Twelve days after leaving the UK, the biggest cruise ship in the world arrived at her home port of Fort Lauderdale, Florida today, to be greeted by a flotilla of small boats and firetugs spraying jets of water high in the air (above).
The 225,000-ton Oasis of the Seas is not yet completely finished and ready to welcome passengers. Over the next few days frantic work will be taking place to load 12,000 shrubs and trees which will be planted in the ship’s Central Park.
Minor repairs will also have to be carried out to two lifeboats damaged by stormy weather which delayed the vessel on its transatlantic crossing from the shipyard in Finland, via a brief stop in the Solent, when 300 workmen were put ashore.
Owners Royal Caribbean are hoping everything will be ready by November 19, when pop star Rihanna is scheduled to perform a spectacular one-off concert in the ship’s open-air Aqua Theatre.
After a series of preliminary events for media and the travel trade, the ship will be officially named at a ceremony on November 30, before setting out on a season of voyages to the Caribbean – where only a few ports are capable of handling the huge ship and its 6,000 passengers.
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