Thinking of booking a cruise on Royal Caribbean's new Icon of the Seas? Get ready for monster crowds.
19.07.2024 - 18:53 / thepointsguy.com / Royal Caribbean / Michael Bayley
Cruise fans in Southern California are about to have another major option for sailings to Mexico.
This week, Royal Caribbean executives revealed that the line's giant, amenity-packed Ovation of the Seas would reposition to Los Angeles for Mexico cruises starting in May 2025. It will become the largest Royal Caribbean ship to ever be based in the city.
Royal Caribbean CEO Michael Bayley and Senior Vice President for Sales Vicki Freed made the announcement Tuesday during a preview event for the line's new Utopia of the Seas, as reported by several media outlets that were at the event, including Seatrade Cruise and Travel Weekly.
For more cruise news, guides and tips, sign up for TPG's cruise newsletter.
According to reports, the executives said the 4,180-passenger vessel would join Royal Caribbean's 3,388-passenger Navigator of the Seas in sailing from Los Angeles. Navigator of the Seas also operates voyages to Mexico.
Bayley and Freed said Ovation of the Seas' new itineraries out of Los Angeles will range from three to six nights in length. As of late Thursday, the sailings were not yet posted on the Royal Caribbean website.
The deployment marks a major expansion for Royal Caribbean on the West Coast and is a last-minute switch for the vessel. Ovation of the Seas was originally scheduled to sail out of Tianjin, China, next summer on sailings aimed at the Chinese market.
Currently, Ovation of the Seas is sailing to Alaska out of Seattle and will soon reposition to Sydney for fall and winter sailings to ports in Australia and New Zealand. It was slated to move to Tianjin after those voyages.
Earlier this year, Royal Caribbean announced plans to move Quantum of the Seas, a ship from the same series as Ovation of the Seas, to Los Angeles in the fall of 2025 — it's still scheduled to begin sailing from Los Angeles in October 2025.
At 168,666 tons, Ovation of the Seas will be one of the biggest cruise ships from any cruise line to ever be deployed to Los Angeles.
Among vessels that have sailed out of Los Angeles, only Norwegian Cruise Line's 3,998-passenger Norwegian Encore is bigger — and only by a tad. Norwegian Encore measures 169,116 tons.
When measured by tonnage, two other Norwegian ships that sail from Los Angeles seasonally, Norwegian Bliss and Norwegian Joy, are slightly smaller than Ovation of the Seas. They measure 168,028 tons and 167,725 tons, respectively.
Other major ships sailing regularly from Los Angeles — including Carnival Cruise Line's Carnival Firenze and Carnival Panorama — are significantly smaller than Ovation of the Seas.
Related: The best Royal Caribbean ships for every type of traveler
Ovation of the Seas will be the first vessel from Royal Caribbean's popular Quantum Class of
Thinking of booking a cruise on Royal Caribbean's new Icon of the Seas? Get ready for monster crowds.
One of the world's most luxurious cruise ships is about to sail 23,000 miles in the wrong direction to avoid violence in the Middle East.
Megaship fans are about to have a major new option for an Alaska cruise.
Call it the most family-friendly MSC Cruises ship ever.
The food on a $675-a-day, ultra-luxury cruise ship is what you'd probably envision: caviar, lobster, and filet mignon.
The cruise industry has long promoted cruise vacations as seagoing alternatives to landside all-inclusive resorts—with the added benefit of hitting multiple destinations in a single trip (and only needing to unpack once). But most cruises aren’t actually all-inclusive—on the vast majority of cruise lines, there are extras available for purchase on the ship that can really mean cruisers pay twice for the same vacation: once up front, and once on board.
Could kids soon face new restrictions on Royal Caribbean ships?
Norwegian Cruise Line will call Philadelphia home in 2026, becoming the first cruise line to sail from the city in years.
Between the shopping malls, specialty dining options, and endless alcoholic beverages, it's easy to lose sight of how much you're spending while cruising.
Luxury cruises can be more than quadruple the cost of an average ship. But before you click away, hear me out — the higher-end vessels are worth the splurge.
Greg Anderson is the new CEO of the Allegiant Travel Company. The organization, best known for operating low-cost leisure carrier Allegiant Air, confirmed the news in a market filing on Thursday morning.
Is the era of ever-larger ships at Royal Caribbean coming to an end? Comments that the line's CEO, Michael Bayley, made this week are sparking renewed speculation on the topic.