In September 2021 there were 49 foreign cruises in the Croatian part of the Adriatic, almost ten times more than in September 2020 and the most in a single month since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, show data from the national statistical office.

The visiting cruise ships stayed 135 days as against 41 days in September 2020, and the number of passengers was 51,600 as against 155 in September 2020.

Compared to August 2021, the increase in the number of cruises continued in September, with 13 more visits. The trend started in June, when there were 15 visits by foreign cruise ships, followed by July, with 34 registered visits, and August with 36.

These results, however, are still far from the 2019 results. In September 2019 there were 101 visits by foreign cruise ships, with more than 152,500 passengers.

The visiting vessels sailed mostly under the flags of Panama, the Bahamas, Malta, Belgium, France and Norway.

In the first nine months of 2021, 24 visiting cruise ships realised 134 cruises in the Adriatic, bringing 137,500 passengers who stayed a total of 372 days in Croatia.

By comparison, in the first nine months of 2020, there were only ten visiting cruise ships, 26 cruises and slightly more than 4,000 passengers.

The number of foreign cruise tours in the first nine months of this year is still far below their number in the first nine months of 2019, with the first nine months this year seeing 76.4% fewer cruises and 84.5% fewer passengers.

Dubrovnik-Neretva County saw the largest number of visiting cruise ships in the first nine months of this year, accounting for 69.4% of all visits, followed by Split-Dalmatia County with a share of 24.6%.