When the Cruise Ships Stop Coming

The Costa Luminosa never made it to Venice. The vessel was one of several ill-fated cruise ships thwarted from exotic ports of call as Covid-19 overtook these luxury leviathans in February and March. Cruise ships functioned as oceangoing hotspots in the pandemic’s early days, until the industry suspended operations; a no-sail order from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will keep boats that ply U.S. waters anchored until at least August.

If current nationwide restrictions in Italy hold, no cruise ships will sail into Venice’s famed lagoon at all this year. The absence of visitors in the famously overtouristed city during Italy’s nationwide lockdown, which began to lift in early May, has been a surreal experience for Jane da Mosto, executive director of the citizen advocacy group We Are Here Venice. “It was sublime and sad at the same time,” she says. “On the one hand, Venice has never been more beautiful. Imagine Venice where the water is so flat on the Grand Canal, you could see the shadows of the palaces as sharp, straight lines.”