http://www.finanznachrichten.de/nachrichten-2009-07/14347540-carnival-corporation-plc-s-costa-cruises-brand-charters-ship-to-thomson-cruises-in-april-2010-costa-europa-will-join-th omson-cruises-fleet-under-008.htm

"On June 29, 2009, Costa agreed to charter one of its vessels, Costa Europa, to TUI UK Limited ("TUI") for a ten year term, commencing April 2010. Costa Europa will be sold during April 2010 to Grand Cruise Investments Unipessoal LDA, a wholly owned subsidiary of Carnival plc, and will continue to be carried and depreciated in Carnival plc's consolidated IFRS financial statements. However, due to the discounting of expected future cash flows required by IAS 36, "Impairment of Assets", the projected recoverable amount, upon signing the charter agreement, is less than Costa Europa's carrying value. Accordingly, an impairment charge of approximately €20m will be recognised in Carnival plc's consolidated IFRS financial statements in the second half of the year ended November 30, 2009. There is no Costa Europa impairment under U.S. GAAP due to differences between IFRS and U.S. GAAP in measuring impairments to long- lived assets."

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Originally posted by mike sa:
She will do really well with Thomson and will look great in their livery - better than she does now.

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Originally posted by Salaison:
I think she will suck in Thomson livery...

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for me an interesting move

it seems that the TUI group is bridging over the gap
of the 2 cruising giants Carnival and RCCI.
as we know Celebrity's Galaxy moving to TUI Germany as their Mein Schiff and now
Costa's Europe to TUI UK as Thomson Dream

and indeed the old HAL Westerdam, Noordam and Nieuw-Amsterdam together again...

I wonder how long the older tonnage of Thomson will sail on (mostly chartered from Louis)
and what about Island Escape... i thought she was going to sail for Thomson too?

best regards
Joe

[ 07-06-2009: Message edited by: buddhaJoe ]

Actually the ones getting the best deal here strikes me as being Carnival, they in effect get rid of one of their oldest and most expensive ships to run but to someone who is no competition to them.

Now all they need is someone mad (or should that be brave) enough to take Allegra and Marina.

You watch when the Spanish economy eventually picks up old Holiday will be moved so fast it will be as if she had skids under her.

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Originally posted by adriana & norway lover:
I received a letter today. Carnival / Costa, in partnership with TMR International, a French Operator, are going to make come back to life the french company Croisières Paquet for the French market with COSTA ALLEGRA, renammed ALLEGRA, from May 7th, 2010, from Marseilles !!!

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Amazing news ! Carnival Corp's response to RCCL's CDF !

She belongs in Davy Jones locker.....or any other Monkees' locker for that matter.

Thomson is putting together a nice ex-HAL fleet - THOMSON DESTINY seems rather out of place though.

She looks nice; neither Costa nor Thomson really appeals to me but I wouldn't mind giving the ship herself a try. Same for the old "N" ships. I used to see these three all the time when they were HAL ships when I was a kid but never got to sail in any of them.

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Originally posted by mike sa:
She will do really well with Thomson and will look great in their livery - better than she does now.

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Oh well, each to his own but I think it is awful, like Korean Air bought a cruise line or something.

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Originally posted by adriana & norway lover:
I received a letter today. Carnival / Costa, in partnership with TMR International, a French Operator, are going to make come back to life the french company Croisières Paquet for the French market with COSTA ALLEGRA, renammed ALLEGRA, from May 7th, 2010, from Marseilles !!!

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As I recall, TMR was very successful when it chartered ex R ships for a while in the earlier part of the decade.

Pity it's not a nicer ship though - poor ALLEGRA got her interiors ruined for her unsuccessful Chinese venture a few years back. Perhaps something a bit more stylish is in order now.

And why not a French name?

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Originally posted by linerguy:
If we're lucky ALLEGRA will sink on her delivery voyage.

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I was on COSTA ALLEGRA a few years back and she is the most unstable ship I've ever sailed on. Even in the calmest of seas she rolled like you wouldn't believe. There wasn't a cloud in the sky and not a white cap to be seen and there we were bouncing around like a toy boat in a bath tub.

I had always thought she was an interesting looking ship (in a sort of quirky way), but from a stability standpoint, the conversion from container to cruise ship just doesn't work.

When we finally did hit rough weather, all hell broke loose.....it would have been nice to have been on QM2 or the SS Norway.

-Russ

[ 07-07-2009: Message edited by: linerguy ]

Sounds like the days before cruise ships were fitted with stabilizers.

The first large passenger ship fitted with stabilizers was the 24,215 grt P & O passenger ship ss Chusan which was built in 1950 at the Vickers Armstrong ship yard at Barrow in Furness, U.K..

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Originally posted by Neil - Ex P. & O. S. N. Company.:
Russ

Sounds like the days before cruise ships were fitted with stabilizers.

The first large passenger ship fitted with stabilizers was the 24,215 grt P & O passenger ship ss Chusan which was built in 1950 at the Vickers Armstrong ship yard at Barrow in Furness, U.K..

With no stabilizers you could sort out the men from the boys !

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It seems they have looked round their fleet and asked what is the worst ship we can come up with and lets dump her in a new market and see what happens.

At least the RCI operation has decent hardware.

You score ten out of ten this week !

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Originally posted by Salaison:
So what does this mean they being back the Mermoz too hehhehe

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Originally posted by Pascal:

Oh no, please no !

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Hey, Mermoz was a lovely ship and the music festival alone justifies her legendary status.

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Originally posted by dougnewman:
Funny, I was just talking about this ship a couple of days ago with a friend on QM2, who was very fond of her as WESTERDAM.

She looks nice; neither Costa nor Thomson really appeals to me but I wouldn't mind giving the ship herself a try. Same for the old "N" ships. I used to see these three all the time when they were HAL ships when I was a kid but never got to sail in any of them.

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I've sailed on an "N" ships as well as WESTERDAM, both under the HAL banner. I wasn't impressed with either and never returned.

This being said, I think they will be just fine under Thomson if priced accordingly.