Silver Spirit, the world’s first “stretched” luxury cruise ship arrives today (Wednesday) at the start of her trans-Atlantic repositioning cruise. The ship is on a cruise from London to New York via Cobh, Newfoundland and Nova Scotia. Following a series of cruises on the east coast of the USA the ship spends the remainder of the year in the Caribbean.

The 39,500 tons Silver Spirit was stretched earlier this year by the Italian shipbuilding company Fincantieri at the Palermo, shipyard in Sicily.

During dry-docking the vessel was lengthened by inserting a prebuilt midsection (length 15 m / 49 ft.). This made Silver Spirit the world's first stretched luxury cruise ship. The new section (hull and superstructure) added to the liner a total of 34 new cabins.

During the dry-docking the ship was also extensively refurbished and updated.

Its crew capacity was increased from 376 to 412. The passenger capacity was increased from 540 to 608 (12%), dining capacity (15%), outdoor seating (20%).

The £60 million refit project cost involved over 500 workers, approx. 450,000 man-hours, 846 tons of steel, 360,892 ft. (110 km) of new cables, 26,247 ft. (8 km) of new pipes.

Following in Silver Spirit’s wake will be Seabourn Ovation, the brand new ultra luxurious cruise ship from the Seabourn Cruises fleet making her inaugural call here on Monday September 17th as she embarks on a 16 day anti-clockwise circumnavigation of the United Kingdom on her “Jewels of the National Trust “ cruise.