One day next week, a new cruise ship is likely to make more headlines than any ship since the Titanic, more than 100 years ago. It's pretty much guaranteed to eclipse the attention showered on any cruise liner of recent vintage.
Unless the baby comes early.
The ship is the Royal Princess, due to arrive Friday in Southampton, where she will be christened next Thursday. The christener — and the reason this ship will make unprecedented headlines — will be Britain's most famous mother-to-be, the Duchess of 
Cambridge herself. Yes…the woman known as "Kate." She will forever be the ship's Godmother and her presence next Thursday is going to capture headlines around the world, and not just in the tabloids. It will be her last official engagement before the wee one arrives.
The baby is due precisely one month later (July 13), but babies don't wait for boats, or anything else, do they? When it's time, all bets are off.
Naturally, the good people at Princess Cruises are hoping for a healthy, but not premature, arrival. How they convinced the new Royals to participate in a ship christening at this time of their lives is a mystery, as well as a coup d'etat, but it probably begins with the fact that Kate's posthumous mother-in-law, Princess Diana, christened the original Royal Princess in Southampton on November 15, 1984, and was the ship's Godmother.
That Royal Princess was transferred to P&O Cruises and re-named Artemis in 2005 and subsequently sold to a German shipping company and re-named again, the mv Artania, 
just over two years ago. She was a shadow of her new successor, carrying 1,260 passengers when full. The new Royal Princess will carry three times as many and become the flagship in a fleet that next week will number 17.
She will be followed exactly one year later by the Regal Princess, a twin and the line's 18th ship. So if the Royal Baby prevents his mother from officiating at next week's ceremony, there's always another time.
It just wouldn't be as unique as this time.
Celebrity Silhouette
10 nights
July 9, 2013
Rome, Naples, Valletta, Athens, Mykonos, Ephesus, Santorini, Venice
Inside: $899
Cost per day: $89
www.celebritycruises.com