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Cruise ships making waves months before she arrives in Southampton
NEW superliner Ventura is already making a big splash, ten months before the huge vessel even arrives in Southampton.
As water gushed around her huge hull, gradually taking up the enormous weight of the ship, Ventura floated for the first time yesterday.
When she enters service in April, 2008 she will herald the arrival of a new generation of 21st century cruise ships now being developed to cater for the huge demand from British seagoing holidaymakers.
Ventura's owner, Southampton-based P&O Cruises, is so confident the ship, which still has a long way to go before completion, will be such a hit with passengers that it has ordered the construction of an, as yet, un-named second vessel of similar size and design from the same Italian yard for the spring of 2010.
In a quayside ceremony held at the shipyard near Trieste, where Ventura is taking shape, powerful valves were opened and thousands of gallons of sea water flooded into the construction dry dock.
Before the water was allowed to cascade around the bulk of Ventura's white hull, age-old nautical superstitions demanded that two ceremonies should be performed to ensure that good luck will always sail with the vessel.
First a specially minted silver £2 piece and a new one euro coin were both placed beneath the ship's mast so, according to legend, Ventura will enjoy safe passage wherever she voyages.
Then, following the long-established Italian tradition, a local priest led a short quayside service during which he blessed the ship and a bottle of sparkling Prosecco wine was smashed against the hull.
7:00am Saturday 9th June 2007
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CommentPosted by: All of yesterdays best stories on 8:39am Sat 9 Jun 07
This was one of yesterday's most exciting and important stories for the city. But a day late is better than never.
This was one of yesterday's most exciting and important stories for the city. But a day late is better than never.
Posted by: Patricia, Hythe on 2:00pm Sat 9 Jun 07
Wouldn't be so bad if they weren't lying about it being a Grand Class Princess making it a Superliner Designed for America rather than Britain. Same with Queen Victoria being a Holland America. They're only fooling themselves.
Wouldn't be so bad if they weren't lying about it being a Grand Class Princess making it a Superliner Designed for America rather than Britain. Same with Queen Victoria being a Holland America. They're only fooling themselves.
Posted by: Robert on 3:02pm Sat 9 Jun 07
It's very brave of Keith Hamilton trying to enthuse us with this fresh Big Ship story. A week or so ago, when a similar story appeared on here, the response was so tired and cynical that even I felt embarrassed, hard-bitten that I am!
It's very brave of Keith Hamilton trying to enthuse us with this fresh Big Ship story. A week or so ago, when a similar story appeared on here, the response was so tired and cynical that even I felt embarrassed, hard-bitten that I am!
Posted by: sean sparks, Woolston, Southampton on 4:09pm Sat 9 Jun 07
[quote][bold]Patricia[/bold] wrote:
Wouldn't be so bad if they weren't lying about it being a Grand Class Princess making it a Superliner Designed for America rather than Britain. Same with Queen Victoria being a Holland America. They're only fooling themselves.[/quote] Well put Patricia, exactly what I have been informing people.
After all the Arcadia was supposed to be the Queen Victoria and you only have to look at her to imagine how the 'new' Queen Victoria currently under construction in Italy will look like. She is just a 'vista' class of ship with a traditional Cunard funnel and a a few internal alterarions.
And people can visulise the Ventura if they look at the Grand Princess class of vessel but unlike the earlier 'Grand' class of vessels the Ventura will not have the 'shopping trolley' look about her with that high stern fixture encompassing the ships night club, she will be a direct sister of the Emerald Princess that entered service in May of this year.
Patricia wrote:
Wouldn't be so bad if they weren't lying about it being a Grand Class Princess making it a Superliner Designed for America rather than Britain. Same with Queen Victoria being a Holland America. They're only fooling themselves.
Well put Patricia, exactly what I have been informing people.
After all the Arcadia was supposed to be the Queen Victoria and you only have to look at her to imagine how the 'new' Queen Victoria currently under construction in Italy will look like. She is just a 'vista' class of ship with a traditional Cunard funnel and a a few internal alterarions.
And people can visulise the Ventura if they look at the Grand Princess class of vessel but unlike the earlier 'Grand' class of vessels the Ventura will not have the 'shopping trolley' look about her with that high stern fixture encompassing the ships night club, she will be a direct sister of the Emerald Princess that entered service in May of this year.
Posted by: Captain Pugwash on 10:01am Mon 11 Jun 07
[quote] Patricia wrote:
Wouldn't be so bad if they weren't lying about it being a Grand Class Princess making it a Superliner Designed for America rather than Britain. Same with Queen Victoria being a Holland America. They're only fooling themselves.
Well put Patricia, exactly what I have been informing people.
After all the Arcadia was supposed to be the Queen Victoria and you only have to look at her to imagine how the 'new' Queen Victoria currently under construction in Italy will look like. She is just a 'vista' class of ship with a traditional Cunard funnel and a a few internal alterarions.
And people can visulise the Ventura if they look at the Grand Princess class of vessel but unlike the earlier 'Grand' class of vessels the Ventura will not have the 'shopping trolley' look about her with that high stern fixture encompassing the ships night club, she will be a direct sister of the Emerald Princess that entered service in May of this year.[/quote]
I can't see what your beef is about this - do you expect ship builders and their customers to start from scratch each time. [italic]"Right lads, I'm imagining something with a great big hull! And some engines! What shall we add?"[/italic] No, most of the time they adapt and improve their designs, only very occasionally making a distinctive enough break to say its 'new'. The main features of interest to passengers aren't the superstructure or maritime heritage, but the interiors, the features, and the service. This is what is bringing more and more British people to ships designed for them. And, overall, this is a good thing for Southampton.
Patricia wrote:
Wouldn't be so bad if they weren't lying about it being a Grand Class Princess making it a Superliner Designed for America rather than Britain. Same with Queen Victoria being a Holland America. They're only fooling themselves.
Well put Patricia, exactly what I have been informing people.
After all the Arcadia was supposed to be the Queen Victoria and you only have to look at her to imagine how the 'new' Queen Victoria currently under construction in Italy will look like. She is just a 'vista' class of ship with a traditional Cunard funnel and a a few internal alterarions.
And people can visulise the Ventura if they look at the Grand Princess class of vessel but unlike the earlier 'Grand' class of vessels the Ventura will not have the 'shopping trolley' look about her with that high stern fixture encompassing the ships night club, she will be a direct sister of the Emerald Princess that entered service in May of this year.
I can't see what your beef is about this - do you expect ship builders and their customers to start from scratch each time.
"Right lads, I'm imagining something with a great big hull! And some engines! What shall we add?" No, most of the time they adapt and improve their designs, only very occasionally making a distinctive enough break to say its 'new'. The main features of interest to passengers aren't the superstructure or maritime heritage, but the interiors, the features, and the service. This is what is bringing more and more British people to ships designed for them. And, overall, this is a good thing for Southampton.
Posted by: Patricia, Hythe on 1:19pm Mon 11 Jun 07
It's called false advertising and Carnival's cheapness. There was never any secret Arcadia (III), Adonia, Oceana and Artemis were transferred from Princess any more than there was Arcadia (IV) was originally Queen Victoria (though no mention of her being ordered for Holland America). Yet here they are claiming Ventura and the latest QV are something they're not. If you're going to put other designs across the brands they way RCI did with their Radiance class for Celebrity's Millennium class you should at least make them look different internally and externally. Arcadia and QV will even have the same funnel, not to mention deck layout. Different decor does not make an original ship. Did you know they used the same furniture on Arcadia as Holland America? QV is also more class divided than they've said in statements and that gets right up a lot of people's noses across the world. David Dingle's speech was full of propaganda. Arcadia is NOT successful. She often sails with a lot of empty cabins and they're struggling to fill the weekender in August. As for Ventura, yes it was mostly sold out in April. But look at it now. The majority of the sold outs are now available again. They assume the British public will accept any old rubbish like the Americans, who in a lot of cases don't even know the name of the ship they've been on. Costa has even stopped being Italian since they took them over. All their newbuilds are Carnival superstructures with similar interiors designed by Joe Farcus. It's not just my and Sean's 'beef'. Read messageboards or talk to people in the street and you'll see how widespread this feeling is among cruisers and ship buffs.
It's called false advertising and Carnival's cheapness. There was never any secret Arcadia (III), Adonia, Oceana and Artemis were transferred from Princess any more than there was Arcadia (IV) was originally Queen Victoria (though no mention of her being ordered for Holland America). Yet here they are claiming Ventura and the latest QV are something they're not. If you're going to put other designs across the brands they way RCI did with their Radiance class for Celebrity's Millennium class you should at least make them look different internally and externally. Arcadia and QV will even have the same funnel, not to mention deck layout. Different decor does not make an original ship. Did you know they used the same furniture on Arcadia as Holland America? QV is also more class divided than they've said in statements and that gets right up a lot of people's noses across the world. David Dingle's speech was full of propaganda. Arcadia is NOT successful. She often sails with a lot of empty cabins and they're struggling to fill the weekender in August. As for Ventura, yes it was mostly sold out in April. But look at it now. The majority of the sold outs are now available again. They assume the British public will accept any old rubbish like the Americans, who in a lot of cases don't even know the name of the ship they've been on. Costa has even stopped being Italian since they took them over. All their newbuilds are Carnival superstructures with similar interiors designed by Joe Farcus. It's not just my and Sean's 'beef'. Read messageboards or talk to people in the street and you'll see how widespread this feeling is among cruisers and ship buffs.
Posted by: Robert on 3:30pm Mon 11 Jun 07
One or two sad little facts for Patricia, whose standards of accuracy are academia-high and would put Lord Goldsmith and his pals to shame.
There's [italic]no connection[/italic] between advertising/marketin
g copy and factual truth. The promoter's job is to [italic]pull in the punters[/italic] and if he starts having a conscience he'll get booted out - there are plenty of others all too eager to replace him. And if a spark of suspicion appears in the minds of one or two awkward customers, wadja think lawyers are for? Lawyers backed up by abundant corporate funds and even the say-so of pop and rock stars?
Let the Message Board Dudes, Party Poopers, cranks and misfits moan all they want! The Public Relations industry managed to get Dubja elected twice, so if the bosses want to say their ship is built by Martians and can fly to the moon, who's bothered as long as the punters believe it?
One or two sad little facts for Patricia, whose standards of accuracy are academia-high and would put Lord Goldsmith and his pals to shame.
There's
no connection between advertising/marketin
g copy and factual truth. The promoter's job is to
pull in the punters and if he starts having a conscience he'll get booted out - there are plenty of others all too eager to replace him. And if a spark of suspicion appears in the minds of one or two awkward customers, wadja think lawyers are for? Lawyers backed up by abundant corporate funds and even the say-so of pop and rock stars?
Let the Message Board Dudes, Party Poopers, cranks and misfits moan all they want! The Public Relations industry managed to get Dubja elected twice, so if the bosses want to say their ship is built by Martians and can fly to the moon, who's bothered as long as the punters believe it?
Posted by: Amy, Los Angeles on 3:32pm Mon 11 Jun 07
I don't think any of us believe that they are going to start from scratch on a new ship. Ships have always been derivative of one another, and build in groups. A famous "classic era" example of this is Titanic and her sister ships. However, what used to happen is that you'd build in groups and add improvements as you went. Now not two or three ships are sisters but ten or fifteen ships. Each line used to have different design groups working on it so though one line might have three ships that were alike, they were vastly different than the other line and reflected the different desires of their clinetelle. What's going on is an economics of scale. Carnival owns all these companies and wants to save money by making rubber stamp ships. The reason this is objectionable, is that the more these ships look alike, the less the individual brands mean anything. Carnival has gotten away with a virtual monopoly (its an oligarchy if you take the big three together: Carnival, NCL, and RC)because they seem to have kept the different lines they've aquired differentiated. But I think what they are working towards is having one line of ships that may be painted differently but are more or less the same. Sure it will be cheaper to run, but we are loosing variety, and I think its going to be bad for thier business. Ship lovers are really frustrated because in order to pretend that isn't whats going on, the companies are lying to the public. THIS IS A BRAND NEW SHIP THAT WE'VE NEVER BUILT BEFORE!!! as if they say it enough we'll believe it.
I don't think any of us believe that they are going to start from scratch on a new ship. Ships have always been derivative of one another, and build in groups. A famous "classic era" example of this is Titanic and her sister ships. However, what used to happen is that you'd build in groups and add improvements as you went. Now not two or three ships are sisters but ten or fifteen ships. Each line used to have different design groups working on it so though one line might have three ships that were alike, they were vastly different than the other line and reflected the different desires of their clinetelle. What's going on is an economics of scale. Carnival owns all these companies and wants to save money by making rubber stamp ships. The reason this is objectionable, is that the more these ships look alike, the less the individual brands mean anything. Carnival has gotten away with a virtual monopoly (its an oligarchy if you take the big three together: Carnival, NCL, and RC)because they seem to have kept the different lines they've aquired differentiated. But I think what they are working towards is having one line of ships that may be painted differently but are more or less the same. Sure it will be cheaper to run, but we are loosing variety, and I think its going to be bad for thier business. Ship lovers are really frustrated because in order to pretend that isn't whats going on, the companies are lying to the public. THIS IS A BRAND NEW SHIP THAT WE'VE NEVER BUILT BEFORE!!! as if they say it enough we'll believe it.
Posted by: sotonian, southampton on 10:05pm Tue 15 Apr 08
David Dingle's speech was full of propaganda. Arcadia is NOT successful. She often sails with a lot of empty cabins and they're struggling to fill the weekender in August[bold]bold[/bold]
Perhaps if they allowed families on board then they would have a full ship.
As for Ventura, yes it was mostly sold out in April.[quote]quote[/quote] [bold]bold[/bold]
ventura cruises went on sale 3 months before aany other p&O ships
David Dingle's speech was full of propaganda. Arcadia is NOT successful. She often sails with a lot of empty cabins and they're struggling to fill the weekender in August
Perhaps if they allowed families on board then they would have a full ship.
As for Ventura, yes it was mostly sold out in April.
quote
ventura cruises went on sale 3 months before aany other p&O ships
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