POINTE BLANCHE:--- On Tuesday morning port management and supervisory board directors were on hand to welcome the Carnival Conquest to the Port of St. Maarten on its first inaugural call with over 3000 cruise passengers.
Carnival veteran Captain Francesco La Fauci told port management representative Hector Peters and supervisory board of directors Renald Williams and Humphrey Mezas, that the destination is one of his favorites. He added that all guests and crew love St. Maarten and always have good things to say about the island upon their return to the ship.
Captain La Fauci is one out of 10 senior captains of the cruise line with 30-years' experience. Prior to the Conquest, he was captain of the Carnival Triumph for four years which also called at the port. The last time Captain La Fauci visited the destination was back in 2009. This is his first time docking at the port's new pier.
The Captain spoke with Peters, Williams and Mezas about the progress the country has made since the last time he was here, and he was very pleased to learn about the economy.
Peters, Williams and Mezas who were presented with plaques by the captain thanked the captain for the cruise lines continued interests and confidence in the destination. They pointed out that the port and the destination overall is always looking ahead and trying to do our best to keep cruise passengers and crew members interested in returning to the island.
The Conquest will homeport out of Miami, Florida after completing two repositioning's which started at the beginning of November. The new Miami-based schedule is part of Carnival's ongoing Fun Ship 2.0 initiative of repositioning its vessels.
The Carnival Conquest can carry 2984 passengers but has a total guest capacity of 3,700; and has a crew of 1150. The vessel is 953 feet in length and has a gross tonnage of 110,000.
The vessel was built at a cost of US$500 million by the Fincantieri Cantieri Navali Italian shipyard. Its inaugural cruise was December 1, 2002.
Also in port on Tuesday were the Disney Fantasy and Norwegian Epic.
