Captain Greybeard

There can't be too many kids desperate to sample Peter Pan's, Decibels or Outer Space, the clubs for younger family members on P&O cruise ship Oriana. If there are, they'd better get mum and dad to book a cruise within the next 12 months, because from the end of November 2011, the ship will become a child-free zone. There are currently two adult-only ships in the P&O fleet; the 2,064-passenger Arcadia and the 1,200-passenger Artemis. In May, Artemis sails off to join a German cruise line, to be replaced by Adonia, which will carry 710 passengers. Because their all-adult capacity [...]

The high winds which were blowing across the UK yesterday must have faded before they reached northern Germany, because Disney Dream (above) set off as scheduled on the complicated journey from shipyard to the sea on Friday night. Unfortunately for the thousands of spectators who turn up in their camper vans for these events, the whole 26-mile journey will have been completed in darkness. The founders of the Meyer-Werft yard at Papenburg can never have imagined when they began building wooden boats in 1795 that one day they would be constructing ships as big as the 128,000-ton Dream. The water [...]

With Carnival Splendor safely in port in San Diego, and investigators beginning their efforts to discover the cause of the fire which crippled the cruise ship, first-hand reports of the three-day ordeal are now beginning to appear. Passenger Bob Flynn - a retired Chicago cop - tells Cruise Critic that it was all a bit of an adventure. In what may be one of the understatements of the year, he accepts "it was a bit inconvenient," and goes on to say that he would not hesitate to take another cruise with Carnival. His highest praise is reserved for Senior Cruise [...]

Welcomed by a flotilla of fire tugs shooting gallons of water into the air, and surrounded by circling news helicopters, Allure of the Seas entered harbour at Fort Lauderdale, Florida for the first time today. Members of crew crowded onto cabin balconies and the railings of the sun deck as the giant vessel, measuring 360 metres (plus an all-important 50mm) long and with a beam of 66 metres, inched along the entry channel and headed towards the berth at the $75 million Terminal 18, which was specially enlarged last year to handle the 6,000 passengers each joining Allure and sister [...]

Allure of the Seas has been making good progress on its journey across the Atlantic. Running fast to stay ahead of the worst of the weather, Captain Hernan Zini has brought the biggest cruise ship in the world to its new home a day early. There was time for a quick pit stop in Bermuda to pick up a group of technicians and to carry out tests on the ship's thrusters before today's early arrival at Fort Lauderdale. But there's still time to kill so that the entry into port can be in daylight for the benefit of spectators and, [...]

This sounds too good to be true, and maybe it's just a dream, but I have been hearing whispers that there might be a surprising addition to the ships sailing for UK cruise lines. If my information is correct, Saga - who only this year introduced Saga Pearl II as a replacement for the much-loved Saga Rose - are lining up a third ship to join their fleet. They are about to announce the acquisition of Bleu de France (above), a 37,000-ton ship which has had a chequered history since it was built in 1982 as Europa for the German [...]