The Harmony of the Seas will debut Splashaway Bay, an interactive aqua park for kids, Royal Caribbean announced today.
The Ultimate Abyss, the tallest slide at sea touting a 100 foot dramatic plunge, The Perfect Storm trio of water slides and Splashaway Bay are the latest in a collection of activities.
Slashaway Bay will be a vibrant waterscape for kids and toddlers with sea creature water cannons, winding slides, a gigantic drench bucket and a multi-platform jungle-gym.
There is the Ultimate Abyss, a 10 story slide that begins in the Pool and Sports Zone at the aft of the ship down to the Boardwalk neighborhood below.
Spiraling five decks above the lushly landscaped, open-air Central Park in the center of the ship, water slides Supercell, Typhoon and Cyclone come together as The Perfect Storm, inviting travelers to slide into an adventure.
Thrill seekers can test their mettle in Supercell, featuring a champagne bowl swirling guests around as they descend into their approach towards a big splash finale.
As a kid, it was hard to keep me out of a pool, but now as an adult I’m less and less inclined to go for a swim.
I was thinking about this on a cruise aboard the Viking Star, the new ship from Viking Cruises, which has three pools. The main pool is midship; there is an infinity pool aft and a counter-current pool in the ship’s spa.
I can’t vouch for the third pool, but the other two did not get a lot of use that I could see. Several passengers I talked to agreed, and they had a variety of theories about why.
One was the cool April temperatures, in the 50s for the most part. The Mediterranean will heat up as summer arrives, and that alone might spur more use of the outdoor pools.
Another factor, one older woman confessed, is that she wasn’t too happy with her appearance in a bathing suit. A man said that the pools are overflow dining areas, and the presence of diners inhibited people from swimming.
The main pool on the Viking Star. Photo Credit: Tom Stieghorst
Unmentioned, but undoubtedly a factor, is that Viking does not encourage children as passengers. The 633 guests on my 10-day cruise between Istanbul and Venice were mainly in their 60s and 70s.
I have to think a ship operated by Carnival Cruise Line or Royal Caribbean International in the same timeframe and location would have more pool users based on demographics.
Which leads to the interesting decision by two cruise lines to get rid of swimming pools. Crystal Cruises planked over one of two pools on the Crystal Serenity in favor of a new dining area. And Windstar Cruises recently announced that it will remove the pool on the three ships it is acquiring from Seabourn, also for expanded restaurant space.
No one uses the pool, Windstar CEO Hans Birkholz said bluntly, in announcing the change at Cruise Shipping Miami in March.
It is tempting to think there will always be a pool on cruise ships. Windstar is adding a counter-current pool for exercise even as it eliminates the more traditional pool area.
Viking, which has no pools on its river cruise ships, opted for two outdoor pools on the 930-passenger Viking Star. And on large, activity-jammed ships in the contemporary segment, pools are an integral part of their appeal.
But on smaller ships that cater to mainly to older guests, there’s already been some erosion of the pool’s primacy. It leads me to wonder how much further the trend might go.
Star Cruises has cut the first steel for a 4,500-passenger ship scheduled for delivery in the fall of 2016.
The unnamed ship, and a similar one due to enter service in fall 2017, will sail in Asia.
The Meyer Werft shipyard in Papenburg, Germany, is building the vessels, which will be the largest by far in the Star Cruises fleet at 151,000 gross tons. Today, the line’s largest ship is the SuperStar Virgo, at 75,000 gross tons and capacity for about 2,000 passengers.
“The delivery of these two newly commissioned mega cruise ships will enable us to continue to strengthen and further enhance our competitiveness across our key source markets,” said Tan Sri Lim Kok Thay, CEO of Genting Hong Kong, the company that owns Star Cruises.
One of ship’s unique features will be a “street night market” with hawker stalls serving delicacies from various Asian countries. The megaship also will have a theater and a water park with slides.
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