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150th Cruise Ship Call - Record Season for the Cruise Port of Hamburg

Published Oct 8, 2012 4:22 PM by The Maritime Executive

October 4th has seen the Hamburg Cruise Center celebrating the 150th visit from a cruise ship in the 2012 cruising season. A total of 161 calls are expected this year.

The visit of the AIDA Cruises ship AIDAblu on 4 October was the 150th of the 2012 season. This represents a new record and certainly gave cause to celebrate the arrival. To mark the milestone, Nadine Palatz (Marketing Manager, Hamburg Cruise Center) presented a commemorative shield to the ship’s captain, Dr. Friedhold Hoppert.

Christened in February 2010 in the Port of Hamburg, AIDAblu made already her third call to the Hanseatic city this year. In the 2012 cruising season, AIDA Cruises will be sending five ships to Hamburg, which will dock a total of 48 times in the city.

After spending the 2012 summer season in the Baltic, AIDAblu is returning on a short cruise to Hamburg via Copenhagen and Oslo. In the evening of October 4, the cruise ship left Hamburg to sail along the Atlantic coast to Palma de Mallorca in the Mediterranean. AIDAblu will then navigate through the Suez Canal to Dubai and from there cruise along routes in the Emirates.

Although the cruising season is slowly coming to an end, the cruise port Hamburg still has a number of highlights to offer with a total of seven cruise ship calls scheduled for the Advent season.

These will include a dual call on 18 December. Fred Olsen‘s BALMORAL will again be bringing numerous British passengers to the Hanseatic Christmas markets, while the Cunard liner QUEEN VICTORIA will also be docking at Hamburg Cruise Center Altona on December 18. She will then sail out of Hamburg on a three-week Christmas and New Year cruise before returning to set off on a world cruise on 7 January 2013.

The last call of the year will be on 20 December, when the Phoenix Reisen cruise ship AMADEA will be heading out to South America.

A total of 161 ship visits in 2012 makes it a record year for Hamburg cruise tourism. The year’s highlights were the record-breaking month of May with a total of 33 calls, the arrival of the Olympic team from London on the DEUTSCHLAND and the third staging of the Hamburg Cruise Days, which will be held again in two years’ time.