AIDA Cruises

The eyes of Aida are upon you! The ships of this German line and simply recognizable, because they all sail with the same hull-art, the mouth, eyes and hair of Aida.

The company is the former VEB Deutsche Seereederei and was founded in 1952 in the East German town of Rostock. They entered the cruisemarket in 1960 with a ship called Völkerfreundschaft, meaning 'Friendship between people'. This ship was the former Stockholm of 1946, now still sailing as Arcalia's Athena. In 1960, this ship sailed for the Freier Deutsches Gewerkschaftsbund, a workers union. The company grew in several directions, first all of these directions were maritime-orientated, but they also started entering the real estate business, project management and development. Also, a brand of hotels and tourism under the name A-rosa is part of the company. A-rosa sailes also with river-cruiseships in central Europe.

In 1996, a ship called Aida entered the fleet of the Deutsche Seereederei. This ship was a very modern liner, built with the new clubship image in mind. A year later, the ship was bought by Norwegian Cruise Line, but chartered back to DSR-touristik. In 1999, Aida was bought back by the former company and her sailings continued under the banner of Arkona-touristik. 

In 1999, the name of the company was changed to Aida Cruises, a joint venture where 49 % was held by Arkona and 51% was held by P&O. DSR also excists today, still involved in shipping by a 20% share they hold in Scandlines and the A-rosa brand of river cruiseships.

Aida Cruises expanded their business by building two ships of almost identical design as the 1996-built Aida, but only slightly bigger. They were named AIDAvita and AIDAaura. These ships entered service in 2001 and 2003 respectively and were added to the Seetours-fleet, registered in London, but part of Aida. In 2004, they entered the Aida Cruises fleet, after the original Aida was renamed AIDAcara. This move was taken after P&O, and thus also AIDA Cruises, became part of the Carnival Corporation after the deal between P&O and Royal Caribbean fell through.

With the new financial backing, Aida Cruises was to become Carnivals stronghold in Germany and because the German cruisemarket is the most active in Europe, a good excuse for Carnival to expand the brand.

Between 2004 and 2006, the former Crown Princess of P&O Princess was added to the fleet as AIDAblu (I). This ship sailed between 2002 and 2004 as A'rosa Blu for A'rosa Cruises, their first and only deepwater cruiseship. But this bigger ship paved the way for the new Project Sphinx that was announced by Carnival. This totally new class would be designed especially for Aida Cruises, thus this will not be seen in other Carnival-brands. Originally, there would be four identical ships built, but this was later changed to three when the fourth ship of the class was to be designed as a somewhat bigger ship, followed by again two newly ordered sisterships. The first of these 68.500-ton ships entered service in 2007 as AIDAdiva. This ship, also recognizable because of the excentric external look, was followed by the sisters AIDAbella and AIDAluna in 2008 and 2009 respectively. The biggest ships in the fleet of Aida, but very moderate for Canival standard. They were followed by the slighly bigger AIDAblu (the second time this name was used) of 71.000 tons in 2010 and the still-to-come sister AIDAsol that will be added to the ever growing fleet in 2011. Another ship will join the fleet in 2012, but her name is still not known. These newest ships offer one extra deck to their passengers, but are furthermore very simular to the first trio.

The watchfull eye of AIDAluna on top of the page was watching while she entered the port of Amsterdam at the 20th of march 2009. The picture where AIDAcara (right) and AIDAvita (center) are shown together was made in Palma de Mallorca at the 22nd of september 2005. The thirth pictures shows not only the eyes but the whole of AIDAluna. The two last pictures are of AIDAblu (II), shot in Amsterdam at the 11th of march 2010, while she entered this port for the first time.