Carnival Cruise Line reaches 2m passengers since restart

The milestone was commemorated Thursday at Port Canaveral aboard Carnival Freedom as the Gibbs family – Daniel and Kristi with son Mason and grandmother Theresa Campbell – from Ocala, Florida, embarked. They were surprised with fanfare from Carnival Freedom’s Capt. Mario Imbimbo, hotel director, cruise director and other team members.

The line's industry pace-setting restart began on July 3, 2021, when Carnival Vista set sail from Galveston. Since then 22 additional ships have resumed service from 13 US homeports.

During this time, passengers have taken more than 1.3m shore excursions, and 2m Carnival-branded items have been sold in the gift shops fleetwide, including 150,000 items from the line’s 50th birthday collection. Additionally, passengers were helping raise $2.25m for Carnival's partner, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

'Providing much-needed vacations'

'We are so pleased to have sailed two million guests since our restart, providing much-needed vacations featuring our signature fun to an array of destinations in the Caribbean, the Bahamas, the Mexican Riviera, Alaska and Europe,' Carnival President Christine Duffy said. 'All the while, providing an economic boost to those destinations and providing our crew members with opportunities to support their families.'

14th homeport restart to come

Carnival will restart in its 14th homeport of New York City in June with Carnival Magic and has announced plans for Carnival Splendor to restart in Australia following its Alaska season with a three-day cruise departing Sydney on Oct. 2.

And, in November, Carnival’s newest ship, Carnival Celebration, featuring a roller coaster and powered by LNG, is scheduled to debut at PortMiami.