Season´s 1st Int´l cruise ship arrives at Helsinki Port

The 2024 cruising season will be kicked off by the MS Borealis, which is due to arrive at Hernesaari on Friday, said the Port of Helsinki in a press release on Thursday.

Ninety-nine vessel calls have been booked in advance in Helsinki this season.

Ship occupancy rates are expected to be good, with 180,000 cruise ship passengers due to visit the city.

Another new development of the season is the water bus quay built by the Port of Helsinki at Hernesaari, intended for water bus entrepreneurs serving international cruise ship passengers.

A total of 13 calls will also involve overnight stays in Helsinki.

The busiest cruising day of the summer looks to be on July 11, when three international cruise ships will be docked in Helsinki.

This year offers an unusually long cruising season, with the last call scheduled for December 20.

“The normal cruising season ends in October, but after that we have a call scheduled from a vessel specialising in winter cruises – the MS Le Commandant Charcot. It offers smaller groups of travellers wintery exoticism and a modern luxury polar cruise by touring northern cruising destinations. The vessel is also well equipped for navigating ice – its ice class is so high that it is practically an icebreaker,” said Harbour Master Staffan Teromaa.

“This will not be the first winter cruise in the Baltic, and it is a trend that we welcome. These kinds of cruises mean that vessel calls are more evenly spaced out and not concentrated just in the summer months,” Teromaa added.