Royal Caribbean International’s president and chief executive has hinted that one of the line’s new ships is likely to be calling at the UK in the near future, although he admitted new vessel Symphony of the Seas would not be one of them.

Bookings opened last week for the line’s latest Oasis-class ship, which like sister ship Harmony of the Seas will spend its inaugural season in Europe when it launches next April, before heading to Miami to sail Caribbean itineraries.

However, Bayley admitted lessons had been learned after sister ship Harmony received “negative feedback” when in 2016 it was showcased to the UK early, prior to its arrival in homeport Barcelona for its official launch.

“It’s a challenge – bringing the world’s largest cruise ship out of the construction yard is a highly complex operation. We were proud to bring Harmony to the UK market but there were still a lot of things we needed to tighten up and frustratingly we had some negative feedback,” he said.

“We wanted to make sure that we didn’t go through that experience again – we wanted to make sure that we have more time to get everything perfect. So we can’t go calling into the UK to show off Symphony straight out of the shipyard [before she sails to Barcelona].”

Instead, Bayley told TTG that UK agents would be given the opportunity to experience Symphony of the Seas in Barcelona. “We will be scheduling events on Symphony in Barcelona for European agents and UK agents.

He added that in total he expected around “20,000 media and trade partners from across the world” to be given the opportunity to experience the ship.”

Meanwhile, he hinted that it was likely one of the line’s new forthcoming ships would be calling at the UK, although he refused to disclose which class of vessel it might be.

“We’ve got several new ships that are still coming and one of them will come to the UK,” he said.

“We never talk about deployment,” he insisted, “but the UK is a great market for us and we will inevitably bring a new ship to the market in the not too distant future.”

Royal Caribbean currently has five ships on order in addition to Symphony of the Seas, which will be the line’s fourth Oasis-class vessel.

It also has two Quantum Plus 4,180-passenger ships scheduled for delivery in 2019 and 2020; a fifth 5,400-passenger Oasis-class ship set to arrive in 2021 and two 5,000-passenger Icon-class ships due to be delivered in 2022 and 2024.