New ports in Greece, Turkey, Corsica and Russia, two new Aegean itineraries from Corfu Town, the return of Zadar in Croatia and a brand new 14 night Black Sea itinerary all feature as part of Thomson Cruises summer 2014 programme.
Well, with a bit of investigating, I’ve managed to obtain Thomson Cruises summer 2014 itineraries. I did post earlier this week Thomson Cruises summer 2014 ex-UK programme onboard THOMSON SPIRIT. These itineraries went on sale Thursday, whereas the fly-cruise programme will go on sale two weeks later.
I have (what I think) are all of the itineraries. However, I don’t yet have all of the sail dates, instead just one for each. I will continue to update this post when more information is released.
So, what’s in store for 2014? Well, there’s not much change from summer 2013 really. The biggest changes are in the Eastern Mediterranean rather than the Western Mediterranean. THOMSON DREAM will be operating from Palma, Mallorca, sailing four different 7 night itineraries with Saturday departures. The itineraries themselves are very similar to this year, in fact some exactly the same. THOMSON DREAM will call at ports including Casablanca, Cadiz, Villefranche, Civitavecchia (for Rome) and Sorrento.
THOMSON MAJESTY will be operating four 7 night itineraries from Corfu Town on Friday departures. Adriatic Explorer returns, almost exactly the same, this time with the return of Zadar, Croatia. Italian Flavours also returns, this time with Sorrento instead of Naples (a pattern seen across the season). However, Pearls of the Aegean (which has been a staple of Thomson Cruises since 2002) is no more. Instead, two new, similar itineraries, Aegean Delights and Aegean Classics will operate instead. From what I can gather, Aegean Delights will be the main itinerary, with Aegean Classics most likely to operate four times throughout the season (although there is no confirmation for this yet, just guessing looking at how the sailing dates appeared). Monemvasia will be a new port of call in southern, mainland Greece. Santorini though has been dropped from any sailings from Corfu Town next year.
THOMSON CELEBRATION will homeport in Marmaris and will operate three 7 night itineraries and one 14 night itinerary departing on Monday’s. The itineraries are similar to this year, with Egypt & the Holy Land remaining the same. Ancient Wonders swaps Mykonos with Santorini (which should be interesting as the last time THOMSON CELEBRATION had Santorini on its itineraries it often had to miss it because of problems with the ship docking in bad winds and hasn’t sailed there since), and Crimean Discovery will miss out Nessebar in Bulgaria to do an extra day at sea and swaps Cesme with Mykonos. The big news though is that Thomson seems to have listened to its customers, and brought back its Black Sea itinerary, previously operated from Corfu. The 14 night itinerary, to operate in October, will call at ports including Odessa, Yalta, Sevastopol, Sochi (Russia) and Sinop (Turkey) to name just a few. Perhaps a response to the excellent sales of Crimean Discovery from this year?
After its ex-UK season, THOMSON SPIRIT will do a re-positioning cruise from Harwich to Marmaris, Turkey, where it will operate a 7 night itinerary to Limassol, Cyprus, stopping in ports including Rhodes, Athens and Beirut in Lebanon.
ISLAND ESCAPE will sail from Palma on Tuesday departures again with four 7 night itineraries. The Island Cruises vessel will dock in ports including Valencia, Mahon, Cannes and a new port of call, Bastia in Corsica.
So, not that exciting really, the biggest change being the Black Sea itinerary (which I’m sure will be rather popular) and the two different Aegean itineraries from Corfu Town (a shame there’s no Santorini though on either of them).
For full itineraries visit: Sailaway’s Blog
Ex-UK itineraries onboard THOMSON SPIRIT are now on sale. Summer 2014 fly-cruises will go on sale Thursday 25 April. As I said, I’ll keep updating this post when there’s more information regarding sailing dates and prices.
