The Eastern Caribbean took a beating in September 2017 from a pair of powerful hurricanes, forcing cruise lines to make long-term changes to their Caribbean cruise itineraries. Hurricane Irma inflicted serious damage on islands with significant cruise line business, including St. Maarten/St. Martin, Tortola in the British Virgin Islands, St. Thomas and St. John in the U.S.V.I., Grand Turk in Turks & Caicos and St. Bart's. Less than a week later, Hurricane Maria roared through the region, devastating Dominica and Puerto Rico.
But the Caribbean is a large place, and the cruise lines have options for alternative ports, even for their biggest ships. Among them are three ports in Jamaica (Ocho Rios, Falmouth and Montego Bay), Grand Cayman, Belize, Roatan, Mexico's Cozumel and Costa Maya, and the islands of the Southern Caribbean: Aruba, Curacao and Bonaire. Several Eastern Caribbean islands -- including St. Kitts, Barbados, St. Lucia, Grenada and Antigua -- also remain open. In addition, the Bahamas and the private islands cruise passengers love (including Labadee, Haiti) have been unaffected by the storm and continue to be called upon by ships. Cuba's ports, too, remain open.
Here is our line-by-line breakdown of the long-term itinerary changes that have been made. Cruise Critic will continue to update this list as the cruise lines release information. Carnival Cruise Line With the most ships in the region, Carnival has been forced to do the most scrambling. The line is still on schedule to resume sailing out of San Juan October 15. Below is a ship-by-ship breakdown of itinerary changes:
Royal Caribbean Adventure of the Seas' September 30 cruise was canceled, and the ship is being use for a relief mission in San Juan, St. Thomas and St. Croix.(Read Cruise Critic's live report.) A handful of other itineraries have been adjusted:
Norwegian Cruise Line Norwegian was the first line to announce it would be making long-term changes to its Eastern Caribbean itineraries. The line's main ship there, Norwegian Escape, will make Western Caribbean sailings through the end of 2017. Changes for other Norwegian ships arriving in the region later in the year have not been announced. Celebrity Cruises Celebrity has been diverting its year-round Caribbean ship, Celebrity Equinox, from St. Thomas, Tortola, Punta Cana, Key West and San Juan to southern Caribbean ports such as Curacao and Eastern Caribbean ports such as St. Croix, St. Kitts, Martinique and Antigua, as well as Falmouth, Jamaica. Itineraries have been adjusted through December 23. Celebrity Summit's first Caribbean cruise begins in late-October. The ship will replace St. Thomas and St. Maarten with St. Kitts and Antigua. It will still begin its winter sailings embarking out of San Juan on October 28, replacing a stop in St. Thomas with St. Croix. Additionally, three other Celebrity ships were have replaced calls in Punta Cana through December. Celebrity Reflection and Celebity Eclipse substituting St. Croix and Celebrity Silhouette will now call at San Juan. MSC Cruises Upcoming MSC Divina Eastern Caribben itineraries that included St. Maarten and San Juan will be replaced by Western Caribbean itineraries; this change affects the ship's October 30, October 14 and October 28 departures. The new ports of call include Montego Bay, George Town, Costa Maya and Nassau. Beginning November 11, MSC Divina's weeklong Caribbean cruises will call at St. John instead of St. Maarten. In January and February 2018, the ship's long cruises will continue to replace affected ports. The January 3 departure will visit Aruba and Curacao instead of Tortola and St. Kitts; the January 25 departure will replace St. Maarten with San Juan; and the February 15 departure will call at San Juan, Barbados and Guadeloupe in lieu of St. Maarten, Tortola and St. John. MSC Seaside, the line's new ship slated to launch December 2017, also will replace St. Maarten calls with St. John through mid-March. Meanwhile, MSC Fantasia's seven-night cruises from Martinique and Guadeloupe will now visit the Dominican Republic's La Romana in place of Tortola and St. Kitts instead of Dominica; it will replace St. Maarten calls with a sea day. The changes will be in effect November 2017 through March 2018. Disney Cruise Line Disney Fantasy's October 7 and October 21 Eastern Caribbean sailings are being modified to include ports of call in the Western Caribbean. These revised sailings will now visit Cozumel, Grand Cayman, Falmouth and Castaway Cay. Fantasy's November 4, November 18 and December 2 sailings will call on the same itinerary with Costa Maya instead of Falmouth. Holland America Holland America's Caribbean season begins in mid-October; the line's private island, Half Moon Cay, is fully operational. Several Caribbean itineraries through December 2017 have been modified. The following sailings are affected:
Crystal Cruises For the 2017-2018 winter season, Crystal Esprit was scheduled to sail alternating itineraries roundtrip from St. Martin. However, as many of the islands on its weeklong British Virgin Islands itinerary are not ready for visitors, all of these itineraries have been switched to the seven-night West Indies Yachting Explorer itinerary. All of the West Indies cruises will also swap an overnight in St. Martin with a call at Moskito Island. The revised West Indies Yachting Explorer itinerary is now St. Martin, Moskito Island, Saba, St. Barts, Antigua, Basseterre (morning) and South Friars Bay (afternoon) in St. Kitts and Nevis, Pinney's Beach in St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Martin. The six-night version of the West Indies itinerary replaces Rendezvous Bay with Moskito Island. The 11-night Christmas itinerary also replaces the Marigot overnight with a call on Moskito Island. In addition, it removes calls at Plymouth, Montserrat, and Rendezvous Bay, Anguilla, and adds an overnight in Iles de Saintes, Guadeloupe. The first January 2018 itinerary, also 11 nights, also cancels the Marigot overnight and calls in Plymouth, Montserrat; Coconut Grove, Nevis; and Sandy Ground, Anguilla. Replacement ports include Moskito Island; Iles de Saintes, Guadeloupe; and Pinney’s Beach, St. Kitts & Nevis. The hotel Crystal uses for its pre/post hotel stays, Belmond La Samanna in St. Martin, is closed for the duration of Crystal Esprit's Caribbean cruise season due to hurricane damage. This has forced Crystal to cancel its pre/post program for Esprit passengers. Oceania Cruises Oceania has made changes to 12 Caribbean itineraries departing between October 2017 and May 2018. It has canceled all calls on St. Maarten and San Juan, and replaced them mainly with visits to St. Kitts, Antigua and Punta Cana. Other minor changes have been made to accommodate the new ports in the ships' schedules. The most major change is Sirena's May 28 cruise, which was changed from an Eastern to a Western Caribbean itinerary. Marina's December 3 transatlantic also added an extra port call in Spain (at Cadiz) and pushed back visits to Santa Cruz de Tenerife and Santa Cruz de la Palma to break up the run of sea days once San Juan was dropped. Impacted itineraries include:
Cunard Queen Victoria's November 18 departure -- 24 nights from Southampton -- will call at Martinique in lieu of St Maarten. Queen Mary 2's November 26 departure will replace calls at St Thomas and St Maarten with Amber Cove and St Lucia. No changes have been made beyond mid-December. Seabourn Select Seabourn Odyssey, Seabourn Sojourn and Seabourn Quest itineraries have been impacted by the hurricane damage in the Caribbean, though no cruises will be canceled. Most notably, any cruise scheduled to embark or disembark in St. Maarten will now embark or disembark in Barbados, through April 2018. This means that one-way sailings from St. Maarten to Barbados, or vice versa, are now roundtrip Barbados sailings. (For cruisers booked on these itineraries, Seabourn is assisting with flight arrangements and change fees.) In addition, Seabourn will not call at the following ports through January 2018:
The line will substitute scheduled port calls to these islands with calls to the following alternative ports:
Seabourn still plans to call on San Juan, Puerto Rico, but continues to monitor the situation there. Azamara Club Cruises Azamara confirms that it will operate its itineraries out of San Juan as planned. No other itinerary changes have been announced. Regent Seven Seas Regent Seven Seas Cruises has altered nine itineraries in 2017 and 2018 to replace calls to Puerto Rico, St. Maarten and Dominica with visits to other Caribbean islands. The changes are as follows: Seven Seas Navigator
Seven Seas Mariner
Seven Seas Explorer
SeaDream Yacht Club From November 2017 to mid-April 2018, SeaDream will embark/disembark passengers in Antigua instead of St. Maarten/St. Martin on its Caribbean cruises. This change affects the following departure dates on its SeaDream I cruise ship: November 11, November 20, November 25, December 2, December 16, December 21, December 28, January 4, January 18, January 27 and February 17. SeaDream II's March 17, March 24, March 31 and April 14 also departures have been altered; no changes have been made to the ship's San Juan turnaround days. Windstar Cruises Some of Windstar's winter and spring Caribbean cruises had been scheduled to embark in St. Maarten; Wind Surf and Star Breeze will now use Bridgetown, Barbados. Its ships will arrive early and depart late on turn-around days in Barbados to facilitate travel to and from the island. Some Caribbean itineraries will go to St. Lucia, Bequia and Mayreau in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Grenada and Martinique instead of affected islands. Windstar plans to operate cruises out of San Juan as scheduled. (The line's first cruise out of San Juan is November 25.) However, the line is still assessing ports of call for Star Pride's sailings out of Puerto Rico, and indicates that itinerary changes are likely. It will contact passengers and travel agents as soon as definitive plans are made. P&O Cruises P&O Cruises currently has no ships in the Caribbean, but towards the end of the month a number will be repositioning from Europe to the Caribbean for the winter season. These include Azura, Britannia and Adonia. In addition, Arcadia will be making a 28-day Southampton round-trip cruise with calls at a number of affected Caribbean ports. P&O Cruises has confirmed a number of port changes for these cruises including:
P&O Cruises is gradually informing passengers of further itinerary changes nearer to their sail dates. Other Lines Long-term changes to Caribbean sailings from Princess Cruises, Silversea, Costa Cruises and Viking Ocean have not been announced. Source: http://bit.ly/2ghgh2f by Cruise Critic staff
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