THUNDER BAY – Starting in 2022, Thunder Bay’s waterfront will be alive with cruise traffic, after the city signed a deal with Viking Expeditions, who plan to bring seven inbound and seven outbound cruise ships to the Great Lakes port.
Paul Pepe, the city’s tourism manager, on Thursday said the agreement should mean an additional 5,200 guests arriving or departing from Thunder Bay en route to or from Milwaukee on the Viking Octantis, and an estimated economic impact of between $1.6 million and $2.3 million annually.
Pepe added because Thunder Bay will be a major embarkation port for the company’s expedition cruises, it means passengers are likely to take in what the city has to offer for a couple of days before or after boarding.
Viking is in the process of finalizing local itineraries for its guests, which include trips to local tourist hot spots such as Fort William Historical Park, Kakabeka Falls, the Sleeping Giant and Ouimet Canyon.
“It’s a much greater economic impact in the community,” Pepe said. “Passengers will be flying in and out of Thunder Bay to catch the ship or leave the ship. They’ll be staying in hotels, they’ll be renting cars, they’ll be seeing a lot of the shore excursions, visiting restaurants.”
The city has been working behind the scenes with Viking for about the past year, taking them to local tourist destinations and helping with photo shoots and tourist videos being used already in the company’s marketing campaigns.
Pepe said the Great Lakes are one of the last untapped cruise destinations in the world, and with Vikings loyal customer base constantly seeking new adventures, the Thunder Bay to Milwaukee route was a natural choice.
The company is also launching cruises to Antarctica.
“They saw the opportunities that nobody else was taking part in, so they started building a number of brand new ice-class expedition vessels that are about 378 passengers each,” Pepe said.
Company chairman Torstein Hagen said Viking invented river cruising 22 years ago in Europe, then took ocean cruising to new depths, with a world’s best ocean cruise line trophy to prove it.
“Our guests are curious explorers. They want to continue traveling with us to familiar and iconic destinations, but they would also like to travel further,” Hagen said in a release provided by the City of Thunder Bay.
The Octantis will berth on the eastern side of the Pier 6 dock, which Pepe said met the needs of the cruise line and can be quickly set up to welcome passengers arriving at and departing Thunder Bay.
Pepe said he’s hopeful Viking’s commitment to the city as an embarkation point will lead to other cruise companies re-evaluating Thunder Bay as a destination port, adding Tourism Thunder Bay may also consider investments in improvements to the Pool 6 property should they be warranted.
