Longer cruises to new areas.

[Jimsgirl]

Does anyone know if Celebrity is going to expand their cruise base, and do longer cruises with one ship. As I am retired I like to go on longer cruises, but the choice of cruise lines is very limited.

 

Crystal, Seabourn, Cunard and HAL are the only ones. The first three are just too expensive for a solo traveller. at 200% . I am going on a HAL cruise in Jan (30 days )but would really like to do a similar trip on Celebrity

[florisdekort]

How about doing a back to back... Hawaii/Alaska (28 days) on Summit, Panama Canal/Hawaii (28 days) on Infinity, Transatlantic/Northern Europe (22 days) on Constellation, and so on...

 

Best Regards,

Floris

[Gimpster]

Oceania has some long cruises that look appealing to me, but they don't solve your problem of the single supplement.

I'd love to go on the one that calls on Saigon, Da Nang, and Hanoi. I've been to Da Nang, but (mercifully) not to Hanoi....

[Brucemcdou]

Jimsgirl - What a great dilemma to have! You may want to also look at Princess, which does long "combination" cruises. For example, they relocate the Saphire Princess to Australia next fall by sailing from Vancouver around the Bering Strait, Russia, Korea, China, Japan, then HK, Southeast Asia, and finally down to Australia/NZ. I don't know how they handle a single supplement, though.

 

I'm not a particular fan of Princess, and it's not in the league of the other lines you mention but it might be worth your consideration for some interesting itineraries.

 

Also, Peter Deilemann (sp?) is an upscale German line that has some long and interesting itineraries. Maybe you can brush up on your Deutsche!

[Andy]

Does anyone know if Celebrity is going to expand their cruise base, and do longer cruises with one ship. As I am retired I like to go on longer cruises, but the choice of cruise lines is very limited.

 

Crystal, Seabourn, Cunard and HAL are the only ones. The first three are just too expensive for a solo traveller. at 200% . I am going on a HAL cruise in Jan (30 days )but would really like to do a similar trip on Celebrity

 

Hi Jimsgirl !

 

Nice idea, but I cant see it happening until Celebrity has several more ships in their fleet, which probably means longer and very exotic itineraries are probably a few years away. Of course, you can always do back-to-back Cruises, but many ports are repeated that way.

 

As for the solo prices, I am totally with you on that. However, as long as Cruise ships are very full, we are probably stuck with high single rates for the time being. Even Celebrity used to run Happy Hour deals, most all of them, at 150 % rates. Lately, many of the Happy Hour deals, have been at 175 % or even 200 %, so deals for singles on Celebrity have been far or few between.

 

I wish I had more encouraging news. All we can do, is wait and see.

[kitty9]

Jimsgirl, you're incorrect about the single supplements on Crystal and Seabourn. Quite the opposite---they have better single supplements than HAL or any of the mass market lines, and they don't charge 200% unless you book the most expensive PH suite. Crystal has SS as low as 10%, with most being 25%, and Seabourn has SS anywhere from 25% to 50%, and not anywhere near the 200% you say it has.

 

Celebrity already does some very nice itineraries, outside of the regular Caribbean routes. South America, Europe and Hawaii are great, and longer cruises.

[Liat]

I would be very interested in a westbound Transatlantic that was more adventuresome than the present plan. Constellation now does a tight little circle involving the Lowlands, France and the British Isles before heading back to NYC. I would like a return that included the Shetland Islands, Norway, the Faroe Islands, Iceland. Greenland, Newfoundland or Novia Scotia, and then New York. This would get our reservations pronto; even if they did it with Century instead of Connie!

P.S. We did an Eastbound Transatlantic on Galaxy from Baltimore through the Azores, Madiera, Gibralter, Villefranche and Livorno to Rome in May 2004 and loved it.

[cruiseyguy]

As kitty9 noted, the so-called luxury lines are better deals for single cruisers than are the mass market lines because of their low single rates. On a per diem basis, Seabourn can be cheaper for a single (on some cruises) than Celebrity would be.