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Crafted with minute attention to detail and inspiration from legends ancient and modern, Carnival's newest cruise ship begins a career of providing fabled travels.
By ROBERT N. JENKINS, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times, published September 29, 2002
AMSTERDAM -- "That's 100 meters, Captain," comes the voice, speaking English with a Dutch accent. "One hundred meters (328 feet) to go."
"100 meters," repeats Claudio Cupisti, master of the 2,124-passenger Carnival Legend, as he directs its passage through a lock into the North Sea.
It is lights-out dark on the Legend's bridge, the better to let Cupisti and a couple of other officers see what there is to see at 1:15 a.m. The faces of those on the bridge are tinted fluorescent green or red, depending on which electronic monitor they are facing as they look out the expanse of windows.
The Dutch official helping the ship through the lock listens to his two-way radio and calls out the ship's progress. At less than three-tenths of a mile per hour, the vessel is gliding toward the huge metal door that holds back the North Sea from this channel.
At the right moment, a motor will move that door sideways, letting in the sea and letting out the ship.
"Seventy meters, Captain."
Before Cupisti acknowledges this, another voice calls through the darkness, but these words are in Italian, the captain's native language.
"Sette metri," announces one of the Legend's other officers, also Italian. He is calling out the space between the side of the hull and the lock wall: seven meters, or about 23 feet.
"Bene, bene," responds Cupisti: Good, good.
And so it goes, until the lock door slides open.
Cupisti, captaining his eighth Carnival ship, looks down through the thick glass panel in the floor of the bridge where it projects beyond the widest deck below. He can see the water between the ship's hull and the open end of the lock as the Legend enters the North Sea.
"Bene," he announces again.
About 115 feet of the Carnival Legend has now passed through the lock. Only 845 more to go before the lock gate can close behind its stern, and the captain can relax slightly.
In little more than 24 hours, the black-haired, reed-slim Cupisti will oversee the predawn docking at Harwich, England, ending Carnival Legend's maiden voyage.
The ship will later leave Harwich on a 15-day trans-Atlantic voyage to New York. Beginning Nov. 10, it will be based in Fort Lauderdale, sailing eight-day trips into the Caribbean.
As master of the vessel, Cupisti's main responsibility is to move the passengers safely from port to port. On every voyage, he'll show up at least once in his formal uniform to greet and pose for photos with the passengers before the traditional black-tie dinners.
Increasingly, cruise ships are marketed as seagoing resorts -- at least as important as the destinations they visit. And passengers are unlikely ever to meet the people responsible for designing and furnishing these vessels.
For Carnival Cruise Lines during the past 25 years, that has been just one man, Joe Farcus.
He says the Carnival Legend's 12 decks of cabins, dining and recreational spaces are arranged in "the closest to an ideal layout of a cruise ship" that he can imagine.
Leading reporters on a narrated tour of the Legend last month, ship's architect Farcus said he came up with the "intellectual point to design the ship around . . . legendary people and places, both real and imaginary," before the ship's name actually was chosen by company executives.
Once he had the theme, Farcus said, it took him about four months to decide details that would display the theme of legends.
The Miami-based Farcus is noted for designing or selecting just about everything on these ships outside the engine room and bridge -- from carpeting to ceiling designs and all the furniture, artwork and bedspread fabrics in between.
He estimates he spent about one-half of the Carnival Legend's reported cost of $375-million on that chore.
The Legend is the third vessel built to the identical blueprint by a Helsinki shipyard, following the Carnival Spirit and Carnival Pride. Thus, Farcus had to work for the third time on the same interior spaces. Interior walls and hallways are not changed from ship to ship, only the decorations and other items designed to please the passengers.
"I don't ever want to repeat myself," he said. Nonetheless, he does not have his computer filled with images of what he has done before. "Pretty much" his previous work "is in my head."
He does use some basics to both enhance the flow of passengers and crew and to "reassure" first-time cruisers about moving into this huge but confined space. That begins with their first steps onboard.
"I'm a bit claustrophobic myself," Farcus admitted, so he designed the main entrance to the Legend and its two predecessors as an atrium that creates an eight-deck-tall hole in the ship's interior.
"Passengers who have never sailed before can find (cruising) a little bit daunting. I want the atrium to be a magnet that pulls you in and helps you lose any feeling of discomfort."
To that end, a curving bar within the atrium envelops a small bandstand for musical combos, there is a wooden dance floor by the bar, and there are numerous niches to either side of this space for sitting and talking.
Scenes of languid maidens in flowing robes, reproduced from pre-Raphaelite paintings selected by Farcus, serve as privacy screens between banquettes and leather couches in these sitting areas. He says he chose the maidens because they are in "dreamy scenes . . . an idea of what a cruise is all about, as people come aboard to get away from everyday life."
Other touches, large and small, differentiate the Legend from its 1-year-older twins. Among them:
There's an edgy, almost menacing look in the ship's disco, Medusa's Lair. Representing the mythical gorgon with a head of snakes instead of hair is a large sculpture on one wall; changing colors of light flash through Medusa's eyes and her snakes.
The decor of the main theater resembles the movie "palaces" of the 1930s -- think Tampa Theatre -- and on one corridor wall leading in is a huge color photo mural. The picture, reproduced from a 1943 issue of Life magazine, shows Louis B. Mayer, czar of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, surrounded by 64 of his stars:
Here is Gene Kelly, looking not much older than the teenage Mickey Rooney, nearby. There is Jimmy Stewart, in his real-life Army Air Force captain's uniform. William Powell offers that impish "Nick Charles" smirk.
Seated to one side of Mayer is the elegant Katharine Hepburn; one row back and one chair over is the man who was her lover for decades, the great Spencer Tracy.
Farcus has eschewed the typical Caribbean/tropical pastels in favor of a darker look. Burgundy-colored, wood-veneer trim with a tiny pattern in gold is prominent in public areas.
In the two-deck-high formal dining room, handpainted borders on the walls "pick up touches from the rims" of one of the most acclaimed table-china patterns, Royal Copenhagen's 18th century Flora Danica. And Farcus estimates he spent $75,000 on pieces of other china that are glued down in display cases along the walls.
Another detail few passengers are likely to notice is that much of the flooring in the lobbies is bordered with a handlaid tile mosaic.
This sort of attention to detail is elevating the motif of the new ships in the 17-vessel Carnival fleet above their gaudier predecessors.
It may take such touches to lure more passengers, as 13 other ships are being delivered to America's cruise companies this year.
Despite this expansion in cabin space, the popularity of cruising on these "newbuilds" is such that the Carnival Legend's just-completed, trans-Atlantic crossing sold out less than three weeks after it was announced.
The Carnival Legend is currently sailing out of New York City but will soon begin a short series of voyages from other East Coast ports. Beginning Nov. 10, it will sail on eight-day cruises from Fort Lauderdale. Alternating itineraries will include calls at St. Maarten, Barbados and Martinique, and Belize, Costa Rica and Panama.
The vessel has 20 cabin categories and two price categories that depend on both the departure date and date of booking the trip. Generally, the "Super Saver Rates" are $900 less for the same cabin category.
Brochure prices begin at $749 for the smallest (185 square feet) inside (no ocean view) cabin, and rise to $2,349 for suites (as large as 300 square feet) with balconies (up to 220 square feet).
While early sailings of new ships seldom are discounted in price, especially during the popular winter season, rates drop once the ships have been in service several months.
For more information, consult a travel agent or contact Carnival: Call toll-free 1-800-227-6482, or go to the Web site, www.carnival.com.