Posted July 20th, 2016 in cruises. news by Galveston Cruise Tips
Great news for Royal Caribbean fans in Texas. With little fanfare, the cruise line has added a second cruise ship to its schedules for late 2017. We first discovered the new ship coming to the island while doing a random search for cruises on cruise line’s website.
To be more specific, Royal Caribbean is adding the Vision of the Seas to its Galveston cruises. As of now, only 10 trips are scheduled. The first trip departs November 6, 2017 and the last cruise departs December 18, 2017.
During that time, the ship will sail 4 and 5-day trips to Mexico, with most trips stopping in Cozumel, but one itinerary stopping in both Cozumel and Costa Maya.
The Vision of the Seas is a smaller and older ship in Royal Caribbean’s fleet, first sailing in 1998 and measuring 915′ long. For comparison, the Liberty of the Seas — the line’s other ship sailing from Galveston — is more than 1,000 feet long and can carry almost double the number of passengers.
So while no one is likely to be “wowed” by the Vision of the Seas compared to more modern ships, we think it’s a very important signal for the Galveston cruise market.
For years Royal Caribbean has left the shorter voyages to Carnival in Galveston. If you wanted a quick 4 or 5-day getaway, your only option was to take one of Carnival’s trips. Royal Caribbean focused only on week-long cruises.
Placing the Vision of the Seas shows that Royal Caribbean is at least testing out the market for shorter trips itself. We believe that if the demand is there, the company may decide to put a smaller ship here full-time to sail shorter cruises.
That would be just another sign that the Galveston cruise market continues to grow steadily.
For a video tour of the ship, check out the video below: