A CRUISE ship that became a familiar site to watchers of the Thames as she sailed to and from her home port of Tilbury has reached her final destination and is about to be scrapped.

The 55-year-old Marco Polo was the ship around which the Thurrock-based Cruise and Maritime Voyages (CMV) was built, setting the standard for the older, mature market that CMV targeted.

Built-in East Germany for the Baltic State Shipping Company, the 19.860 gross ton and 176 meters long MS Marco Polo was first and foremost an ocean liner that sailed on the Leningrad- Montreal route.

In 1990 after being laid up for three years the ship was rebuilt entirely as a cruise liner for now-defunct cruise line Orient Lines, under whose flag she sailed for until 2008. After that, the vessel sailed for Transocean Tours, the German subsidiary of Cruise and Maritime Voyages, and later CMV.

With the collapse of CMV last year all its ships were sold. Marco Polo was auctioned off by CW Kellock & Co for $2,770,000. Initially there was hope she would sail for Offshore Solutions Unlimited but that failed to materialised and now she has been beached at a ship-breaking facility in Alang, India.

As for the other CMV vessels, Magellan, Columbus, and the Pacific Aria were sold to Seajets in Greece. Astoria has been returned to the Portuguese bank that owns her, and Mystic Invest, a relatively new cruise operator from Portugal, bought the Vasco Da Gama.

However, the Magellan now lies alongside Marco Polo at Alang and is also about to be scrapped. Sea Jets, citing high operating costs, sold her on for scrap. She was renamed Mages and sailed to Alang and was beached in the early morning of 30 January.

The MV Astor ended her days at the Aliaga ship breaking facility in Turkey.