The ship was built between 1999 and 2001 at the Blohm + Voss shipyard in Hamburg for the Greek shipping company Royal Olympic Cruises . The keel-laying of the ship took place on July 14, 1999. The completion took place on April 1, 2001. On April 25, 2002 the ship was delivered. In 2004 Stella Maritime bought the ship and it was used as a university ship by Semester at Sea . In November 2014, Celestyal Cruises , a new cruise brand from Louis Cruises, announced that the Explorer had been chartered for 3 years. The charter contract began in May 2015 and the ship was renamed Celestyal Odyssey . In June 2015 the Celestyal Odyssey went on a cruise for Celestyal Cruises for the first time.
In September 2015, however, it was announced that Celestyal Cruises would terminate the three-year charter contract, the ship left the fleet in October 2015, and in 2016 the Celestyal Nefeli was chartered for it. In October 2015 the ship was sold to Diamond Cruise International from Greece. Since March 2016 the ship has been used by Diamond Cruise International Co. as the Glory Sea on cruises between China and South Korea. As of November 2017, the Golden Bridge Cruise Company will charter the ship for 10 months.
