In a first for the Port of Tauranga, three passenger cruise ships are alongside today.

They are the Volendam and Dawn Princess, both of which have been in port already this summer, and the boutique passenger ship Orion.

The Volendam arrived about 6.30am, the Dawn Princess at about 6.45am and the Orion about 10.30am.


The smallest of the three cruise ships, Orion, far right, was the last ship to arrive when it came into port at about 10.30am on Tuesday.

The Volendam and Dawn Princess are between them expected to land about 2500 passengers and crew for a day in the Mount, Tauranga and the Bay of Plenty.

The Orion is expected to bring ashore about 165 passengers and crew.

The Volendam and the Sun Princess were in port together on February 25.

The Volendam and Dawn Princess are from Auckland, and are heading down the east coast with the next ports Gisborne for the Volendam and Napier for the Princess.

Neither port is large enough to take all three ships at once.

The Orion has arrived from the Bay of Islands and is also going to Napier or Gisborne.

The agent for all three ships is ISS McKay.

Three ships in port at once will not happen again this season, says agent Dave Taylor, but owing to the fluid nature of cruise ship scheduling, two more ships have been added to the Tauranga list this season. They are the Amadea due March 4, and the Aurora, due March 9.

The passenger numbers coming ashore are expected to be about the same as last Friday when the Volendam and Sun Princess were in port together, says Mount Mainstreet manager Leanne Brown.

'This year we have had six days where we have doubled up, whereas last year we had one,” says Leanne.

'So it's really busy down on the wharf as the Port Tauranga try to move the people around.

'The buses come in and the inbound tour passengers all get off first, then it's the other tour operator vehicles coming out all the time picking up people that have previously booked.

'There's such a vibrant buzz when there's two cruise ships in. There's a neat atmosphere about it.”

Mount Mainstreet is sending around printed explanations for downtown business operators to show customers when they observe the two minute silence for Christchurch.

There are lots to double up with next season's cruise ships as well, says Leanne.

'There's a lot more people around and there are definitely more sales.

'It doesn't necessarily mean that they spend more money.

'It depends if it's the start of their cruise or the end of their cruise, or whether they are Australian or American – pretty much the Volendam is normally American and the Dawn Princess is normally Australian, so they have a different spending pattern.”