Crystal Endeavor

CRYSTAL ENDEAVOR, LAUNCHED IN ICELAND IN JULY 2021, IS CRYSTAL CRUISES’ FIRST PURPOSE-BUILT EXPEDITION SHIP. THIS POLAR CLASS YACHT, BUILT BY MV WERFTEN, FEATURES 100 ALL-BALCONY SUITES, AN EXTENSIVE SPA, AND SIX FINE DINING RESTAURANTS. SO YOU WON’T HAVE TO SKIMP ON LUXURY, EVEN WHEN TRAVELING TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH.

ALL PHOTOS COURTESY OF MV WERFTEN.

This frst luxury expedition yacht with ice class constructed in Germany was named at MV Werften in Stralsund on 26 June 2021. The naming ceremony, duly complying with the strictest hygiene and safety regulations, took place in the fnest weather on the ship’s helicopter deck. Guests included Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Energy Peter Altmaier, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania’s Prime Minister Manuela Schwesig, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania’s Economics Minister Harry Glawe, Genting Hong Kong’s Group President Colin Au, and MV Werften Managing Directors Peter Fetten and Carsten J. Haake. The event was viewed by several thousand people all over the world via livestream on YouTube and Facebook.

Ms Schwesig was to serve as Godmother of Crystal Endeavor. She wished the new ship good voyages at all times before she pressed the red yard buzzer to activate the bottle release. “The naming ceremony is a sign of Germany’s relaunch as a shipbuilding location”, states Mrs Schwesig. “Our shipyards are innovative high performers, with highly motivated experts and know-how acquired over decades. The employees at MV Werften have successfully driven the transformation process from containership production via specialpurpose shipbuilding to cruise ship construction in the last few years, demonstrating that even under diffcult circumstances they can achieve top performances, also in recent months.” “Today is a landmark day as we christen Crystal Endeavor, the frst and only Polar Class Six (PC6) expedition yacht to be built in Germany, and a testament to Crystal’s award-winning design and MV Werften’s superb German engineering with system redundancies, including 100% additional lifeboat capacity, to handle extreme polar conditions”, states Tan Sri Kok Thay Lim, Chairman of Genting Hong Kong, on the occasion of the naming ceremony.

At 20,200GT, 164m long, and 23m wide, Crystal Endeavor is the fastest, highest-performing, and most spacious expedition mega yacht in its sector, with a passenger space ratio of more than 100. Her Polar Class PC6 classifcation enables her to navigate Arctic and Antarctic regions. She offers a total of 100 suites of between 28 and 105m² with 24-hour butler service for a maximum of 200 passengers. Six gourmet restaurants and a casino, a glasscovered, two-storey solarium, a spa, and a ftness centre, as well as various lounges and shopping possibilities are provided on board. For expeditions by air and by water, she carries two helicopters, eighteen Zodiacs (infatable >>

rubber boats), fourteen kayaks and a six-guest submersible. Jack Anderson, President and CEO of Crystal Cruises, praises the state-ofthe-art technology, innovative design, and high safety standards of Crystal Endeavor, describing her as an “unparalleled and bold new expedition yacht made in Germany”. He also notes, “She is precision engineered to launch a new standard in global travel”. This expedition yacht is the ninth ship in the fleet of Crystal Cruises.

On 10 July, Crystal Endeavor cruised out of MV Werften in Stralsund. In the early morning, the signal horn of the yacht blared loudly several times over the Strelasund Strait to bid farewell to the Hanseatic City of Stralsund. Many Stralsund shipyard employees and their families waved goodbye to ‘their’ ship from the quayside. Hundreds of onlookers – both local people and tourists – had also gathered in Stralsund to wave farewell to the expedition mega yacht, which departed from MV Werften in Stralsund, where she was designed and built, bound for Iceland and her inaugural voyages.

From here, Crystal Endeavor went en route to arrive in Reykjavík on 15 July. She departed from Iceland’s capital on her inaugural voyage on 17 July on the first in a series of five 10-night immersive voyages circumnavigating Iceland’s most dramatically beautiful and fascinating locales. The ‘Luxury Iceland Expedition’ voyages will sail round-trip from Reykjavík. These voyages will be followed by the 10-night ‘Journey of Vikings: Iceland & Norway’ from Reykjavík to Tromsø, departing on 5 September. Additional autumn departures include the 13-night ‘Norwegian Fjords & Scottish Isles Exploration’ from Tromsø to London, departing 15 September, featuring the fjords and UNESCO treasures of Norway and an overnight stay in Edinburgh, and the 11-night ‘Breton, Bordeaux and Beyond’ from London to Lisbon, departing on 28 September and highlighted by two nights in the heart of Bordeaux and an overnight call in London.