Cruise destinations across the globe are seeing more of Indian travellers. In the past financial year cruise tourism in India grew 10% year-on-year, driven largely by an increase in foreign ship arrivals. But the Red Sea Crisis has restrained the arrival of foreign cruises by crossing the Suez Canal, forcing them to shelve some of the planned voyages from the past season and many of the tours planned for the coming months.
In January, Royal Caribbean and MSC, among prominent operators had cancelled cruises following houthi attacks. Thus, the void created by the international cruises is being filled by domestic cruises.
From Mumbai, the popular cruise sectors in the past season included Mumbai-Goa-Mumbai (3 nights); Mumbai-High seas-Mumbai (2 nights); Mumbai-Lakshadweep-Mumbai (4 nights); Mumbai-Goa-Lakshadweep-Mumbai (5 nights); and Mumbai-Kochi-Lakshadweep-Mumbai (5 nights).
Mumbai Port Authority Chairman Rajiv Jalota confirms, in the last season, a major reason for the increase in domestic cruise passenger traffic was the availability of two ‘home ported ships.’ The cruise ships are offering longer itineraries with increased capacity and better occupancy rates than before. Mumbai Port is adding a new cruise terminal being built under PPP with the JM Baxi Group and is expected to be ready by the year end.
