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MSC Cruises will keep the MSC Armonia in Miami next summer and will replace its previously scheduled calls in Havana with Key West.
The Armonia moved to Miami last December to take advantage of the popularity of Cuba cruises from the U.S., but the ship was only able to cruise there for six months before a change in U.S. policy put Havana off limits.
MSC said the Armonia will depart Miami on Mondays for one-week cruises from November 2019 to April 2020, and on Sundays thereafter. It will visit Ocean Cay MSC Marine Reserve in Bimini, Bahamas; Costa Maya; Grand Cayman; and one of three Jamaican ports (Ocho Rios, Montego Bay or Falmouth).
Starting in April 2020, the itinerary will include Key West.
MSC said the Armonia’s call at Ocean Cay will last from 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. and will include a junkanoo parade.
In November 2020, the Armonia will go into drydock in Grand Bahamas Shipyard.
Prior to moving to Miami, the 2,065-passenger Armonia sailed out of Havana, but those cruises were not available to U.S. passengers.
Source: travelweekly.com
MSC and the other cruise lines are being incredibly passive in the face of an overtly political action by John Bolton and Mauricio Claver-Carone that meets their long time ideological objective but not the goals of President Trump.
When Trump fires Bolton (rather than just sending him to Mongolia), Claver-Carone will go with him. The President needs to recognize how badly and unnecessarily hurt the cruise lines were and undo the damage.
MSC was doing a good Cuba business with non-US passengers prior to its ability to also pick up customers in Florida. Why are they abandoning that market because of US politics? Americans could even still use MSC as a means of transportation and undertake their own independent programs on the ground under Support for the Cuban People.
Are they using the influence of lobbyists in Washington and mobilizing their former passengers to push Congress to end all restrictions on travel, the position of 81% of the American people, including 57% of Cuban Americans.