Marella Cruises will call at Patras for the first time in summer 2028, adding Greece’s third-largest city to a programme that otherwise sticks closely to the ports British cruisers already know.
The whole summer 2028 season goes on sale on 15 October 2026.
A Greek port that isn’t on the cruise circuit
Patras sits on the north coast of the Peloponnese, at the mouth of the Gulf of Corinth. It’s a working ferry port, a university city and the home of Greece’s biggest carnival, and it has largely escaped the cruise crowds that pack Santorini and Mykonos.
The headline sights are the Church of St Andrew, a medieval castle with views over the city and the gulf, and a restored Roman odeon. The Rio-Antirrio bridge, the longest multi-span cable-stayed bridge in the world, is a short drive out of town.
Ancient Olympia is roughly an hour and a half to two hours away by road, so a day trip is possible but it’ll be a long one. Marella hasn’t published excursions for Patras yet.
The call will feature on Marella Explorer’s new ‘Grecian Gems’ itinerary, sailing from Corfu from July 2028. Marella says fares for Grecian Gems start from £1,966, though that figure can’t be checked against a booking page until sales open.
Explorer 2 goes back to Spain
Marella Explorer 2, the first of the line’s two adults-only ships, returns to Malaga for a seven-night ‘Spanish Shores’ itinerary from June 2028.
The round trip takes in Gibraltar, a day at sea, Ibiza Town, Mahon on Menorca, Palma and Cartagena before returning to Malaga. Chris Hackney, Marella’s chief executive, says the return follows “the success of previous sailings from the region”.
Four one-way cruises to open the season
Marella’s ships spend the winter in the Caribbean and the Canaries, and the sailings that bring them back to Europe in April are being sold as ‘repositioning cruises’ with extra guest speakers, additional shows and more tribute acts on board.
There are four:
- ‘Sail into Spring’ on Marella Explorer: 10 nights from Las Palmas to Corfu, or 11 nights from Santa Cruz, Tenerife to Corfu
- ‘Flavours of the Mediterranean’ on Marella Discovery 2: five nights from Palma to Dubrovnik
- ‘Transatlantic Treasures’ on Marella Explorer 2: 13 nights from Barbados to Malaga
- ‘Atlantic Horizons’ on Marella Voyager: 13 nights from Barbados to Palma
The two transatlantic crossings are the ones to watch for value. Thirteen nights with flights, drinks and tips included has historically been one of the cheapest ways to get a long cruise on a British line, because the line needs to move the ship anyway.
Where the rest of the fleet will be
Marella Discovery and Marella Voyager will homeport in Palma. Marella Discovery 2, which went adults-only in 2027, will be based in Dubrovnik.
That’s three of five ships in the Western Med or Adriatic, with only Explorer in Greek waters. Hackney says demand for the Eastern Med “remains strong, with summer 2027 already ahead of last year”.
Cruise and stay packages, where you bolt a hotel week onto the cruise, expand to 119 hotels across Majorca, Corfu, Dubrovnik and Malaga, with flights from 22 UK and Irish airports.
Bottom line
This is a programme built on the same four homeports, with one new port and one new Spanish loop. If you want to see a Greek city before the cruise industry does, Patras is the one to book. If you want a bargain, the April transatlantics will be worth a look on 15 October, once there are actual fares to compare rather than a single lead-in figure from a press release. We’ll check the booking pages when they open.
