Winter 2015/16 Itineraries

[CRUISIN LINDA]

I've put it on fb Sailaway. It's very popular :)

[Sailaway487]

New destinations for winter 2015/16 are:

 

Valle Gran Ray - La Gomera

Argostoli - Kefalonia

Bequia - The Grenadines

Holguin - Cuba

Kings Wharf - Bermuda

Mersin - Turkey

Mindelo - Cape Verde

Puerto de la Estace - El Hierro

Santiago de Cuba - Cuba

Trujillo - Honduras

[Sailaway487]

Blog piece on Thomson's site:

 

http://www.thomson.co.uk/blog/2014/11/thomson-cruises-launches-winter-2015-holidays/#.VF59BFOsUQQ

 

Although dates have been put on wrong, says 2015 instead of 2016. :o

 

Interestingly for the Aegean itinerary it says Thomson Spirit will be sailing it from November to April. Either it will just do those months or perhaps it could be doing a full winter season this time!

[Malch_uk]

Blog piece on Thomson's site:

 

http://www.thomson.co.uk/blog/2014/11/thomson-cruises-launches-winter-2015-holidays/#.VF59BFOsUQQ

 

Although dates have been put on wrong, says 2015 instead of 2016. :o

 

Interestingly for the Aegean itinerary it says Thomson Spirit will be sailing it from November to April. Either it will just do those months or perhaps it could be doing a full winter season this time!

 

I think they have got the Spirit dates the wrong way round and they should read April to November. Everything will be closed between November and April. Just heard from a friend who was in Rhodes (with Saga) at the end of September and she was complaining that everything was winding down and the hotel was half empty.

[okavango]

I think they have got the Spirit dates the wrong way round and they should read April to November. Everything will be closed between November and April. Just heard from a friend who was in Rhodes (with Saga) at the end of September and she was complaining that everything was winding down and the hotel was half empty.

 

why would they have announced it under the winter 2015 banner then???????, actually makes perfect sense to start doing year round with Spirit. thom's are pumping a lot of brass into the job so they need more than a 7 month season to recoup that investment, was a lot of thoms/louis top brass aboard in the last weeks sorting out the changes

[okavango]

Blog piece on Thomson's site:

 

http://www.thomson.co.uk/blog/2014/11/thomson-cruises-launches-winter-2015-holidays/#.VF59BFOsUQQ

 

Although dates have been put on wrong, says 2015 instead of 2016. :o

 

Interestingly for the Aegean itinerary it says Thomson Spirit will be sailing it from November to April. Either it will just do those months or perhaps it could be doing a full winter season this time!

 

what makes you say the dates wrong ????? thoms are talking winter 2015/16 not winter 2016/17 ,they always describe winter as just the year it starts in,

winter 2014 winter 2015 winter 2016

 

 

edit: just read again and yes it should say to april 2016

Edited November 9, 2014 by okavango

[Sailaway487]

Release date has been brought forward! They will be now on sale by the end of this month.

[okavango]

Release date has been brought forward! They will be now on sale by the end of this month.

 

hope so, very interesting as to what home port Spirit would use, looking at this winters flight schedules for the region theres nothing jumping out that would match the logistics required before about march

[BaggersCruising]

hope so, very interesting as to what home port Spirit would use, looking at this winters flight schedules for the region theres nothing jumping out that would match the logistics required before about march

 

Spirit is normally laid up over Winter and not in use by Thomson.

[okavango]

Spirit is normally laid up over Winter and not in use by Thomson.

 

suggest reading the beginning of the thread including the link

[BaggersCruising]

suggest reading the beginning of the thread including the link

 

What am I looking for, exactly?

[okavango]

What am I looking for, exactly?

 

that Thoms have announced (or thats what it seems) that Spirit WILL be sailing a through winter itinary next year (2015/2016)

[BaggersCruising]

that Thoms have announced (or thats what it seems) that Spirit WILL be sailing a through winter itinary next year (2015/2016)

 

The only link that seems to support that is Thomson's own blog, but as they've got all the other dates wrong, I would take it with a pinch of salt until the brochure proves us wrong.

 

http://www.thomson.co.uk/blog/2014/11/thomson-cruises-launches-winter-2015-holidays/#.VGxzpfmsUfR

 

For example, it mentions it's new Cuban Revolution itinerary, sailing from 26th January 2015. However, Jan/Feb/Mar/Apr 2015's Cuban itineraries are called Cuban Fusion, and the blog is supposed to be talking about Winter 2015/2016, which means that it should read as 2016. In addition, the Dream is booked into Grand Cayman every other week through the winter season, starting 24 December 2015, but then is also booked into Funchal, Madeira for NYE!

 

The dates are incorrect all the way through the article.

[okavango]

The only link that seems to support that is Thomson's own blog, but as they've got all the other dates wrong, I would take it with a pinch of salt until the brochure proves us wrong.

 

http://www.thomson.co.uk/blog/2014/11/thomson-cruises-launches-winter-2015-holidays/#.VGxzpfmsUfR

 

For example, it mentions it's new Cuban Revolution itinerary, sailing from 26th January 2015. However, Jan/Feb/Mar/Apr 2015's Cuban itineraries are called Cuban Fusion, and the blog is supposed to be talking about Winter 2015/2016, which means that it should read as 2016. In addition, the Dream is booked into Grand Cayman every other week through the winter season, starting 24 December 2015, but then is also booked into Funchal, Madeira for NYE!

 

The dates are incorrect all the way through the article.

 

yes they have made a cock up with the dates BUT the article IS definately referring to next winter so i would be pretty certain that the bit about Spirit is correct or it would not even come in to the equation of winter sailing itineries and would not be mentioned at all

[geomagot]

so....all 4 ships will be sailing next winter? :eek::cool: ...or could it be that spirit will be covering for dry docks??

[BaggersCruising]

yes they have made a cock up with the dates BUT the article IS definately referring to next winter so i would be pretty certain that the bit about Spirit is correct or it would not even come in to the equation of winter sailing itineries and would not be mentioned at all

 

Well, we'll find out either way in a ten days time!

 

In any case, I did say that the Spirit is normally laid up over Winter, not that Thomson are always guaranteed to have it laid up over the Winter.

[okavango]

Well, we'll find out either way in a ten days time!

 

In any case, I did say that the Spirit is normally laid up over Winter, not that Thomson are always guaranteed to have it laid up over the Winter.

 

i think we will find Spirit will become a year round ship every year from next year, Thoms are not going to pump all that money in to "rent" it back for 7 months a year, there are also changes to the "divi up" as well from next year so 7 months would not be as attractive to Louis either

[Sailaway487]

TUI did say they were going to extend their Greek season into the winter, so I'm guessing this will be a reflection of it. If they do operate Spirit all year round, I would have thought the most sensible option would be to operate cruises out of Limassol or possibly Antalya.

[geomagot]

imo...i think they may struggle to fill 4 ships? especially in february (unless its dirt cheap)

[Sailaway487]

imo...i think they may struggle to fill 4 ships? especially in february (unless its dirt cheap)

 

Did they try once before with IE operating eastern Med over the winter but pulled the itineraries because of low sales? I'd personally love the Spirit to go to the Far East but it doesn't look like that is happening anytime soon. :(

[happy v]

TUI did say they were going to extend their Greek season into the winter, so I'm guessing this will be a reflection of it. If they do operate Spirit all year round, I would have thought the most sensible option would be to operate cruises out of Limassol or possibly Antalya.

 

The weather isn't too good in Greece during the winter.

[okavango]

i see we have now got the official dates for winter 2015/16

 

looks like spirit is just doing extended seasons rather than being full winter, based back at limassol sailing nov 4th,11th,18th then a break till 2nd march then through till 20th april (thats as far as dates go at the moment as it will be classed as summer after that)

these dates seem to work in with the normal winter flight schedules for paphos, to sail between the end of nov and beginning of march would need extra flights as very few to paphos in that period to accomodate an extra 1200 people a week.

[mtt]

booked the spirit for next april agean titans