The Crown Princess cruise ship at Queen's Wharf in Auckland. Photo: RNZ / Jessica Hopkins
The first of an expected 170,000 cruise ship visitors to New Zealand this year arrived in Auckland today, on the Crown Princess.
The promise of 80 ships visiting Auckland during this year's cruise season is welcome news for the city's tourism operators.
Helen Silvey, who runs the main downtown information centre for Fullers 360 Ferries, said it was great that the ships were back.
"We don't have as many cruise ships coming this season as in previous years, which is unfortunate. But I think it's looking pretty bright for the future."
She was keen to get tourists across to Waiheke Island if they had a day to spend in the city before a late departure, like with the Crown Princess, which was leaving at 10pm on Monday.
"That means they've got time to go out to Waiheke, have a really nice experience out there with our hop-on hop-off bus, some nice wine tasting, and then come back, and maybe even something else as well."
Princess Cruises was expected to make up about a fifth of cruise ship calls this season.
It's Asia Pacific vice president Matthew Rutherford said four Princess ships would make 52 stops across Auckland, Bay of Islands, Tauranga, Napier, Wellington, Christchurch, Dunedin, and Milford Sound.
As well as visitors from Australia and the UK, the ships would be bringing many American tourists.
Coral Princess, departing from Fort Lauderdale, and Island Princess, departing from Los Angeles, would arrive in Auckland in February and April respectively, before calling at ports across the country.
"New Zealand is the most incredible cruise destination. It has beautiful landscapes, a rich Māori culture. The Kiwi welcome is just outstanding, and people love being in New Zealand," Rutherford said.
He said there had been a drop off in ships visiting this part of the world, due to the high costs of reaching New Zealand's waters for operators.
Cruise passenger numbers were down 20 percent last summer and projected to fall another 20 percent this year.
But Rutherford said plenty of people still had Aotearoa on their cruise bucket list.
"Demand is high and people want to cruise in New Zealand, it's just the costs for operators.
"We need to work out a way to become more cost-effective and encourage more cruise ships to the region to want to operate here."
Tourism and Hospitality Minister Louise Upston said the government was working on making the country a more attractive cruise destination.
She said this included the development of a new wharf and passenger terminal for cruise vessels and making it easier for ships to meet biosecurity rules.
"We know some cruise operators had questions about the New Zealand operational environment before they could commit to future scheduling.
"We've worked hard to address those questions so forward planning can go full steam ahead once again."
She said ministers met with cruise and port sector representatives in July to discuss removing barriers to cruise operators coming here.
"As a result, we've worked on new ways to manage biofouling, so cruise lines have confidence any extra cleaning needed to meet biosecurity rules can be done safely and efficiently."
They'd also worked hard to provide clarity on regulatory costs facing the sector and set up a Fast-Track approvals process supporting efficient consenting for much-needed infrastructure like Port of Auckland's development of a new wharf and passenger terminal for cruise vessels.
Ongoing cruise access to Milford Sound had also recently been confirmed.
"I also want to acknowledge the work of Port of Auckland who announced earlier today that it is in the final stages of developing an innovative in-port biofouling solution to clean niche areas of ships."
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