Port Canaveral will become homeport to Norwegian Cruise Line’s largest ship and currently the fifth largest in the world, Norwegian Epic, starting in November 2016.
Norwegian Cruise Line will increase its Port Canaveral presence in fall 2016 and will mark the line’s return to the port after a three-year absence with the arrival of the 4,100-passenger Norwegian Epic that will replace her sister the 2,018-passenger Norwegian Spirit, announced from the cruise line a few months ago.
The Norwegian Epic will join the 5,400-passenger Oasis of the Sea that is also set to debut at Port Canaveral in November 2016. The two cruise ships will be the biggest at Port Canaveral and will berth alongside Carnival Magic and Carnival Sunshine, as well as Disney Cruise Line’s Dream and Fantasy.
The Norwegian Epic will offer seven-day Eastern and Western Caribbean itineraries and three- and four-day cruises to the Bahamas.
The Eastern Caribbean itinerary will feature visits to Tortola, British Virgin Islands and St Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands, as well as Great Stirrup Cay, the line’s private island in the Bahamas.
The Western Caribbean itinerary will have stops in Cozumel, Mexico; George Town, Grand Cayman; Ocho Rios, Jamaica; and Great Stirrup Cay. In January and March 2017 the Norwegian Epic will offer three- and four-day Bahamas itineraries that include Nassau and Great Stirrup Cay.
The Epic boasts some impressive features and the most notable is the Aqua Park with three pools, five hot tubs and three several-story water slides, not to mention a 200-foot-long bowl slide which is the first-ever at sea. Along with the Aqua Park, the Epic also offers plenty of other activities to keep its guests busy at sea, like a 31,000-square-foot spa and fitness facility, a bowling alley and a comedy club.
The Norwegian Epic, 155,873-gross-ton and 1,081-foot long, debuted in 2010. The vessel was at the time the world’s third biggest cruise ship behind Royal Caribbean’s Oasis of the Seas and Allure of the Seas and it is still the largest cruise ship in Norwegian’s fleet. However, it will give away the title to Norwegian Escape which will start sailing this fall from Port Miami.