Carnival Sunshine will return to service tomorrow after being out of service since the first week of January.
The cruise ship’s time out of service was part of a scheduled dry dock. Older cruise ships go into dry dock every three years for routine maintenance and to keep the vessels running in top form.
In addition to routine maintenance, several parts of the ship received complete refurbishments. This includes the water park, ropes course, mini golf course, jogging track, and all flooring of all open decks.
New motion lights were added to guest cabins and the casino received several upgrades including a new host deck on the Promenade Deck.
Carnival Sunshine’s first cruise back will be a five-night sailing from Norfolk to The Bahamas on February 11, 2025. The cruise will visit Freeport and Bimini.
The cruise ship will homeport in Norfolk for all of 2025 sailing mostly six- and eight-night cruises to The Bahamas and Eastern Caribbean.
Since Carnival Sunshine has been in service 1996, the ship goes into dry dock every three years. The ship made history in 1996 being the very first cruise ship to ever be larger than 100,000 gross tons.
In 2013, a two and a half month dry dock saw the ship transform from Carnival Destiny into Carnival Sunshine.
The previous dry dock in late 2021 saw the ship receive the new red, white and blue hull design to go along with general hotel and ship maintenance.
You can see Carnival Cruise Line’s complete ship dry dock schedule here.
