Costa Plans To Resume Cruising on Costa Smeralda in March

Costa Cruises, the Italian company of Carnival Corp., will resume sailing with its flagship, Costa Smeralda, on March 27, 2021, in Italy.

It will operate itineraries unchanged from its short season last fall when it sailed three-, four- and seven-night cruises from Trieste to ports such as Savona, La Spezia, Civitavecchia, Naples, Messina and Cagliari.

A second ship, Costa Luminosa, also is expected to resume weeklong cruises from Trieste on May 2, and the following day from Bari, to visit ports in Greece and Croatia.

Those sailings are available for purchase only in Italy. Later cruises are available for booking in North America, but when North Americans will be able to visit Europe remains to be seen.

“It really depends on the governments when they’ll allow us not only to sail there, but to get there,” said Scott Knutson, vice president of sales and marketing for Costa Cruises North America.

Costa said it is working with national and local authorities of the countries included in the itineraries outside Italy to define details of the restart of cruise operations, with enhanced health and safety measures through the implementation of the Costa Safety Protocol.

The protocols include reduced onboard capacity, swab tests for all guests and crew, temperature checks when disembarking and re-embarking the ship, protected shore excursions, physical distancing on board and at the cruise terminals, enhanced sanitation and medical services and mask-wearing when necessary.

At an online press briefing on Feb. 24, Knutson said the company has not decided whether to require vaccinations for passengers.

“The protocols are absolute and nonnegotiable. The vaccines, we haven’t made a decision on guests because of a lot of different reasons. Our goal is to have the crew vaccinated, to the extent we can do that. We think we can get to 100 percent.”

Knutson said there is pent-up demand, especially from families and groups that want to get together again.

“People are saying when we are ready to sail again or travel again, wouldn’t it be fantastic to get together with people we haven’t spent time with?” Knutson said. “It’s a trend I think is going to happen. There’s really a pent-up demand to enjoy life again.”

All other cruises scheduled until the end of May, and not included in the updated program, will be canceled. Costa is in the process of informing travel agents and customers affected by changes.

Costa operated three ships sailing last fall – the Costa Smeralda, Costa Diadema and Costa Deliziosa. The program was shut down Dec. 20 over fears of another surge over the winter holiday period. COVID cases increased throughout Italy in January, so Costa’s restart dates kept being pushed back until the current schedule of late March and early May.

Here is the tentative schedule for restarting cruises for Costa ships, in alphabetical order, although the company notes dates can change.

SHIP RESUMING

Costa Deliziosa May 29, 2021

Costa Diadema June 4, 2021

Costa Favolosa June 6, 2021

Costa Firenze May 30, 2021

Costa Fortuna June 5, 2021

Costa Fascinosa June 7, 2021

Costa Luminosa June 6, 2021

Costa Magica May 29, 2021

Costa Pacifica May 28, 2021

Costa Smeralda June 1, 2021

Costa Toscana Dec. 26, 2021

The new 5,200-passenger, 135,000-gross-ton Costa Firenze was delivered in December 2020 and is now scheduled to start sailing May 30. The 185,000-gross-ton Costa Toscana, the line’s newest ship, is scheduled to enter service Dec. 26 in South America.