Opus Casino (formerly ''Liquid Vegas'', ''Royal Star'', ''Liberty II'', ''Liberty I'', ''Royal Empress'', ''Punta Pedrera'') is a cruiseferry built in 1985 in Valencia, Spain for Marítima de Formentera SA, to handle traffic between

Ibiza Ibiza (natively and officially in ca, Eivissa, ) is a Spanish island in the Mediterranean Sea off the eastern coast of the Iberian Peninsula. It is from the city of Valencia. It is the third largest of the Balearic Islands, in Spain. Its l ...

and

Formentera Formentera (, ) is the smallest and most southerly island of the Pityusic Islands group (comprising Ibiza and Formentera, as well as various small islets), which belongs to the Balearic Islands autonomous community (Spain). It covers an area of ...

. In July 2012, the vessel was donated to

The Seasteading Institute The Seasteading Institute (TSI) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization formed to facilitate the establishment of autonomous, mobile communities on seaborne platforms operating in international waters (a proposed practice called seasteading). It ...

, and is currently available for

bareboat charter A bareboat charter or demise charter is an arrangement for the chartering or hiring of a ship or boat, whereby no crew or provisions are included as part of the agreement; instead, the people who rent the vessel from the owner are responsible f ...

or sale, preferably to businesses that could support experimentation with long-term ocean habitation.

History

A 1986 incident required expensive repairs. In 1993, the vessel was sold to Helton Limited. In 1995, she was sold to Adventure Holdings Corp. (

Kingstown Kingstown is the capital, chief port, and main commercial centre of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. With a population of 12,909 (2012), Kingstown is the most populous settlement in the country. It is the island's agricultural industry centre ...

) and commenced duty as a casino ship near

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

under the name ''Royal Empress''. In 2004, she was sold to Royal Star. In fall 2009, the vessel owner at the time, Las Vegas Casino Lines, LLC, declared bankruptcy and ''Liquid Vegas'' was sold at auction on October 29, 2009, by the Canaveral Port Authority. The winning bid was by The Mermaid I, LLC. (wrong IMO in the article title, but correct in the article body) The ship is currently classified through Registro Italiano Navale.

External links

Fact sheet and deck plans
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Partial ship history
until 2004 - Fakta om fartyg
Professional photographs
from shipspotting.com * {{csr, register=E, id=8409056, shipname=Opus Casino, accessdate=27 August 2012

References

Cruiseferries 1985 ships