Mahogany Bay News

Carnival Corporation & plc today officially opened an all-new, highly anticipated expansion of its operations in Cozumel, Mexico, adding a third berth to the company's pier at Puerta Maya, the most popular cruise destination in the Caribbean. With an investment of more than $20 million, the all-new "arm" was added to the company's existing pier to allow three ships to be moored at the terminal at the same time. To mark the occasion, three of the company's ships – Carnival Breeze, Carnival Freedom and Carnival Triumph – arrived today and became the first trio of ships to use the new three-berth pier. The pier will accommodate any ship across Carnival Corporation's 10 brands, including its next-generation ships.

New Orleans’ largest year-round cruise ship, the 3,646- passenger 'Carnival Dream', has sailed on its inaugural 6-day cruise from New Orleans. The Port explains that Carnival is the port’s largest cruise operator with two ships carrying more than 400,000 passengers annually – the most of any cruise line. The special six-day voyage, visiting Costa Maya, Mahogany Bay (Isla Roatan), and Cozumel, left from the newly refurbished Erato Street Cruise Terminal, which has undergone a $2.3 million upgrade to accommodate a ship as large as the 130,000-gt Carnival Dream.

The totally transformed 3,006-passenger Carnival Sunshine – the largest Carnival Cruise Lines ship ever to be homeported in New Orleans -- will sail this afternoon on its inaugural voyage from the Big Easy, embarking on a six-day cruise to Cozumel and Grand Cayman. Earlier this year, Carnival Sunshine underwent a $155 million, 75-day makeover that added a variety of innovations that are part of Carnival’s groundbreaking Fun Ship 2.0 enhancement initiative, along with several features unique to this vessel and 182 new staterooms.

Carnival Corporation & plc has signed an agreement to build and operate a cruise terminal on the island of Roatan, Honduras. Development of the facility - to be called "Mahogany Bay - Roatan" – is expected to start in fall 2007 and be completed by summer 2009 at a cost of $50m. The cruise facility will be situated on 20 acres on the Roatan waterfront and will consist of a two-berth cruise terminal capable of accommodating super post-Panamax vessels and up to 7,000 passengers daily. Partnering with Carnival on the project is Jerry Hynds, a local business leader and a member of the Honduran Congress. He is also the owner of Coral Cay, a resort property located adjacent to the planned port facility. host 225 cruise ship calls and 500,000 passengers annually.