| IMO | 7822457 |
|---|---|
| Gross tonnage | 37,049 GT |
| Length | 199.62 m |
| Beam | 28.5 m |
| Passenger capacity (max) | 600 |
| Service speed | 21.0 knots |
| Builder | Bremer Vulkan |
| Hull number | 1001 |
| Launched | 1980 |
| Maiden voyage | 1982-01-08 |
| Operator | Anex Tour |
| Status | Active |
| All names | Blue Sapphire; Saga Sapphire; Bleu de France; Holiday Dream; SuperStar Aries; SuperStar Europe; Europa |
Overview
This hull has had one of the most travelled name boards in modern cruising. Built in Germany as Europa, the flagship of Hapag-Lloyd's cruise operation, she went on to sail for Star Cruises in Asia, for Pullmantur and CDF Croisières de France in Europe, and for Saga Cruises in Britain as Saga Sapphire — the name the dataset originally carried. That Saga identity ended in 2020, when she was sold to the Turkish tour operator ANEX Tour and renamed Blue Sapphire. The dataset's status, operator and current name were therefore stale and have since been reconciled; this guide is written to the sourced facts: she is the same hull throughout, IMO 7822457, but her Saga chapter closed years ago. The discrepancies are logged with this batch's notes.
Key specifications
The dataset records 37,049 GT, a length of 199.62 m, a beam of 28.5 m, a speed of 21.0 knots and a maximum capacity of 600 — the as-built figures, which her article confirms: 37,049 GT, 199.63 m by 28.55 m, 600 passengers as built, powered by two seven-cylinder MAN–Bremer Vulkan diesels totalling 21,270 kW. Later configurations carried many more berths: as Bleu de France she was listed at 752 lower-berth passengers, 1,158 with all berths, and 406 crew. She has twelve decks. Any single capacity number for this ship is therefore configuration-specific, and the 600 figure should always be read as "as built."
Design and construction
She was built by Bremer Vulkan at Bremen, Germany — yard number 1001 — for Hapag-Lloyd, at a reported cost of US$120 million. Her keel was laid in April 1980 and she was launched on 22 December 1980; the dataset's "launched 1981" is her completion year (she was completed in 1981 and acquired by Hapag-Lloyd on 5 December 1981), and her article's dates are followed here. As Europa she was a purpose-built, premium cruise ship of the early 1980s — a generation designed from the keel up for cruising rather than converted from liner service, sized at around 37,000 tons for an era when that was a large cruise ship.
Naming, launch and maiden voyage
She entered service under the most storied name in German cruising: Europa, a name Hapag-Lloyd and its predecessors had carried on successive flagships. Her maiden voyage began on 8 January 1982, a date the dataset and her article agree on. Every subsequent name was a new owner's branding rather than a christening tradition: SuperStar Europe and SuperStar Aries for Star Cruises, Holiday Dream in Spanish-market service, Bleu de France for the French market, Saga Sapphire for Saga's gemstone-themed fleet, and finally Blue Sapphire.
Career by operator
| Period | Name | Operator |
|---|---|---|
| 1981–1999 | Europa | Hapag-Lloyd Cruises |
| 1999–2000 | SuperStar Europe | Star Cruises |
| 2000–2004 | SuperStar Aries | Star Cruises |
| 2004–2008 | Holiday Dream | Pullmantur Cruises |
| 2008–2011 | Bleu de France | CDF Croisières de France |
| 2011–2020 | Saga Sapphire | Saga Cruises |
| 2020–present | Blue Sapphire | ANEX Tour (Selectum Blu Cruises) |
The dataset's operator history is much thinner — "Saga Cruises; Royal Caribbean International" — and names Pullmantur's parent rather than the operators she actually sailed for; the table above follows her article. In outline: Hapag-Lloyd sold her to Star Cruises in 1998–99, and she spent five years in Asian service. Sold on in 2004, she became Pullmantur's Holiday Dream; in May 2008 she transferred to CDF Croisières de France as Bleu de France. In November 2010 she was sold to Saga but stayed on charter to CDF for a further year. Saga announced her sale to ANEX Tour in August 2019; she was delivered in mid-2020, after a farewell Saga season, and renamed Blue Sapphire for ANEX's own cruise product homeported in Antalya, Turkey.
Onboard character
As built, Europa embodied the early-1980s German premium cruise ship: spacious for her size — 600 guests on 37,000 tons was a generous ratio — formal in style, and aimed at an experienced, largely German clientele. Each later owner re-cut the same hull to a different market: Star Cruises for Asian deployment, Pullmantur and CDF for high-density Mediterranean holiday cruising (hence the jump to over 1,100 berths), and Saga for the British over-50s market, where her appeal was precisely her traditional scale, her 382 cabins and her comfortable, conventional public rooms. Her onboard character is thus best understood as layered: a low-density premium hull repeatedly re-fitted for denser or different markets, with the basic architecture — twelve decks, mid-size public rooms, a classic profile — surviving each rebranding.
Major refits and incidents
The defining refit of her later life was Saga's extensive rebuild in Italy from November 2011 to March 2012, between her CDF charter and her entry into Saga service, which adapted her to Saga's British clientele and included additional balcony cabins. Earlier ownership changes each brought refurbishment, though less extensively documented. In her ANEX era she has continued in service, her registry moving from Malta (her Saga-era flag) to Nassau and, from 2022, to Basseterre, Saint Kitts and Nevis, per her article. No major casualty is recorded in the sources used for this guide.
Sister ships and class
She is a one-off, with no sister ship built to the same design. She is sometimes grouped loosely with other early-1980s purpose-built cruise ships of similar size, but she has no class in the formal sense: Bremer Vulkan's yard number 1001 stands alone.
Fate and where she is now
She is not a Saga ship any more, and she is not laid up: per her Wikipedia article, she remains in service as Blue Sapphire, owned by ANEX Tour since 2020 and operated under its Selectum Blu Cruises brand. Any listing still showing her as an active Saga Sapphire — including this dataset's row — is describing the ship she was between 2012 and 2020, not the ship she is now.
Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cruise_ships, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_Europa_(1981)