Tag Archives: Symphony of the Seas

Tried and tested: Royal Caribbean’s Symphony of the Senses pop-up

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by Harry Kemble

“Bizarre”, “outrageous” and “unbelievable” were some of the words spluttered by rather flabbergasted journalists last night after exiting Royal Caribbean’s interactive cruise experience.

I had only been in the room for 30 seconds but already I knew this was going to be no ordinary event.

Billed as the Symphony of the Senses, the experience uses sight, sound, feel, taste and scent to give people a unique preview of the soon-to-be world’s largest ship.

Through clever marketing and a clearly sensational product, Symphony of the Seas’ launch date has been fixed in our diaries for months now.

But on a dreary London night at Victoria House, Royal Caribbean managed to ramp up the excitement levels that little bit more.

The aim of Royal Caribbean’s pop-up, which runs until Saturday, if you want to take a look, is to inspire a new-to-cruise audience.

And they certainly did just that.

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Mirroring the features that will be on Symphony, we walked through tunnels reminiscent of the Ultimate Abyss slide, tried some Mexican food that you can eat onboard and learned the moves from Hairspray, the musical that will be performed for the ship’s guests – among other surprises.

Even the most ardent cruise-goer would struggle not to smile at the experience’s “perfect synergy”, as Royal Caribbean’s Ben Bouldin put it.

He also said: “As with all our ships, Symphony will push the boundaries of what is possible when holidaying and this event promises to do exactly that… except in London!”

With more than 400 members of the public expected to pass through the Symphony of the Senses event, Royal Caribbean is giving potential passengers a little taster of what they can find onboard Symphony, ahead one of the most eagerly anticipated ship launches in its history.

No Concerns in the Caribbean for Royal

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Oasis of the Seas (Photo: Arjan Elemendorp)
Oasis of the Seas
The new Symphony of the Seas will help propel the Caribbean to a record year of cruise capacity.

Despite the uptick in ships and passengers, capacity and pricing is not a concern for Royal Caribbean International.

“After the hurricanes in September, we saw that softness for about four to six or seven weeks but that recovered and picked up and we’re in a good booked position for Q1,” said Michael Bayley, president and CEO, on the company’s Q4 2017 earnings call. “And overall we’re feeling pretty good about the Caribbean for 2018.

“We’re fortunate because we’ve got the Symphony of the Seas coming into the Caribbean towards the end of the year. We have also got Celebrity Edge and we’re introducing Mariner of the Seas after an extensive modernization and revitalization and we’re putting that product into the short market, so that’s quite a lot of volume that’s coming into that market. We’re actually very excited about what that product’s going to do, the bookings are going very well and it’s still outside of its typical booking window because it’s a short product. So overall, we’re feeling okay about the Caribbean.”

As for the booking window, the company opened 2019 deployment four months earlier than in previous years.

Richard Fain, chairman and CEO of Royal Caribbean Cruises, noted the booking window continues to impress.

“Now you may recall that a year ago I said and I’m quoting, that the booking window has stretched as far as we will ever want and I don’t expect to announce another record level bookings a year from today,” Fain said. “Well I wasn’t terribly accurate, here we are a year later and we’re announcing another record level bookings.”

CFO Jason T. Liberty advised that other companies in the Caribbean marketplace may have pricing challenges, but those incidents are not indicative of the entire market.

“There are occasions sometimes when a new product enters the market from competitors and they may have some challenges initially and you may see some fairly aggressive pricing going into the market,” he said. “That can be disruptive but it’s very localized.”

World’s largest cruise ship, Symphony of the Seas, nearing completion

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The exterior of Royal Caribbean's soon-to-debut Symphony
Symphony of the Seas

The giant is almost ready.

New photos from the shipyard building Royal Caribbean’s Symphony of the Seas — the largest cruise ship ever — show the vessel rapidly approaching the finishing stages of construction.

As seen in the carousel above, the new images of the 230,000-ton ship show an exterior now gleaming with a finishing coat of paint and work well under way on outdoor decks including the Boardwalk amusement zone. Boardwalk will be home to a classic carousel, diner, rock climbing walls, the base of a nine-deck-high slide and more.

Another highlight of the Boardwalk area, an “aqua theater” that will boast daring high-diving and aerial performances, also can be seen nearing completion in the photos.

Royal Caribbean revealed earlier this month that Symphony would be ready weeks ahead of schedule. Now debuting in March instead of April, the vessel has been under construction for more than two years at the giant STX France shipbuilding facility in St. Nazaire, France.

Symphony was floated out from a dry dock at STX France in June, a construction milestone that marked the end of basic exterior work. It is now undergoing months of finishing work to its interior.

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Behold the largest cruise ship ever built, Royal Caribbean’s Symphony of the Seas. USA TODAY

Symphony will be more than 3,000 tons bigger than the current size leader in the cruise world, Royal Caribbean’s 226,963-ton Harmony of the Seas. Like Harmony, Symphony will be part of Royal Caribbean’s record-breaking Oasis Class of ships, though it won’t be an exact copy of its sisters. Royal Caribbean has unveiled several new features for the vessel including a first-of-its-kind, two-deck-high family suite with a slide between floors.

Symphony is scheduled to sail to the Caribbean out of Miami starting in November 2018. It’ll move to the city after spending its first few months operating voyages in the Mediterranean.