Saga Sapphire News

Saga announced it has completed the sale of cruise ship Saga Sapphire to Anex Tour, a family-run Turkish tour operator. The ship is scheduled to reenter service as Blue Sapphire operating for Anex Tour’s new cruise line in 2021.While many cruise ships are currently being sold or scrapped due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Saga Sapphire sale is unrelated to COVID-19. Anex Tour had announced in August 2019 it would acquire the vessel.Neset Kockar, Chairman of Anex Tour, said,…

Several major cruise operators have voluntarily suspended operations in response to the developing coronavirus pandemic. For most, the reason given has been "an abundance of caution".On Wednesday, Viking became the first major cruise line to temporarily suspend operations, canceling all river and ocean cruises scheduled to embark between March 12 to April 30. It said it expected to resume sailings on May 1.Princess Cruises, the operator of two coronavirus-stricken ships -- Diamond…

Turkish-based tour operator Anex Tour is entering the cruise business with the acquisition of Saga Cruises' Saga Sapphire.Anex chairman Neset Kockar said the acquisition would allow the Turkish holiday giant to create a “unique eastern Mediterranean cruise experience”. “With changing habits of travelers, we must adopt our product offering accordingly,” said Kockar.The 800-passenger vessel will be transferred to ANEX Tour in mid-2020 and begin sailing cruises around the Eastern Mediterranean from her new homeport in Antalya, Turkey.Spanning 12 decks, Saga Sapphire offers various onboard amenities, such as 382 cabins, restaurants, pools…

Damen Shiprepair Vlissingen (DSV), part of Damen Shiprepair & Conversion (DSC), has said farewell to Marco Polo, the 800 passenger cruise ship owned by Global Maritime and operated by Cruise & Maritime Voyages. Launched in 1964 as the Aleksandr Pushkin, she was in for her 10th special survey and general maintenance and refurbishment. The project took around five weeks to complete. An elegant vessel whose design harks back to an earlier era, the Marco Polo had a full schedule of works during her time at DSV.

The Port of Montreal is expecting a banner year of tourism. The emergence of spring marks the beginning of a brand new cruise season, says Tourisme Montréal. With no fewer than 19 ships expected, including 5 new ones (the Oceania Marina, Oceania Insignia, AIDA Diva, Saga Sapphire, and M/V Saint-Laurent Prestige), it’s going to be a great cruise season at the Port of Montréal. The M/V Saint-Laurent Prestige, which chose Montréal as its home port for the 2015 season, will be the first vessel of the year to take on passengers and set sail from Montréal on May 12. The first call, on May 12, the Port of Montréal will salute the first ship of 2015, as it sets sail with some 200 cruise passengers aboard.

Lerwick Harbour’s cruise season launches at the double this week, with the arrival of the first two vessels of the year on Wednesday (18 March), bringing 1,850 passengers to Shetland. En route from Andalnes, Norway, to Torshavn, Faroe, Saga Sapphire will anchor in the deep-water port while on a 12-nights Nordic Eclipse cruise, and Magellan will also anchor on her way from Invergordon, Scotland, to Reykjavik, Iceland, on a 12-nights Solar Eclipse maiden cruise. The vessels are 200 and 222 metres long, respectively. There are 48 arrivals – including six maiden visits - currently scheduled by end-of-season on 10 September, with a cumulative gross tonnage of 1,446,291 tonnes and bringing an estimated at 34,330 passengers.

The Saga Cruises-owned Saga Sapphire left Damen Shiprepair Rotterdam December 19 after receiving repair and refurbishment works as well as a scheduled Class Survey. The 199.63-meter vessel is now back in action, picking up passengers from Dover before heading for the Canary Islands. This latest contract signifies a period of back-to-back cruise ship repair projects that also includes work carried out on a 300-meter vessel that left the yard last month. As is customary with cruise ship repair projects…

After a very fast and successful 17-day drydocking the cruise ship MSC Magnifica left Damen Shiprepair Rotterdam (part of Damen Shiprepair & Conversion) for Hamburg on schedule to start her next cruise. Next week (December 2) another cruise vessel will arrive at Damen Shiprepair Rotterdam - the 200 m MS Saga Sapphire. In the meantime, Damen Shiprepair Vlissingen recently handled two, 167 m cruise ships, the Astor and Marco Polo. Commenting on the MSC Magnifica project, Marc Derks, Shiprepair Rotterdam Project Manager, comments: “This was an excellent operation, I am very proud of the team. Built in 2010, the MSC Magnifica is 293 m long and has a capacity for more than 2,500 passengers.

Saga’s newest vessel, the Sapphire, has undergone a makeover. Saga relied on Knud E. Hansen A/S for their design package to Classification Society and Flag. As part of the process, significant parts of the upper decks have been altered or retrofitted; this includes new cabins with balconies, changed restaurant lay-outs, and installation of elevators to allow disabled people to access all areas of the vessel. Hansen A/S evaluated the vessel prior to the purchase for structural integrity, stability, safety and fire protection. “Our engineers have often visited the shipyard in Italy during the refit to monitor the progress,” said Giuseppe Tringali. “There has been a close cooperation with yard, interior designers, and classification society through which Knud E.

MIVAN  announced at the recent Cruise Shipping Miami show that it had secured over £4 million of cruise ship outfitting orders for 2012 in Europe. The largest of these contracts is the £1.7 million re- fit of the Crystal Symphony for Crystal Cruises. The 2 week fit -out will take place in June in Blohm & Voss, Hamburg. This is the second contract Mivan has secured with the Crystal Cruises following the successful fit-out of the retail areas of the Crystal Serenity in May 2011.