Saturday 29th June 2019
I woke this morning on board ORIANA, with a day at sea ahead of me. Up on deck the air was chilly and the fog horn was sounding, but in board there was lots to do, or not.
I remember that I sailed on this ORIANA for 2 nights on 5th November 2005 and looking at my few pictures taken back then it will be interesting to see what changes have been made. The first obvious one is that her P&O original buff yellow funnel has disappeared, to become dark blue on here. It seems I didn't do any diary notes as it was simply a group social outing, visiting the port of Zeebrugge and enjoying the ship for less than 48 hours. I did keep one souvenir from the trip - a plastic coated luggage label, in a delightful shade of lavender!
These are a few pictures from that 2005 trip.
I knew that the ship was built for P&O at Meyer Werft's shipyard in Papenhurg, Germany, starting in March 1993. She was named by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II on 6th April 1995, at 69,153 gross tons and started her maiden voyage on 9th April 1995. She is capable of carrying 1822 passengers, and currently sails as an adults-only ship. She has been an extremely popular cruise ship for the line but it was subsequently decided that two new and bigger liners were needed, and as ORIANA is the smallest and oldest ship in the fleet, she would be sold. The sale will take place in August 2019. The first new ship, to be named IONA , is due to enter service in 2020 and will run on Liquefied Natural Gas, and I am already booked on her to sail out of Southampton on 23rd May 2020.
To be continued...