Micky Arison’s $90 million superyacht, the Sixth Sense, has been anchored off Bar Harbor since Saturday, and he left the vessel by tender around noon on Monday. By Monday afternoon, it was still not clear whether the 77-year-old Carnival Corp. chairman had come ashore.
The yacht’s presence is drawing attention because Arison’s company is still boxed in by Bar Harbor’s 1,000-person cruise ship passenger cap during July and August, when Carnival’s largest ships cannot dock there. The Sixth Sense, a 242-foot motor yacht built by Amels in 2019, was visible from the town pier and was seen cruising in the harbor on Monday, a striking contrast to the restrictions that govern Carnival’s ships in peak season.
Arison is no ordinary visitor. He has a net worth of $9.7 billion, spent more than 34 years as Carnival’s chief executive and expanded the fleet from a couple of vessels to more than 100 ships before becoming chairman. He also owns the Miami Heat. The Sixth Sense can travel at a maximum speed of 16 knots, carry up to 12 guests and 19 crew members, and comes with a spa, beauty salon, swimming pool, hot tub and helicopter pad. The four-deck yacht costs about $9 million annually to maintain.
Bar Harbor’s cap sits at the center of a long-running dispute over cruise traffic, one that has already moved through years of legal and political fight. In May, U.S. District Judge Lance Walker said the passenger limit was enforceable only during shoulder months in the spring and fall, leaving the July and August restrictions intact for Carnival’s largest ships. The town spent about $111,838 on legal and regulatory expenses in the nine months before April 2026 as the fight continued.
The oddity is hard to miss: Carnival’s biggest cruise ships are blocked in the months when Bar Harbor is busiest, yet the company’s chairman can still arrive offshore on a private megayacht and move around the harbor at will. Whether Arison steps onto land is still unanswered, but the more immediate question is how long the Sixth Sense stays anchored off Mount Desert Island once its owner has finished looking around.
