Australians will be given first
dibs on the remaining cabins
aboard Ventura for P&O World
Cruises’ seven-ship spectacular
in Southampton.
AFTER almost selling out the seven ships
involved in its 175th anniversary “Grand Event”
in July, P&O (UK) is planning to give the last
precious spaces to Australians – instead of
selling them to more British passengers.
Visiting Sydney on Friday, P&O Cruises
managing director Carol Marlow told Cruise
Weekly that the unsold cabins would be made
available to Australian travel agents for group
bookings on the historic voyage.
“There was such a demand [for the
anniversary event] from the UK that we don’t
have a lot of Australians, so now that we have
space left on Ventura and Adonia, we are
looking to see if we can get group allocations
for the Ventura Mediterranean cruise,” she said.
The 3092-passenger Ventura is one of seven
P&O ships that will rendezvous in
Southampton, UK, on 3rd July 2012.
It will be the first time in the company’s
history that the entire fleet has docked
together in one port on the same day, and will
involve 15,000 passengers.
Marlow said the send-off will be
“spectacular” as Southampton has never
before had seven ships docked at once.
She said the ships will depart together and
then form a procession as they leave
Southampton Water for the English Channel.
Once in the open water, the ships will meet
again, saluting one another before sailing
onwards to their various destinations.
All seven cruises will be heritage-themed
with onboard entertainment including a gala
dinner, art display and guest speakers.
The 17-day Ventura cruise will visit Venice,
Dubrovnik and Split in Croatia , Malaga, Palma
and Vigo in Spain, Corfu and Lisbon.
The special occasion is part of several
celebrations marking 175 years since the
Peninsular Steam Navigation Company (now
known as P&O) was awarded the contract to
carry mail to the Iberian Peninsula, giving birth
to the concept of cruising.
Meanwhile, P&O is preparing to launch its
new, unnamed, 145,000-tonne, 3,600-
passenger superliner in the UK in 2015.
“We will be asking our passengers what
name they would like – a new one or a
traditional one,” Marlow said.
“We have designed this ship according to
what our passengers want – they don’t want a
bigger ship, they don’t want glitz and gadgets –
they want ‘sophisticated wows’.”
Marlow also praised the success of the
company’s recent ‘Ten Pound Poms’ campaign
which sought Brits who had migrated to
Australia on a P&O ship – “We were looking for
175 people but we got 1,500 responses.
“It was amazing to discover that so many of
them are still cruising,” she said.
