Cruises International set new travel record

Malta's agents for Costa Cruises, Cruises International Ltd, have established a new record - that of having the largest-ever group of Maltese travelling on a single trip out of Malta.

The cruise liner Costa Allegra shall carry 930 passengers departing out of Valletta on June 29, for a one-week cruise to the Adriatic Sea that shall include stops in Italy, Albania, Montenegro, Croatia and Slovenia. This shall be the first of a short series of cruises, each taking 930 Maltese passengers to the Adriatic or Greeki slands.

With 14 cruise ships, Costa Crociere is the largest European cruise company and carries over 1.2 million passengers annually. Its cruise ships offer a variety of all-year-round programmes in European waters as well as itineraries to North and South America, the Gulf, the Indian Ocean and the Far East.

Together with the Costa Pacifica, the other cruise liner embarking Maltese passengers out of Valletta on a weekly basis (from March to November), Costa is expected to carry over 6,000 passengers in 2010, making it this year’s top-selling cruise company in Malta.

It is believed that the previous record for the largest number of Maltese travelling in one single trip was five years ago when a leading Maltese tour operator chartered a Corsair Boeing 747 Jumbo with an all-economy passenger configuration that carried 580 passengers for a weekend holiday to Disneyland.