Princess Cruises yesterday celebrated a bigger presence in Hawai'i — its Diamond Princess, a ship capable of carrying more than 2,600 passengers to the islands in regular stopovers.

"This is the largest ship that we've ever brought out," said Dean Brown, Princess Cruises executive vice president. The ship marks a progression of larger vessels for the cruise company, which had operated here with 1,600-passenger boats and then went to a 2,000-passenger vessel.

Brown said Princess is expanding its cruise presence in Hawai'i but has been sailing to the islands for more than 30 years.

The expansion comes as Norwegian Cruise Lines is reducing its three-ship fleet here to two. Brown said Princess Cruises' strategy has been to increase its island presence slowly while NCL made a more dramatic decision to base three U.S.-flagged vessels here.

"It's really been not a revolution in growth but just a steady evolution," he said. "We haven't had that dramatic growth that NCL had over a short period of time."

The number of cruise ship visitors has increased in the past year at a time when arrivals by air had dipped after two years of record-breaking growth.

Through June, cruise visitors have risen 42.3 percent to 225,607, according to the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism. That included a jump in the visitors who arrived by air to board a cruise ship — up 46.1 percent compared with the same period in 2006.

Norwegian officials have said increases in competition have dropped prices on some of their seven-day interisland cruises to less than $500 a person.

HAS A 'SMALL SHIP FEEL'

Princess aims for a more expensive, longer cruise, with the cheapest online deals yesterday on the Web at about $1,259 for a 15-day cruise. The typical Diamond Princess deployment will be sailing on a 15-day voyage that takes five days to sail to the islands from Los Angeles, five days to cruise through Hawai'i and five days to return.

Brown said the longer Princess cruises tend to attract people who have cruised before, often don't like to fly and prefer to enjoy the journey.

For them, a larger ship offers more choices and more activities. But Brown said the company tries to balance the size with the amenities such as having five smaller dining rooms instead of one huge one. "It's a different facet to the visitor industry," he said.

"We like to say we have large ship choice with small ship feel."

Brown said the company is also weaving in more Hawaiian cultural programs that include demonstrations by local artisans, a hula show from Halau Hula Olana and guest lecturers who highlight natural history and Hawaiian customs. The new programs are available on all Princess Hawaiian Islands and Hawai'i/Tahiti sailings aboard Diamond Princess and Pacific Princess.

The new Hawaiian cultural demonstrations include such crafts as bone carving and creating a shell lei from the privately owned island of Ni'ihau; and onboard presentations from experts on topics from marine biology to the ancient art of Hawaiian storytelling.

Reach Robbie Dingeman at rdingeman@honoluluadvertiser.com.