You read that right. Carnival Australia’s CEO Ann Sherry, spilled the beans that the 85,000grt Carnival Spirit, will sail down under full time beginning Oct 2012. The 2,680 pax ship will be the cruise giant’s first ship outside the U.S. Itineraries have not been released yet but it will be interesting to see if they keep her just in Australia, or send her out into the Pacific, Tahiti, Fiji for example.
As far as we know, the ship will not be transferred over to P&O Australia and will retain her Carnival identity. This was done with former fleetmates the Tropicale and Jubilee.
My initial reaction was “Wow!” If I were a betting man, I would have guessed Carnival would place a ship in Europe. Then again they have it covered pretty well with Princess and especially Costa.