{"id":2985,"date":"2016-11-14T10:56:27","date_gmt":"2016-11-14T10:56:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/press.thomson.co.uk\/?p=2985"},"modified":"2018-05-30T15:56:22","modified_gmt":"2018-05-30T15:56:22","slug":"thomson-cruises-expands-long-haul-for-winter-2017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tui.co.uk\/press\/thomson-cruises-expands-long-haul-for-winter-2017\/","title":{"rendered":"THOMSON CRUISES EXPANDS LONG-HAUL FOR WINTER 2017"},"content":{"rendered":"<ul>\n<li><em>Three ships based in the Caribbean with, \u00a0new homeport in La Romana, Dominican Republic for Thomson Celebration<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>TUI Discovery 2 to be based in Montego Bay, Jamaica with overnight stays in Havana, Cuba<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>New ports of call in Puerto Rico, Guatemala, US Virgin Islands, Bahamas and Porto Santo<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Thomson Majesty and Thomson Spirit embarking on their last sailings<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>14 November 2016<\/strong> \u2013 Thomson Cruises has today unveiled its winter 2017 programme which, due to customer demand, sees long-haul a focus with more ships based in the Caribbean than ever before and exciting new ports of call added.<\/p>\n<p>From November 2017, Thomson Celebration will be moving to its new homeport of La Romana in the Dominican Republic, meaning for the first time in its history, Thomson Cruises will have three of its ships based in the Caribbean. All-inclusive ships TUI Discovery and new addition TUI Discovery 2 will join Thomson Celebration and will sail out of Bridgetown, Barbados and Montego Bay, Jamaica respectively.<\/p>\n<p>Thomson Celebration\u2019s move to the Dominican Republic means Thomson Cruises customers now have more opportunities to team their cruise holiday with a beach stay, with Thomson\u2019s stunning 5T Sensatori Resort Punta Cana, which was a new addition for summer 2016, among the properties added to the portfolio. The addition of this tropical island retreat also means new itineraries, with Coral Islands and Caribbean Gems calling at exotic hotspots such as St Lucia, Grenada and Antigua, as well as lesser known gems like St Maarten and Martinique.<\/p>\n<p>Guatemala\u2019s port Santo Tomas de Castilla is introduced on new itinerary Exotic Explorer on TUI Discovery 2, as well as Nassau in The Bahamas as part of repositional itinerary Atlantic Discoveries. Due to significant customer demand, the number of Cuban Fusion sailings on the new ship will be increased, giving customers more chance to explore Havana during its overnight stop.<\/p>\n<p>Recently named \u2018Best New Ship\u2019* TUI Discovery will sail new itineraries Tropical Horizons and Seven Isles from Barbados, which include new ports of call St Thomas in the US Virgin Islands and San Juan, Puerto Rico.<\/p>\n<p>Direct Thomson Airways flights now take Thomson Cruises customers to the Caribbean from Cardiff, Doncaster Sheffield, East Midlands, Glasgow, Newcastle and London Stansted airports, joining existing flights from Birmingham, Manchester and London Gatwick.<\/p>\n<p>Thomson Dream will move to its new mid-haul homeports of Santa Cruz, Tenerife and Las Palmas, Gran Canaria in November 2017 to explore the Canaries on itineraries such as the new A New Year\u2019s Dream which visits new port of call Porto Santo, as well as its New Year\u2019s Eve visit to Funchal, Madeira for its famed fireworks display.<\/p>\n<p>Thomson Majesty and Thomson Spirit will both embark on their last sailings in November 2017 before they leave the Thomson Cruises fleet. Thomson Spirit will be based in Limassol, Cyprus and will head off for the first time on the 15<sup>th<\/sup> November 2017, while Thomson Majesty will leave its homeport of Malaga, Spain for its final sailing on 19<sup>th<\/sup> November.<\/p>\n<p>Managing Director of Thomson Cruises Richard Sofer said: \u201cWe\u2019re really excited about the introduction of the Dominican Republic as Thomson Celebration\u2019s base for next winter. This is the first time we\u2019ll have had three ships in the Caribbean and that means we can continue to offer more choice and flexibility to our customers, who we know are looking more and more for holidays further afield.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The winter 2017 programme will be on sale from 17<sup>th<\/sup> November. Free all-inclusive upgrades are available on selected cruises on board Thomson Celebration, Thomson Dream, Thomson Majesty and Thomson Spirit which set sail between November 2017 and April 2018. TUI Discovery and TUI Discovery 2 offer all-inclusive package as standard.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>*TUI Discovery was named as \u2018Best New Ship\u2019 at the 2016 Cruise Critic Editors\u2019 Pick Awards.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Three ships based in the Caribbean with, \u00a0new homeport in La Romana, Dominican Republic for Thomson Celebration TUI Discovery 2 to be based in Montego Bay, Jamaica with overnight stays in Havana, Cuba New ports of call in Puerto Rico, Guatemala, US Virgin Islands, Bahamas and Porto Santo Thomson Majesty and Thomson Spirit embarking on [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":50,"featured_media":3513,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[147,36,146,145,67,58,128,133,144],"class_list":["post-2985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-caribbean","tag-cruise","tag-homeports","tag-la-romana","tag-programme-launch","tag-thomson-cruises","tag-tui-discovery","tag-tui-discovery-2","tag-winter-2017"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>THOMSON CRUISES EXPANDS LONG-HAUL FOR WINTER 2017 | TUI UK Media Centre<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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