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Major cruises from British ports will resume this week with a maiden voyage of a vessel around the coast of the UK.

MSC Cruises second ship of the Meraviglia-Plus class, Afloat adds is MSC Virtuosa, which according to the Belfast Telegraph, will leave Southampton (see ship's earlier entry cruise) on Thursday for a four-night cruise. This is to be followed by three and four-night mini-cruises.

From June 12, the 19-deck ship will start to operate longer seven-night sailings through to mid-September. This will offer guests additional embarkation ports in Liverpool and Greenock as well as calls at Portland in Dorset and Belfast (from where Afloat adds arrived this morning from Liverpool).

For comments on the visit by MSC Cruises UK & Ireland's managing director, click the newspaper's link here. 

Today's call of the MSC Virtuosa to Belfast Harbour, Afloat adds, follows the first and only cruisecaller last year to Northern Ireland before Covid-19 struck.

On that occasion, Hurtigruten's newbuild hybrid-powered expedition cruiseship MS Fridtjof Nansen made a maiden debut to the city.

Published in Cruise Liners

The Dragon was designed by Johan Anker in 1929 as an entry for a competition run by the Royal Yacht Club of Gothenburg, to find a small keel-boat that could be used for simple weekend cruising among the islands and fjords of the Scandinavian seaboard. The original design had two berths and was ideally suited for cruising in his home waters of Norway. The boat quickly attracted owners and within ten years it had spread all over Europe.

The Dragon's long keel and elegant metre-boat lines remain unchanged, but today Dragons are constructed using the latest technology to make the boat durable and easy to maintain. GRP is the most popular material, but both new and old wooden boats regularly win major competitions while looking as beautiful as any craft afloat. Exotic materials are banned throughout the boat, and strict rules are applied to all areas of construction to avoid sacrificing value for a fractional increase in speed.

The key to the Dragon's enduring appeal lies in the careful development of its rig. Its well-balanced sail plan makes boat handling easy for lightweights, while a controlled process of development has produced one of the most flexible and controllable rigs of any racing boat.