Annually, several thousand Romanians choose to go on a cruisefor their holiday, with prices starting from several hundred euros,and reaching as much as 45,000 euros, the price of the mostexpensive cruise sold by a local agency. Although in their countryof origin, the USA, cruises are very popular, in Romaniaspecialised companies say sales are 10% of what they could be.
Nicolae Demetriade, president of World Travel - which representscruise companies Royal Caribbean, Celebrity Cruises and Azamara inRomania, and airline company Emirates Airlines, says this winterseason around 600 Romanians have travelled with Royal Caribbean andCelebrity Cruises. The average price of a cruise ranges between 100and 150 euros per day for a cabin for two, with the amountincluding accommodation in four and five-star cabins, meals, aswell as other facilities such as access to bars, restaurants,discos, skating rink, casino, fitness studios and swimming pools,according to Demetriade, who adds the average duration of a cruiseis seven days.
Ioan Băşea, who has been operating on the Romanian cruise marketwith croaziere.net agency since 2005, when this market waspractically non-existent on the Romanian market, says he is inadvanced talks with a cruise line to make Constanţa into anembark/debark port once a week. At present Costanţa is anintermediate port, with no one boarding or leaving the ship. 2010was not a very good year for Ioan Băşea, and, although he sold morethan 2,000 cruises on all 18 cruise lines, he says "we sold only10% of our potential."
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