The Costa Firenze has made its debut in Genoa, marking the restart of Costa’s cruises from the city.
Guests will be able to disembark freely as the company will no longer require bubble-style excursions.
Costa said it will call at Genoa every Thursday through November as part of a one-week Western Mediterranean itinerary, which also includes Marseille, Barcelona, Cagliari, Palermo and Civitavecchia/Rome.
In addition to the Costa Firenze, starting in November and through the end of the year, the Costa Luminosa will also be in Genoa every Sunday, again for one-week cruises in the Western Mediterranean.
In 2022 Costa will be in Genoa for a total of 45 calls, after only a few calls in 2021 and 2020.
Numbers will continue growing in 2023 too with weekly calls on Fridays from the new Costa Toscana.
“After a two-year pause, we are finally returning regularly with our cruises to Genoa. We are doing so with a new-generation ship, Costa Firenze, and an even richer product that will allow exploring our destinations in the best possible way,” said Mario Zanetti, President of Costa Cruises.
“Costa Firenze, as well as the other ships in the fleet, offer the opportunity to generate shared value in the territories and contribute to creating models of future development that are sustainable and able to multiply growth opportunities for the territory. I am thinking, for example, of projects such as cold ironing, i.e., the use of land-based energy for ships calling at ports,” he said.
On Jan. 25, 2020, the cruise industry saw the start of the events that left the industry with damages it’s still recovering from. Cruise lines started cancelling their sailings due to the outbreak of the coronavirus in Wuhan and around China.
Citing urgent guidelines from the Chinese government to combat the spread of the coronavirus, Costa Crociere, MSC, Royal Caribbean and Genting Cruise Lines all suspended their cruise operations in mainland China on Jan. 25, 2020.
Ships marking a year without passengers:
Astro Ocean’s Piano Land.
MSC’s Splendida.
Genting’s SuperStar Gemini.
Costa’s Serena, Atlantica and Venezia, plus the neoRomantica which has since been sold to Celestyal.
Royal Caribbean’s Spectrum of the Seas.
February continued as cruise lines first banned or put in restrictions for passengers from specific countries.
Then countries in Asia started to shut down to tourism and cruise lines issued non-stop itinerary changes for immediate and future sailings, and slowly relaxed booking and refund policies.
Even more, cruises were cancelled in Asia on Feb. 15, 2020, following the outbreak onboard the Diamond Princess in Japan,
Princess Cruises later reacted to the growing spread of the coronavirus in Asia and worldwide by pausing all of its ship operations for 60 days from March 12, 2020. On the same day, Celestyal Cruises also announced it was suspending operations.
AmaWaterways and Avalon Waterways (as well as its sister brands Globus, Cosmos and Monograms) said they were taking a voluntary pause in operations, too.
On March 13, 2020, the Canadian government announced it would be deterring the start of its cruise season (normally in April) to at least July. The ban was then extended twice, the last time until February 2021, which will make Canada cruise less for nearly a whole year.
Also on March 13, 2020, Windstar Cruises stated it would be suspending its sailings through April 30, 2020.
On March 14, 2020, CDC issued a No Sail Order and Suspension of Further Embarkation for cruise ships in waters subject to U.S. jurisdiction; the No Sail Order was extended on April 9, 2020, July 16, 2020, and Sept. 30, 2020, as cruise lines continued announcing more and more cancelled cruises affected by the order.
July 2020 saw the start of the long-awaited cruise resumptions in Europe with TUI Cruises starting on July 24, MSC on Aug. 16 onboard the Grandiosa and on Oct. 20 onboard the Magnifica, Costa Crociere on Sept. 6, and AIDA Cruises on Oct. 17. Mystic Cruises restarted sailing in early September under its Nicko brand. And in Asia, Dream Cruises’ World Dream has been operating short cruises to nowhere since Nov. 6.
Sadly, the pandemic claimed the lives of the following brands: Pullmantur Cruceros, Cruise & Maritime Voyages, FTI, Blount Small Ship Adventures, and Jalesh Cruises, while a record-high 13 ships were reduced to scrapping in 2020.
However, new brands – such as Swan Hellenic and Tradewind Voyages – were born in 2020, too.
And while safe returns demonstrated by TUI, MSC and other cruise lines give hope already, cruise lovers around the world are still patiently waiting for other brands to join. And, with the No Sail Order being replaced with the Conditional Framework in late 2020, it looks like these times may be just around the corner.
Costa Cruises restart plan includes two new itineraries for Italian guests only, sailing to only Italian ports. Guests will only be allowed off the ship on organized shore excursions from Costa.
From September 6 to September 27, the Costa Deliziosa will depart every Sunday from Trieste, with calls in Bari and Brindisi in Puglia, Corigliano-Rossano in Calabria, Siracusa and Catania in Sicily.
On September 19, the Costa Diadema will leave from Genoa and call at Civitavecchia/Rome, Naples, Palermo, Cagliari and La Spezia.
“With the aim to allow guests to better enjoy their holidays while respecting the safety of guests, crew and local communities, the company has developed the Costa Safety Protocol for its fleet,” the company announced. “The Costa Safety protocol is a comprehensive set of measures and procedures in response to the COVID-19 situation, relating to all aspects of the cruise experience, both onboard and ashore. Supported by a panel of independent scientific experts in Public Health, the Costa Safety Protocol is consistent with the health protocols defined by the Italian Government and European (EU Healthy Gateways) authorities. The protocol will be constantly updated based on the evolution of the scenario and medical knowledge.”
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