New Cruise Line: Paradise Caribbean

[KINGBOBOFTHENORTH]

Port Canaveral announced this past Wednesday that a new cruise line will begin service to the Bahamas later this year offering 1-night and 2-night cruises, according to an article in the Orlando Sentinel.

 

The new line, Paradise Caribbean Cruise Line, plans to operate its 16,000-ton ship Orient Queen from Port Canaveral. Voyages are expected to begin in November or December. I could not locate a website yet for this cruise line and a ship with that name is not in the directory I have. The ship has 392 cabins and underwent $15M in renovations, according to a port spokeswoman.

 

Until 2000, Cape Canaveral Cruse Lines operated 2-night cruises from Port Canaveral to Freeport using the famous Dolphin IV. During 2003 the short-lived Ocean Club Cruises operated the ship Mirage 1 (formerly Bolero) on the same route with some sailings to Nassau and Key West. Bankruptcy ended service on both lines.

 

Let's hope Paradise Caribbean does better.

 

BobK/Orlando

[dougnewmanatsea]

This is an interesting development... From what I've read, the man behind this was previously in charge of Ocean Club Cruises and was also involved with Canaveral Cruise Lines. Both of this were failed ventures which operated similar short cruises from Port Canaveral, though to be fair Canaveral Cruise Lines did seem to be reasonably successful until their ship, the ancient DOLPHIN IV, had major mechanical problems which forced her to be sold for scrap. They never acquired a new ship but some of the same people started up Ocean Club which turned out to be a flop. It seems that we are seeing the same concept and the same people once again with Paradise Caribbean, though with a nicer ship... Canaveral's DOLPHIN IV was, as I said, an absolute antique - too dated even for Premier Cruises, a company which only had old ships! - and Ocean Club used a ship called MIRAGE I which was nothing more than a glorified North Sea ferry (though I know one person who sailed in her and thought she was actually pretty decent).

 

This ship, ORIENT QUEEN, was built in 1968 as NCL's STARWARD; she was the first ship purpose-built for NCL (their first ship, SUNWARD, was briefly used on a short-lived ferry service between England and Spain before going to NCL). NCL kept her all the way until 1995 when she was sold to Festival Cruises and renamed BOLERO. They went bankrupt in 2004 and she was sold again to a Lebanese company, Abou Merhi Cruises, who renamed her ORIENT QUEEN. After a massive refit, she entered service on cruises from Beirut in the spring of 2005. For the winter 2005-2006 season she repositioned to Dubai for a series of cruises based there, but was not successful. The remainder of the winter programme was cancelled a few months back but she is still scheduled to do her Beirut-based summer programme, which apparently was more successful. It seems that it is in November, after this is completed, that she is supposed to begin service from Port Canaveral. My guess is that Abou Merhi are hoping to use her in the summer on their own run from Beirut, and then charter her out to this new company during the winter rather than using her on the unsccessful Dubai service.

 

Abou Merhi have an excellent web site here which has lots of deck plans, photos, etc. As you can see, in 2004 she received a huge refit and as a result looks very modern internally, though I don't know anyone who has been aboard since the refit so I can't confirm whether she is as nice in person as she looks on the web site. Nonetheless her owners did dump quite a lot of money into her and she was not a bad ship to begin with, so I guess she should be pretty nice. It does remain to be seen whether this new operation can compete against the various giants in the Florida cruise market, though Imperial Majesty Cruises, a similar company based out of Port Everglads, have been extremely successful so I guess it is possible. At any rate it is always nice to see new entrants into the market... Competition is good!

[KINGBOBOFTHENORTH]

Host Doug, thanks so much for the information and the link. I couldn't find anything on my own.

 

I do believe there is a niche for this type of service but the difficulties are numerous. This ship is only 1-ton larger than Mirage 1 that Ocean Club used and I've previously read some horror stories about Mirage 1 getting stuck in storms. Hopefully if service is limited to winters and springs then they won't be effected by the daily afternoon thunderstorms and only have to deal with the few cold fronts that pass through.

 

Another difficulty is the destination of Freeport/Grand Bahama Island. There is so little to do there and it pales to Nassau, which is too distant from Port Canaveral to operate on 2-night sailings. Another problem is pricing. A 2-night cruise has to be priced lower than the 3-night cruises that Royal Caribbean and Carnival offer from the same port to Nassau, the better destination. Also, beginning soon all passengers must have a passport. A cruise line used to catch a bus load of passengers marketing to tourists who were already visiting Florida, with the attraction being a quick trip to the Bahamas. In the future you'd have to catch these people before they get to Florida so that they bring their passports with them....if they have one. The list of difficulties goes on and on.

 

But I'll certainly give them a try, if only to add another ship to my roster of cruises. I just hope they change the name....Orient Queen just isn't a good marketing name for a Florida-departing ship and I think it will cause them difficulties if they don't rename her to something more alluring.

 

BobK/Orlando

 

PS-Looked at their website and the ship actually looks pretty decent. It's not the Sovereign of the Seas by any means, but for a 2-night trip to Freeport, I think I'd do it.

[artureo]

Host Doug is correct - for the most part - the ship (x-Starward) is gorgious. BUT...from my research, the company (Paradise) is a complex diversion of smoke and mirrors. Tenmark Marine, operator of Paradise, is supposed to have the vessel chartered, but the ship's broker says otherwise. Additionally, Tenmark Marine, the operators/owners of Paradise, have hired and turned to an executive team that has a history of failure. For example, Ocean Club Cruises (Mirage) was a great formula for success but failed miserably. Here we go again...Furthermore, the President of Tenmark has NEVER operated or had any association with the cruise industry (Mr. Munir Kahn). Tenmark's only history with a passenger ship is a bankrupt casino hull sitting in Freeport.

 

Buyer(s) beware...there are no records for Paradise on file for a cruise line bond, a license or even a company in the State of Florida under the name of Paradise Caribbean Cruise Lines. This smells bad - do the homework...

 

The concept is great, but can it be delivered...IMO probably not. I would only sail if I could pay the fare at the end of the cruise with these guys...

[MEA707]

This ship, ORIENT QUEEN, was built in 1968 as NCL's STARWARD; she was the first ship purpose-built for NCL (their first ship, SUNWARD, was briefly used on a short-lived ferry service between England and Spain before going to NCL). NCL kept her all the way until 1995 when she was sold to Festival Cruises and renamed BOLERO. They went bankrupt in 2004 and she was sold again to a Lebanese company, Abou Merhi Cruises, who renamed her ORIENT QUEEN. After a massive refit, she entered service on cruises from Beirut in the spring of 2005. For the winter 2005-2006 season she repositioned to Dubai for a series of cruises based there, but was not successful. The remainder of the winter programme was cancelled a few months back but she is still scheduled to do her Beirut-based summer programme, which apparently was more successful. It seems that it is in November, after this is completed, that she is supposed to begin service from Port Canaveral. My guess is that Abou Merhi are hoping to use her in the summer on their own run from Beirut, and then charter her out to this new company during the winter rather than using her on the unsccessful Dubai service.

 

Abou Merhi have an excellent web site here which has lots of deck plans, photos, etc. As you can see, in 2004 she received a huge refit and as a result looks very modern internally, though I don't know anyone who has been aboard since the refit so I can't confirm whether she is as nice in person as she looks on the web site. Nonetheless her owners did dump quite a lot of money into her and she was not a bad ship to begin with, so I guess she should be pretty nice. It does remain to be seen whether this new operation can compete against the various giants in the Florida cruise market, though Imperial Majesty Cruises, a similar company based out of Port Everglads, have been extremely successful so I guess it is possible. At any rate it is always nice to see new entrants into the market... Competition is good!

 

I just got back from Beirut yesterday (beautiful city) and spotted the ORIENT QUEEN docked at port. She just started the 2006 summer season and is operating a one week long Mediterranean cruise routing Beirut - Port Said - Limassol - Rhodes - Marmaris - Antalya - Beirut departing every Tuesday from the Port of Beirut.

 

She looks very good from the outside. I forgot how many millions of dollars they spent on restoring it. They added a helicopter pad on its bow, so there were some changes to the exterior.

 

I picked up a brochure of the ORIENT QUEEN from the Abou Merhi Cruises main office in downtown Beirut and from the photos, the inside looks very nice and modern. There is a room full of Playstation 2 consoles for kids, I know those weren't around back in 1968 when she was built. ;)

 

By the way, Abou Merhi Cruises' plans have always been to operate Mediterranean cruises in the summer from Beirut and charter her out to other companies during the winter season. Beirut (and much of the Mediterranean) gets gloomy and wet in the winter, so it's not an ideal time to operate cruises. The Dubai cruises were not successful, so there will not be a repeat of them. It was the vacation companies who chartered the her that lost though, not Abou Merhi Cruises, so they are still doing fine.

 

I attached a photo of her docked at port taken a week ago from a helium balloon at 150 meters.

[dougnewmanatsea]

MEA707, thanks for the update.

 

Does your username refer to one of these :) ?

[MEA707]

Does your username refer to one of these :) ?

 

It indeed does! :)

[KINGBOBOFTHENORTH]

I saw over at the Cybercruises website that Louis Cruise Lines has signed a deal to lease the Orient Queen for 5 years with an option to purchase the ship for $22M within the first six months of the lease.

 

Appears that this ship will NOT be coming to Port Canaveral this winter for 2-night cruises. Too bad.

 

BobK/Orlando

[dougnewmanatsea]

I am still waiting for Lelakis from Regency to start something soon.

After the Regency debacle, I doubt he could ever get anything off the ground.