AIDAblu (II) 

AIDAblu sailing into the port of Amsterdam for the first time, at the 15th of march 2010.

Although AIDA Cruises is a relatively new brand, the name AIDAblu was used twice already. When P&O started up AIDA Cruises together with Seetours in 1999, they planned to put one of their ships into the new company and wanted to give her the name Tosca. It seemed that the ships of AIDA Cruises, that sailed with the Aida at that time, would be named after opera's. The ship chosen was the 1989-built Crown Princess. Instead of this first plan, P&O ordered two slightly larger ships then Aida for the new company and Crown Princess was instead placed in the fleet of A'rosa Cruises under the name A'rosa Blu from june 2002 onwards. Next to this large ship, two rivercruiseships were also sailing under the A'rosa brand, that was loosely based on the AIDA concept.

When Carnival took over P&O Princess, the A'rosa brand was sold to a private firm and the A'rosa Blu was transferred to AIDA Cruises as AIDAblu. This was in 2004, just before the order for the new Sphinx-class was placed. In fact, the first AIDAblu was mainly used for the crewmembers to get familiar with larger ships so the step towards the 70.000-ton Sphinx ships wouldn't be that difficult. Just before the first Sphinx-class ship, AIDAdiva was put into service in 2007, the first AIDAblu was transferred to another P&O daughter, Ocean Village.

The second AIDAblu left her building dock at the Jos L. Meyer werft at Papenburg, northern Germany at the 5th of january 2010 where she had been built under yardnumber S.680. She was the first ship of a slightly modified design to the first trio of ships, making her the fourth member of the Sphinx class family. The ship measures 71.300 tons, is 252,07 meters long, 32,16 meters wide and she has a draft of 7,30 meters. The ship can sail with up to 2500 passengers maximum, although her normal number given is 2174 based on two passengers per cabin. Also, 646 crewmembers are there. Her homeport is Genoa, Italy and she can sail at a normal speed of 22 knots.

AIDAblu was delivered to the company at the 4th of february 2010, before she set sail for Hamburg where she was named at the 9th of february by Jette Joop, a German fashion designer. The ship has some novelties. She has its own micro-brewery where the beer that is served onboard is brewed, th first ship in the world to have one. A TV studio comes with the package and also, she has one of the largest spa's afloat, even surpassing the large Samsara spa aboard the Costa Serena and Costa Pacifica, once named the biggest Spa's at sea. The Spa onboard AIDAblu measures some 2600 square meters. For children, a special Kids Theatre is also available.

The ever-smiling AIDAblu seems happy to have a small shower while entering the port of Amsterdam, I kind of like to know how big the smile on the ship was when she learned about her record crossing of the English Channel...

After her naming, the ship sailed for the Mediterranean port of Palma de Mallorca, that could be named the Mediterranean homeport for the ships of AIDA Cruises, because they are seen there quite often. A nice record was set by AIDAblu, when the magazine 'Ships Monthly' announced she had made a record cruiseship crossing of the English Channel (or La Manche for the French), between Le Havre and Southampton. I did not exactly know about this competition in this strech of water, that kind of reminds of the Blue Ribband of the North Atlantic. According to the magazine, AIDAblu crossed within 6 hours and 45 minutes, while the weather was truly bad with 70 mph winds and 5-meter high seas. This record crossing was made at the 5th of september 2011.