The much-loved Pacific Princess, which starred in the popular television series “The Love Boat” has been sold to Azamara.
“The Love Boat” will join Azamara’s fleet of three, premium small- ships which were recently sold by Royal Caribbean Group to private equity firm Sycamore Partners for US$201 million.
Azamara president Carol Cabezas said that Pacific Princess will be upgraded to the same standard of Azamara Pursuit, Azamara Journey and Azamara Quest.
“We absolutely will invest in making her look like her Azamara sister vessels,” she said in a report published by Travel Agent Central.
New owners Sycamore Partners bought the Azamara fleet because of its loyal following.
“They don’t want to so the heavy lifting of standing up a new brand in the cruise sector. To them, it was ideal that they were coming into a brand that is well respected,” Ms Cabezas added.
The Azamara brand will continue to sail to off-the-beaten destinations with more overnights and late night stays in ports and continue with the immersive land excursions and exclusive events, she said.
Pacific Princess was featured in the TV show “The Love Boat,” with the former star Gavin Macleod who played Captain Stubing and other stars from the show, including Fred Grandy who played Gopher, Ted Lange who played bartender Isaac, Bernie Kopell who played the ship’s doctor, Lauren Tewes who played cruise director Julie, and Jill Whelan who played the captain’s daughter Vicki, were all on board during a sailing of the ship in 2015 to celebrate the line’s 50th anniversary.
“Pacific Princess holds so many memories and cherished experiences to all who sailed upon her,” said cruise line President Jan Swartz recently. “It’s difficult to say goodbye to our ‘Love Boat’”.
Pacific Princess was the smallest in the Princess fleet with a capacity of 670 guests and sailed more than 1.6 million nautical miles and hosted 11 world cruises.
The love boat of the series was built in about 1971. Pacific Princess and sometimes Island Princess (later Discovery) were used but both were scrapped.
The Pacific Princess recently with P&O Princess Lines was built for the Renaissance
Line so R3 is joining the former R6 and R7 with Azamara who know the perfect size of 688 passengers which I hope will manage post Covid cruising
The Pacific Princess was not the ship in “The Love Boat”. It was a previous ship of the same name. The current ship was built way after the TV series ended.