The Cruise Industry suffered heavy losses during the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021, so it was a real pleasure to see that in 2022 it recovered well, with over 1m Cruise Passengers arriving in Turkiye throughout the year, carried by 991 ships. Compare that to 2021, and it’s a huge increase given that only 45,000 passengers arrived in that year, carried by 78 cruise ships which docked at the various ports around the country.
Given the restrictions that were placed on the population to try and curb the spread, Cruise Ships were probably hit hardest of all, with many liners forced to either cancel altogether or postpone to another year, which had dire consequences for their finances, staff and of course the passengers that had booked to join the cruise. Therefore, the news coming out now in regard to total numbers for last year, will be extremely refreshing and pleasing for everyone involved with the Industry.
Kusadasi was by far the busiest of the ports with over 400 Cruise Liners docking in the berths, bringing with them a total of 493,834 passengers. Galataport hosted 143 ships, and Bodrum came third with a total of 98. There was also a major uplift in the number of passengers welcomed into other ports as well including Amasra and Unye which hosted liners for the first time.
Galataport in Istanbul was voted as Port of the Year, but there’s so much more to come for this project, which has already had an investment of around $1.7bn USD. Offering essential features, multiple facilities, Cruise Liner Termninal, 250 shops, bars and restaurants plus a Hotel, it has already and will continue to transform the local harbour area into a major World-Class Cruise Liner Hub capable of handling approximately 25 million passengers per year, of which around 1.5 million will come from the Cruise Industry itself.
