Fred Olsen Cruise Lines is selling its smallest ship , which has been laid up since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The 24,300-gt Braemar (built 1993), which is expected to be sold via broking channels, is one of two cruise ships on which Fred Olsen holding company Bonheur recently took an asset value impairment of NOK 456m ($45.7m).
Bonheur, in its third-quarter results, said the UK cruise operation, which owns four vessels, posted an Ebitda loss of NOK 42m, against a deficit of NOK 138m the year before.
The operation was affected by low occupancy due to rebookings, high fuel costs and the falling value of the British pound.
Bonheur called the outlook for the UK cruise market “uncertain”.
Fred Olsen told travel media on Tuesday that the Braemar was “not aligned with where we now want to be as a business”.
Although Fred Olsen has marketed the smaller size and traditional style of its vessels as an antidote to giant modern mass-market cruise ships, it took advantage of Carnival Corp’s pandemic fleet sell-off to acquire the 61,800-gt Rotterdam (built 1997) and 62,700-gt Amsterdam (built 2000) from Holland America.
Put into service under the names Borealis and Bolette, these two ships were twice the size and had double the passenger capacity of the elderly pair of former Royal Viking vessels they replaced. Nevertheless, they are still considered relatively small in today’s cruise market.
The 924-berth Braemar is currently laid up in the Scottish port of Rosyth.
Bonheur also owns Norway’s DN Media Group, the parent company of TradeWinds.
