Celestyal Cruises (former Louis Crusies) has high expectations for 2015, by offering an authentic Greek experience

2014 was a dramatic year of change for Louis Cruises, which involved the official launch of its new Celestyal Cruises division. While the ships chartered to Thomson Cruises will effectively operate under the old Louis Cruises name, as this is the trusted formula Thomson are accustomed to, the 3 remaining new and upgraded ships will operate under the new brand of Celestyal Cruises.

Part of the fresh Celestyal Cruises mix will be a 3 year charter of the MV Explorer, which will be renamed as the "Celestyal Odyssey".  At present the vessel is being operated by Semester At Sea. The ship was originally constructed in 2001 by Blohm and Voss for Royal Olympic Cruises as the "Olympic", which later became the "Olympia Exployer". The ship was actually designed for short or multiple port intensive cruises due to its exceptionally fast speed (speeds of 28 knots - making it one of the fastest cruise ships in the world), so it should fit in nicely with the Celestyal brand, which offers multiple Eastern Mediterranean ports within a single itinerary, a real Greek experience, local cuisine and Greek entertainment. The 420 cabin ship has a total capacity of 836 guests and in many respects is coming home!

Effectively the new brand of Celestyal Cruises will now operate 3 vessels as follows: 

1. Celestyal Odyssey: Described above 
2. Celestyal Olympia: Former Song of America & Sunbird)etc
3. Celestyal Cristal: Former Leeward & Opera) 

Commenting on the addition of a third vessel to the Celestyal Cruises fleet, Kyriakos Anastassiadis, CEO of Louis Cruises expressed his satisfaction and stated that: “The addition of a third vessel to our fleet is the result of continuous increased demand that is attributed to the repositioning and the redesign of our product. We remain focused on establishing Celestyal Cruises as the foremost ambassador of a real Greek experience that is an excellent value for money .”