PORT CANAVERAL, Fla. – Royal Caribbean is preparing to sail again from Port Canaveral with employees and volunteer passengers.
Royal Caribbean owns the ship that was the first to return to cruising this summer from an American port.
Now on Tuesday, the cruise line resumes departures from Port Canaveral with a simulated cruise of the Allure of the Seas.
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“It seems like yesterday that people were asking me if I thought cruising would restart by December,’' CEO Richard Fain said in a Royal Caribbean video earlier this month.
Fain said his cruise line has nearly two-dozen ships back to work in Europe, Asia and now the U.S., too.
“For our crew members, it was a literal lifeline after so many months without work,” Fain said. “For the communities we serve, it represents tourism and jobs after so many months of pain and for our guests, it was a sense of freedom, of escape from the isolation of this terrible period of shutdown,” the CEO added.
Last week, Disney completed Port Canaveral’s first test cruise.
Disney said the Dream cruise ship will sail with paying customers next month.
The port’s long-anticipated debut of Carnival’s Mardi Gras is set to on Saturday become Port Canaveral’s first revenue cruise departure since the shutdown.
As long as it’s smooth sailing for Royal Caribbean’s departure Tuesday, the Allure of then Seas will then plan its first revenue cruise from the port in September.