,600 gt) has a full promenade with teak and thick cushioned loungers.  We thought it was an excellent ship design for our Round Australia cruise.

[MMDown Under]

3 hours ago, capriccio said:

Coral Princess (91,600 gt) has a full promenade with teak and thick cushioned loungers.  We thought it was an excellent ship design for our Round Australia cruise.

I agree.  It sounds perfect.

[OzKiwiJJ]

8 hours ago, MMDown Under said:

I agree.  It sounds perfect.

Coral is perfect for Australia and I can't see why Princess is sending her back to the US late 2024. Instead they are giving us Royal class ships with no promenade deck, an expanded Grand class ship that holds too many passengers for the standard public spaces including the MDRs, and one regular Grand class ship. I don't think we'll be cruising with Princess much after the 2024 world cruise. 

[arxcards]

34 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Coral is perfect for Australia and I can't see why Princess is sending her back to the US late 2024. Instead they are giving us Royal class ships with no promenade deck, an expanded Grand class ship that holds too many passengers for the standard public spaces including the MDRs, and one regular Grand class ship. I don't think we'll be cruising with Princess much after the 2024 world cruise. 

They are not sending her back but taking her back. She is also perfect for Panama cruises, and the US market always matters more than us antipodeans who will cruise on anything. In normal circumstances, I don't think she would have been sent here, so I am glad to get the opportunity, but also disappointed she is going.

 

Who knows, bring on Pacific Coral in 2027

[MMDown Under]

42 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Coral is perfect for Australia and I can't see why Princess is sending her back to the US late 2024. Instead they are giving us Royal class ships with no promenade deck, an expanded Grand class ship that holds too many passengers for the standard public spaces including the MDRs, and one regular Grand class ship. I don't think we'll be cruising with Princess much after the 2024 world cruise. 

If people don’t cruise on unsuitable sized ships for our region maybe we’ll get more suitable size ships. 
I’ve been disappointed with itineraries on offer.

 

 

[icat2000]

The itineraries are so poor for us at the moment. I've been looking overseas too for cruising but then you look at the flight cost. Makes me depressed.

[Kiwi_cruiser]

In my option if P&O was going to get the Grand Princess, I would thought that they would have got her instead of the Star Princess.

 

If P&O are going to get another Princess ship I think it going to be the Sapphire Princess or Diamond Princess.

 

I also I think the next ship P&O might get will be a Carnival or Costa ship. I cant see them getting another Holland America ships, as P&O off loaded those two Ex Holland America ships as soon as they could!, which covid help with.

 

 

[Kiwi_cruiser]

On 5/24/2023 at 1:57 AM, arxcards said:

Who knows, bring on Pacific Coral in 2027

 

Trademark 🤣

[arxcards]

10 minutes ago, Kiwi_cruiser said:

 

Trademark 🤣

You can have it. Get your new page sorted early Stu 🤣

[ceeceeDee]

I guess we can speculate all we like. Only time will tell. The only sure thing is that it won't be the Titanic!🤣

[NSWP]

19 hours ago, ceeceeDee said:

I guess we can speculate all we like. Only time will tell. The only sure thing is that it won't be the Titanic!🤣

But it might be 'Pacific Mary' (ex QM2 in 2040, lol.)

[MicCanberra]

IMO, the ship is likely to come from Carnival or Princess as Stu surmised.

[CarnivalShips480]

5 hours ago, MicCanberra said:

IMO, the ship is likely to come from Carnival or Princess as Stu surmised.

Not Carnival. We don't have an extra ship that we could give away

[arxcards]

23 minutes ago, CarnivalShips480 said:

Not Carnival. We don't have an extra ship that we could give away

I agree. Australia hasn't scored a Carnival cruise line hand-me-down since 2005. Carnival is more likely to employ ships for the full 30 year life cycle by keeping them operating in their minor ports. 

[MicCanberra]

Perhaps they may get there new build like what was promised years ago

[OzKiwiJJ]

On 5/24/2023 at 11:03 AM, MMDown Under said:

If people don’t cruise on unsuitable sized ships for our region maybe we’ll get more suitable size ships. 
I’ve been disappointed with itineraries on offer.

 

 

Me too. I've booked a token Diamond Princess Queensland cruise for 2025 but may not even bother doing it in the end. 

[ceeceeDee]

We have just returned from a cruise on Pacific Encounter. Scuttlebutt is (source was a crew member so may be a tad reliable, who really knows except P&O executives) that Explorer has already been sold and that Coral Princess will be coming over to the P&O fleet in the not too distant future. Coral was launched in 2002 which would make her around the same age as Encounter and five years younger than Explorer.

Guess we'll all have to be patient and see what eventuates.

[reeves35]

31 minutes ago, ceeceeDee said:

We have just returned from a cruise on Pacific Encounter. Scuttlebutt is (source was a crew member so may be a tad reliable, who really knows except P&O executives) that Explorer has already been sold and that Coral Princess will be coming over to the P&O fleet in the not too distant future. Coral was launched in 2002 which would make her around the same age as Encounter and five years younger than Explorer.

Guess we'll all have to be patient and see what eventuates.

It would be good if true.  Hopefully, they would spend a bit on a major refurb before the transfer so the ship could remain in the fleet for a good period of time. 

[arxcards]

44 minutes ago, ceeceeDee said:

We have just returned from a cruise on Pacific Encounter. Scuttlebutt is (source was a crew member so may be a tad reliable, who really knows except P&O executives) that Explorer has already been sold and that Coral Princess will be coming over to the P&O fleet in the not too distant future. Coral was launched in 2002 which would make her around the same age as Encounter and five years younger than Explorer.

Guess we'll all have to be patient and see what eventuates.

Crew advice on these things is particularly unreliable.

 

I agree it would be nice, but I would rather see her cruising here as a Princess. Curious why they have only recently released Coral's Panama itineraries for 24/25 which follows Coral's full set of Australian cruises (including 2 nominally sold-out world cruises) through till October 2024. Coral's Panama relocation was only announced not much more than a month ago.

 

That 30 year thing mentioned earlier in the thread usually pans out to be true. I think we will be hearing this rumour doing laps until late 2025, when an announcement is made about Explorer leaving the fleet in 2026/27.

[Ondine]

It would make more sense for Grand to go to P&O as she is almost identical to Encounter and Adventure.  Also she is the oldest in the Princess fleet.

[SinbadThePorter]

46 minutes ago, Ondine said:

It would make more sense for Grand to go to P&O as she is almost identical to Encounter and Adventure.

 

But no trolley handle. ☹️

[Ondine]

I reckon the trolley handles are the best part of the Grand Class chips.  Lovely to hide out in during the day.