YEAR 2007-08

December 7, 2006 - Fred Olsen will operate its biggest ever season of worldwide cruises for 2007/8 season aboard its fleet of five ships - Boudicca, Braemar, Black Watch, Black Prince and, for the first time, Balmoral.

The second edition of its brochure is the most comprehensive Fred Olsen has ever launched and features 138 sailings, lasting from just two nights to 107, visiting 281 different ports, so the choice is unsurpassed.

The introduction of the fourth ship - Boudicca - in February 2006, has allowed for a wider choice of destinations and more long cruises ex-UK. Black Watch will set sail for a world cruise again in 2008 - her third - and other cruise destinations include Africa, the Amazon, the Baltic, the Canary Islands, Caribbean, Mediterranean and the Norwegian Fjords.

The choice of departure points has also been expanded for 2007/8, with Braemar adding Edinburgh (Leith) to her Newcastle season. This allows Black Prince to cruise from western British ports with more sailings from Liverpool, Glasgow (Greenock), Dublin and Belfast.

One of the key highlights among the new cruises is Black Watch's North America 51-night voyage leaving Dover on September 23, 2007. This travels via Iceland and Greenland to Canada and all along the Eastern Seaboard of North America including Boston and New York, then on to the Bahamas and Bermuda returning via the Azores.

This classic New World odyssey can also be booked in three separate, shorter sectors:- these are Dover - Montreal, Montreal - Nassau, and Nassau - Dover and there are cruise and stay options, with pre and post cruise holidays in Canada and the Bahamas an as optional extra.

Prices for the full 51-night cruise start from £5,443 per person including the early booking Cruiseaway Discount.

The 2007/8 cruise programme visits a huge variety of ports worldwide, of which many are first time destinations for the cruise line. The World Cruise alone includes nine new destinations that Black Watch will visit on her epic 107-night voyage in 2008, as well as twenty new ports in the rest of the programme.

Summer 2007 cruises travelling north will visit, for the first time, Lulea, Sweden's Lapland port; Halmstad in Sweden celebrating its 700th birthday and Archangel on RussiaÕs White Sea coast.

New destinations in a southerly direction are Khania, Crete; Sochi on Russia's Black Sea Coast; Split in Croatia, Koper in Slovenia and Seville in Spain, with 40 miles sailing up the Guadalquivir River.

Lol Nichols, Fred. Olsen's general sales manager says: "We have many customers who cruise with us again and again, so we are always looking for new and interesting destinations to visit. Having extra capacity with the introduction of Boudicca has given us more scope to vary our itineraries - and of course the relatively small size of our ships allows us access to many fascinating ports that the larger ships cannot reach. We think the choice of destinations offered in the 2007/8 programme is our best ever Ð and with the introduction of a fifth ship in 2008, we will be able to visit an even wider selection of ports."

Boudicca starts 2007 with an epic Latin America cruise of 48 nights. She departs Southampton on 21st January, travelling via the Canary Islands to the Caribbean and Central America, with key ports of call including Costa Rica, Honduras, Mexico and Cuba. She returns via the Bahamas, Bermuda and the Azores. The Cruiseaway fare on this cruise starts from £4,667 per person.

Among first time ports of call added to 2007/8 itineraries are Koper in Slovenia, Lulea in Sweden and Dunedin on New Zealand's South Island. The cruises offer the most extensive choice ever - both of destinations and departure ports - from mini cruises of just 2 nights right up to Black Watch's World Cruise of 107 nights.

Fred Olsen has also extended its programme of departures from regional UK cruise ports for the 2007/8 season. It has been a policy for many years to "take the ships to the people" and the extra capacity provided by Boudicca has made it possible to include more regional departures than ever before.

A new development will be a series of summer cruises from Edinburgh (Leith) aboard Braemar in 2007, travelling to Iceland, the Baltic and the Norwegian fjords. First of these departures is a 10-night cruise to Iceland departing Leith on July 6. This cruise travels via Bergen in Norway and visits four Icelandic ports - Djupivogur, Akureyri, Reykjavik and Heimaey - and returns via Kirkwall in Norway. Braemar will also repeat her season of summer and early autumn cruises from Newcastle, introduced in 2006.

Black Prince cruises exclusively from regional ports in 2007/8 with departures from Liverpool, Glasgow (Greenock), Belfast, Dublin and Waterford. On some cruises there is a choice of departure ports Ð for example a cruise to Iberia can be taken from Liverpool on March 31, 2008, or from Waterford departing March 30. The full itinerary for this 10-day cruise is Waterford, Liverpool, then two days at sea before reaching Lisbon, Tangier and Seville and finally La Corun a in Spain.Other cruises offer a choice of departures from Belfast or Greenock (BP707, Canaries Easter cruise), Dublin/Liverpool, Belfast/Liverpool or Dublin/Greenock.

Says Lol Nichols: "We welcome the opportunity to offer more regional departures and a choice of ships. We know that our customers who live far from the southern ports appreciate being able to cruise from nearer home. We have also seen a marked increase in demand from Ireland, which is why we have extra departures from Belfast, Dublin and now Waterford. With a fifth ship on the horizon, the regional programme will expand still further over the coming years."

Balmoral joins the fleet in 2008 and during her inaugural season will sail out of two new homeports - Miami and Civitavecchia (Rome).

The fleet of five ships now sails from a wider range of ports than ever before and the back cover of the new brochure carries a useful Homeports Calendar showing where each ship will be based at any given time.

It includes an introduction to Balmoral, a 34,242-ton vessel carrying just under 1,000 passengers in 523 cabins. The overall theme of the ship will be British, calling to mind a comfortable and opulent English Country House. The names of the interior rooms are currently being decided but will include the Ballindalloch Room (the main restaurant), the Blenheim Lounge (main lounge) and Neptune Lounge (entertainment venue.)

The brochure also includes an extended guide to cruises featuring The ArtsClub, Fred. Olsen's programme of special interests that includes such varied topics as music, dance, antiques, gardening, wine, bridge, comedy, history, painting, wildlife and photography.

Selected cruises are flagged as Family Friendly - on these cruises, which are during school holidays, such as peak summer, Easter and Christmas, child discounts apply of up to 85 pewr cent for 2-11 year olds and 75 per cent for 12-16s sharing their parents' cabin.

Selected cruises in the new edition of the brochure are highlighted as Star Buys meaning that they carry an enhanced Cruiseaway Discount that may be as much as 50per cent less than brochure price. One such is Braemar's Route to the Caribbean (BM187) departing Southampton on October 9, 2007. This 17-night cruise voyage visits the islands of St Maarten, Antigua, St Lucia and Barbados flying back to Gatwick or Manchester. It additionally has an ArtsClub theme of comedy. Prices with the enhanced discount start from £1,119 per person based on two sharing an inside twin cabin.

Full details of all cruises are featured in Fred Olsen Cruises Worldwide 2007/8 brochure and on their website. For reservations, call 01473 742424.