Tuesday afternoon there were various cruise ships docked at the Oranjestad port. The Director of Aruba Ports Authority, Marc Figaroa, catalogued this as an important day for them as well as for Aruba itself.
Amongst the ships was the “Celebrity Beyond”, who was visiting Aruba for the first time. APA is overjoyed, as this is one of Celebrity Cruises’s most latest ships. The ship was welcomed with open arms, along with two others in the port; Carnival Horizon and one other from the Holland America Line.
For APA, Celebrity Beyond is a very modern ship and is said to have 2500 passengers aboard. Marc Figaroa emphasized that it appears that the Cruise Ship tourism is recuperating as we had hoped it would. He is convinced that the coming winter months (November, December, January, and February) are going to be very fruitful.
Aruba Ports Authority celebrated the arrival of the Celebrity Beyond as well as the Norwegian Prima, who arrived last Saturday. Marc Figaroa is satisfied with how cruise tourism is developing. There are still three more ‘first calls’ for this year. One from Royal Caribbean, another Norwegian ship and one Azamara.
It should be mentioned that Celebrity is a part of Royal Caribbean Group, which is one of Aruba’s largest cruise markets. This only goes to show Royal Caribbean’s loyalty to us. Besides Celebrity, there are other Royal Caribbean cruises that also frequent Aruba.
Lastly, Figaroa believes that there are good times ahead for Aruba’s cruise tourism, as he mentioned earlier. “Let us hope that no other external factors have an impact on our cruise tourism. For us, it is crucial to care for and improve Aruba’s economy and its recuperation after the COVID-19 pandemic.”
