Ritz Carlton’s Ilma makes maiden call to Barbados with over 450 visitors

The Ritz-Carlton Yacht Collection’s luxurious vessel, Ilma, made its inaugural berth at the Port of Bridgetown in Barbados on Monday, marking the island’s first maiden port call for 2025. The vessel comprising of 224 suites arrived with a total of 448 passengers, several of which disembarked and explored the various local offerings of the island nation.  

Also in the port were the MV Viking Sea, Norwegian’s Breakaway and the MS Amadea. The four vessels brought a total of 6101 visitors to the island on Monday.  

While welcoming the Ilma cruise on its maiden call, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Tourism, Francine Blackman hosted a traditional plaque exchange ceremony onboard the vessel. Notably, Ilma is the newest vessel in the collection of Ritz Carlton and it started sailing in September 2024.  

During the brief ceremony, the Permanent Secretary said that the celebration is an exciting development for the cruise industry of Barbados. She outlined that over the years, the Ministry of Tourism in partnership with the Barbados Port Inc and Barbados Tourism Marketing Inc has worked consistently to diversify and enhance the cruise tourism of the island. 

She further said that the Ritz Carlton brand is recognised across the globe as a leader in hospitality, luxury and service excellence so to have the Ilma call on the Port is indicative of the strides made in maintaining the island’s status as a premier destination.  

According to Blackman, the Ministry will continue to target the luxury segment of the cruise industry in its overall strategy as the island strives to position itself as a premier port destination in the region.  

During the ceremony, she also revealed that between January to November 2024, there was an increase in the overall cruise arrivals as compared to the same period for the previous year. Barbados witnessed a 23% increase in total cruise ship arrivals and there were a total of 649,125 cruise arrivals, more than 526,114 cruise arrivals for the same period in 2023, she added.