Nearly six months after leaving Belfast on its three-and-a-half-year world cruise, Villa Vie’s Odyssey is filling a unique market niche, Hotel Manager Rodrigo Lopes said.

“I believe Villa Vie grabbed a new market niche, with a very well-thought-out business plan and a great structure, which makes the product unique,” he said in an exclusive interview with Cruise Industry News, which was the first media outlet to visit the ship.

“We currently have 249 residents onboard right now, but we actually have over 360 residents currently living onboard,” Lopes added, noting that villas onboard are expected to be sold out by the summer.

The Odyssey is also home to seven pet cats, which are allowed to live onboard along with their owners.

“That’s one of the plans that Villa Vie developed. While there are standards and policies for dogs sailing onboard cruise ships, there were no such regulations for cats,” Lopes explained.

“We created these policies, got approval from relevant authorities, and now the cats are living fine onboard,” he continued.

A former boat owner, Holly Hennessy (pictured above with Captain the cat) is one of the residents who brought a cat to live onboard the Odyssey.

Captain, who is eight-and-a-half years old, has been in Hennessy’s balcony stateroom since the ship left Belfast last September.

“It’s the perfect place for both of us. The cabin is light and airy, the bed is nice and high, so he can watch all the traffic from it, which he loves,” Hennessy said, noting that Captain has spent winters on a boat since his early years.

“I had my own boat for 17 years. I loved it and used it as my winter home for most of those years. But there were so many headaches. Now I get to be in the water all the time, go on boat rides every day, and I don’t have the headaches,” Hennessy added.