Carnival Opens Amber Cove Port in Dominican Republic

Carnival Corporation today announced it will begin welcoming guests at its newly developed Amber Cove port in the Dominican Republic beginning October 2015.

Six of Carnival Corporation’s nine brands will call on Amber Cove along the country’s Amber Coast – a partial filming location for the original Jurassic Park movie – to give cruise passengers another exotic location to explore as part of their vacation experience.

With the opening of the new Amber Cove port, passengers will be able to make stops along the Dominican Republic’s north Amber Coast, which has not been regularly visited on cruise itineraries since the 1980s.

It will open expanded itinerary options in the Caribbean, the world’s most popular region for cruise vacations, and will pair with the company’s Grand Turk Cruise Centre only 100 miles to the north to anchor new central Caribbean itineraries for Carnival’s nine global brands.

In looking to the future, the port is strategically located to be incorporated into itineraries featuring potential stops in Cuba.

The new $85 million facility represents the largest cruise industry investment ever made in the Dominican Republic, and will feature a two-berth port able to accommodate the largest cruise vessels in operation today.

Carnival Corporation has monitored the various stages of the port’s construction progress with the use of drones, an innovative development that is being used for the first time as part of the company’s port development process.

The facility, a joint project between Carnival Corporation and the Rannik family of Grupo B&R, is expected to host more than 250,000 cruise passengers in its first year of operation. It will provide approximately 430 local jobs.

The port will open with a visit from Carnival Victory from the company’s Carnival Cruise Line brand on October 6th, 2015.

Following this inaugural visit, five additional Carnival Corporation brands are scheduled to make calls on Amber Cove - including Cunard’s Queen Mary 2 on November 22nd, P&O Cruises’ (UK) Azura on December 5th, AIDA Cruises’ AIDAvita on December 11th, Costa Cruises’ Costa Deliziosa on December 31st and Holland America Line’s ms Eurodam on January 19th.

As the world’s largest cruising market – representing more than 37 percent of the global cruise business – the Caribbean is a strategic geographic region for Carnival Corporation and the overall cruise industry and is highly popular for vacationers.

This new port facility in the Dominican Republic underscores the company’s focus on creating great vacation experiences, as passengers sailing the Caribbean will have an exciting new destination to visit.