Carnival Cruise Line Announces Next Round of Restart Plans
Carnival Cruise Line revealed plans for additional ship restarts for November 2021 and beyond. The line already is operating eight ships and plans to restart more in September and October.
Carnival Valor will join Carnival Glory in New Orleans with four- and five-night sailings starting on Nov. 1.
Carnival Legend will restart Nov. 14 out of Baltimore, replacing Carnival Pride, which restarts guest operations from Baltimore Sept. 12 and then moves its homeport to Tampa Nov. 14 following a Panama Canal repositioning cruise.
Carnival Radiance will have a new maiden voyage date of Dec. 13 out of Long Beach – the voyage was rescheduled from Nov. 5 due to a revised dry dock transformation plan.
Carnival Conquest’s restart from Miami on Oct. 8 has been rescheduled to Dec. 13, while Carnival Sensation’s Oct. 21 restart from Mobile has been moved to January 2022.
With the extension of Carnival Sensation’s restart, five ships operating out of U.S. homeports will be moved to 2022: Carnival Liberty (Port Canaveral), Carnival Sunshine (Charleston), Carnival Paradise (Tampa), Carnival Ecstasy (Jacksonville) and Carnival Sensation (Mobile).
“We are very pleased with the progress of our restart, which will grow to 15 ships sailing from seven U.S. homeports by mid-November,” said Christine Duffy, president of Carnival Cruise Line. “We are making slight adjustments to our timeline to take into account supply chain realities and ensure that our destination and shore excursion offerings can meet the strong demand we are seeing from our guests. Our teams, ship and shore, are prepared to continue delivering on our great guest experience and manage all health and safety protocols.”
Guests booked on November and December cruises need to present proof of both vaccination and a negative COVID-19 test at check-in. Only a small number of capacity-restricted exemptions will be granted for children under 12 and other guests who cannot be vaccinated. Carnival is working to set up mobile pre-cruise rapid testing sites at all of its homeports as an alternative for vaccinated guests who aren’t able to get tested in advance. In addition, guests will be asked to wear masks in most indoor venues of the ship.