When ORIANA arrived in the port of Santa Cruz de Tenerife early in the morning of 27 October 2015, on yet another cruise to the Canary Islands, she was about to meet for the first time, and far away from home, her newest mate and flagship of P&O, BRITANNIA, in service from March that year.
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| ORIANA seen from BRITANNIA as she approached the port of Santa Cruz. |
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| Due to the lack of space in the south harbour wall, ORIANA docked in the north terminal of Santa Cruz. |
Just like BRITANNIA, ORIANA was also the flagship of the company 20 years ago, and at the time was amongst the largest cruise ships in the World with 69,153 GT and a 1,975 pax. cappacity. On the other side the new flagship has 143,730 GT and is able to accomodate up to 4,372 pax. which is a clear sign of the growth, not only of the cruise industry, but of the British cruise market as well, with more and more people willing to go cruising from their "doorstep".
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| BRITANNIA in Tenerife on her eastbound positional voyage to the Caribbean, where she is spending the Winter months. |
This reunion between the two was almost like a surprise one, since BRITANNIA was originally scheduled to call in Funchal on her maiden transatlantic crossing, but the lack of available berth space led to the decision of chaging the call to Tenerife, where she could dock instead of staying at anchor in Madeira.
Two days later, on 30 October, ORIANA met in Funchal with a more familiar fleetmate, the ARCADIA, cruising for P&O since 2005. In fact this was the second time the two have met in Madeira's capital, the first occured 6 years before, on 21 December 2009.
At the time (Oct. 2015) ARCADIA was returning to the UK after a Caribbean transatlantic cruise, and made quite a curious meeting with ORIANA, both displaying a contrast of P&O liveries, the classic white and buff against the new blue livery respectivaly.
At the end of the day, as both ships were ready to depart to their homeport of Southampton, a horn salute took place with ORIANA successfully having the last word! The video bellow depicts the moment:
To watch the 2009 horn salute click here.
Photographic Achivement [Tenerife]: Marcial Fernandes
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