Nick the Greek Posted June 6, 2021 Author Share Posted June 6, 2021 (edited) Sunday, June 6th, 2021 The 2nd in a row covid summer is definitely here, both in terms of temperatures and also of overall feeling. We are beginning to see some clarity on the schedules of the ferries and considerably more traffic in comparison to this time last year. - As we have mentioned a few weeks ago, Seajets will not be seen in Rafina, at least not this season, and as a result Attica is grabbing the opportunity to send there the Flyingcat 3. Her daily departure will be at 0745 to Tinos, Mykonos and Naxos with evening sailings to Tinos and Mykonos every Friday and Sunday at 1600hrs. These evening departures will become a daily feature as of July the 1st. She's not carrying cars obviously, but her EUR 35 fare(for Tinos) compared to EUR 42 with Golden Star, will probably see her attract some extra passenger traffic. - Talking about Attica, looks like the Highspeed 4 shall commence sailings on/abt the 4th of July. Her daily schedule will see her depart at 0930hrs from Piraeus to Paros - Naxos - Koufonisi and Katapola(Amorgos island). No change compared to summer 2019 in terms of the destinations but a later departure from Piraeus. I think the idea of the owners of the Thunder is getting copied from others as well, we will have departures at 0930 from the Highspeed 4, 1100hrs from the Hellenic Highspeed and 1200hrs from the Thunder. I like the idea of more evenly spread departures, the hassle of early morning in Piraeus is a nightmare. - The Superrunner has now officially been handed over to Seajets and her new name is the uninspiring Superrunner Jet. As we have previously reported, she will indeed be sailing from Thessaloniki this season, destinations being Skiathos, Skopelos and Alonissos(aka Sporades island complex) and Mantoudi. The novelty is that rather than sailing to Volos, her turnaround port is Mantoudi on Evia island. An interesting choice which is an option already as the Proteus is calling there at least twice a week. Compared to Volos, it's less of a drive from Athens but at the same time the specific road is not exactly a highway, it's a rather difficult drive to get to Mantoudi. It will be interesting therefore to see how this choice will pan out. - Now let's talk about the Iris I, a highspeed craft which arrived in Greece during the winter without much fanfare. She spent the winter in Salamis island and recently she was drydocked in Pireaus, here she is fresh from the drydock. She remains a bit of a mystery as there is no official request for a route from her owners, therefore it's anyone's guess about where she will be employed and when. - A bit of a rumour concerning the Worldchampion Jet, latest speculation is that she won't be sailing from Piraeus this summer but rather from Heraklion to the Cycladic islands. - Let's catch a glimpse of the Golden Bridge during one of her recent departures from Igoumenitsa. - We had a change of guard in the Igoumenitsa - Ancona route for Grimaldi Lines. The Corfu changed places with the Venezia in the Napoli - Cagliari and Cagliari - Palermo route, Grimaldi needed the extra bed capacity in Italy in order to fulfil the requirements of the subsidy. Basically a like for like, Visentini for Visentini change thus no real impact. - Also in the Ionian side of things, the Kefalonia has resumed sailing on the Patras - Sami(Kefalonia island) - Ithaca route after a saga which lasted 6 months in terms of when and under which terms she will be employed. There's growing unhapiness in general about the level of service Levante is offering, specifically to Kefalonia and Ithaca. In a normal world, perhaps there could be an opportunity for another operator here. - No real news here but the summer cruise schedule of the Salamis Filoxenia is officially cancelled. - Last but not least, for those of you who enjoy the process of loading and unloading on a ferry, here is a couple of relevant videos from our Youtube gallery. On one hand the Hellenic Spirit is loading from Igoumenitsa to Ancone and on the other hand we have the Superfast II unloading in Igoumenitsa from Bari. You can choose the 4K option from the menu and enjoy yourselves. Edited June 6, 2021 by Nick the Greek Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted June 12, 2021 Author Share Posted June 12, 2021 Saturday, June 12th, 2021 A very subdued week the one that just passed, not really something juicy to report. The good news for the ferry companies is that at least the garages of the ships are showing significant levels of occupancy and in certain islands the tourist traffic starts to pick up, all things considered. - The Worldchampion Jet, the jewel of Seajets' fleet is now operational in the Cyclades, a sign of the company's confidence in the market for the summer. Let's see if this confidence pays off. At the same time, the Superrunner Jet is painted in Seajets' livery and will take up service in the Sporades islands next week. - In another demonstration of market dominance and willingness to exploit their customer base, Attica has made considerable increases in the number of points one needs through their loyalty card in order to obtain certain rewards like free tickets. Unfortunately they are showing all the signs of a monopoly company who believes they are on top of the world and that nothing can go wrong. And that usually ends up in tears, if you look at the history of Greek coastal shipping. - The Knossos Palace had a near miss earlier this week when she lost propulsion for about 1 hour in the middle of the Aegean Sea and drifted for that period of time. Actually this is the second similar incident within the last month, the Europa Palace having a blackout near Patras being the other incident. This is definitely a bit of a worrying sign for Grimaldi and the summer season that's already started. - The Ariadne is back in action from Piraeus to the Dodecanese islands, it is very impressive to see her loading process. Her first 2 sailings from Piraeus were to Santorini - Anafi - Kos - Rhodes and to Samos - Kos - Rhodes. She will also serve the tactic of Attica to merge their services, as and when it suits them. - The Blue Star Myconos is also undergoing sea trials with her scrubber, her return to service is not very far away. - Last but not least, the Celestyal Crystal is getting ready to resume cruising, a very good sign indeed. - You can still vote for the best ferry in Agapitos Lines' fleet, ever. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted June 21, 2021 Author Share Posted June 21, 2021 (edited) Monday, June 21st, 2021 Summer is here and these past few days have seen the re-emergence of several ferries and high-speed craft out of their pandemic sleep. Let's see the recap: - The Blue Star Myconos has resumed her sailings, now fitted with a scrubber. I think you'll be hard pressed to find someone who genuinely likes this funnel. On top of that, the ship has had for the last couple of years some issue with excessive noise coming from her engines. This was not addressed either and the ship is creating noise pollution which is considerable. Of course I was not expecting Attica to address this really, the fact that reports on the Ariadni suggest that her interior is in a sorry state(torn upholstery, malfunctioning air type seats, missing televisions from the cabins), tells you all you need to know. The Ariadni spent 1 month in Perama and came into service in such a shape, which is pitifull. - More on the Attica front, the situation in the Piraeus - Chios - Mytilene service is becoming troublesome and an increasing amount of dissatisfaction about Attica's service is now apparent. Over the last month or so, intermediate calls in Paros have been added several times, last week saw one more case of this as well as an extra call to Syros in another occasion. These are considerable deviations obviously and with the amount of traffic(we have seen the Nissos Rodos spend 1 hour in Paros, discharging circa 60 unaccompanied lorries) and the result is arrivals in Mytilene at around 1100hrs the next morning(normal arrival is around 0630-0700hrs), that's a bit too much. Of course Attica has 2 huge ships to fill in this route and bearing in mind they are a monopoly, they don't give a toss about anything else than filling their ships, which are basically ships they could not fit anywhere else. - SAOS Ferries have announced the purchase of the Japanese ferry Mishima (IMO 9244398) which is to be converted for service in the Greek islands. Strange this one, SAOS have a tendency to surprise and they have done just that. We'll have plenty of time to talk about that one, I think they have the Saonisos fish to fry first which still remains berthed in Lavrion without her propellers having turned even once. - The start of the summer service saw already some initial engine trouble for some fast ferries. The Santorini Palace lost one sailing due to water ingress in one of her watertight compartments, as we have been advised by a very carefully worded announcement from the Coast Guard. In classic Greek fashion, there is no word about how the ship ended up having water ingress in her hull. So from the moment the Coast Guard leaves the door open to interpretation, any scenario about the cause is plausible. - The Paros Jet suffered some engine trouble as well and was briefly subbed by the Power Jet. Today's victim was the Flyingcat 3 and the damage appears to be considerable as Attica rushed the Highspeed 4 into service in order to undertake the sailings of the Flyingcat 3. Not a good star at all. - Small ferry Panorama operating between Rafina and Marmari has now been activated and towed to Chalkis Shipyards amidst rumours that she might have been purchased by ANES Ferries. Don't have an opinion about this, it would make sense if they were to replace the Symi with something bigger and better. - Let's see some Harmony of the Seas in Souda Bay and a little bit of Hermes in Igoumenitsa. And how about some Gallipolli Seaways in Patras? Edited June 25, 2021 by Nick the Greek Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted June 25, 2021 Author Share Posted June 25, 2021 (edited) Friday, June 25th, 2021 A bit of a small update with a hellishly hot weekend ante portas all over Greece: - The Rafina - Marmari ferry Panorama has completed a very short overhaul in Chalkis and is now back to Marmari. The rumours of a possible sale have not been confirmed, this looks like a return to her usual service. If her owners have decided to do so, it probably shows that the traffic numbers are not so bad after all. - Trouble ahead for the Flyingcat 3 which is now sidelined due to what appears to be a serious engine issue, as we reported in the previous update. The Highspeed 4 subbed her for a few days and next in line to do so is the Flyingcat 4 untill July the 5th, a date after which nobody knows what will happen. This might cause a bit of a domino effect to the high speed craft fleet of Attica. Anyway, remains to be seen when the Flyingcat 3 will be back in action. These situations, meaning ships coming off a long layup and immediately suffering engine issues, are a bit of a two-way street: if you get engine issues like this one, one wonders "they had all winter to prepare her". The flipside is "what do you expect with a ship which was inactive for so long?". I think there's merit in both approaches. - On a similar note, the Thunder has been in Greece for almost 2 years now but the timetable for her to commence sailings is falling backwards. The latest date we'll see her in action is July the 8th, I presume things are not going as planned and let's hope she does not lose more time in the high season. - The Hellenic Highspeed has not started sailings yet but there's an update concerning her itinerary: every Saturday, instead of spending the day in Leros, she will be performing a round voyage from Leros to Kos, Symi and Rhodes, returning back to Leros in the evening. - The career of the Superrunner Jet in the Sporades island complex started with decent traffic numbers, as per the hearsay. Or is it excessively decent? The latter is what the Coast Guard of Thessaloniki seems to believe, as they performed a headcount of the number of passengers during one of her recent arrivals. The result was that there were about 100 passengers above her maximum capacity under Covid restrictions. So there was ample life saving appliances available to these people in case of emergency, but still there were too many of them. As usual in Greece, this leads to the temporary arrest of the Master who is always the fall guy. The company whιch controls the online ticket system and allows the agents to issue more tickets than they ought to, is nowhere in the picture. It's a shameful practice and a banana-republic legal framework which a) gives the company full control without any real consequences and b) is happy to pin everything on a single person who has no control over the specific item, just to let the interests of the ship owner and the mockery of a Coast Guard we have, whistle away without a care in this world. - Check out a couple of views from Santorini in the summer. Edited June 26, 2021 by Nick the Greek Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted July 16, 2021 Author Share Posted July 16, 2021 Saturday, July 17th, 2021 Back with a fresh article following a desperately needed holiday. The ferry traffic has picked up since our last update, the temperature has gone up but unfortunately so has the number of covid-infected people. Τhe outlook is very grim for the remainder of the summer. But let's focus on the facts: - The Thunder has finally commenced sailings from Piraeus to Syros - Mykonos and Naxos since a good 10 days now, following a one-year delay due to the pandemic. Members who have already paid her a visit or sailed on her are suggesting a very modern and comfortable interior, seems as if Fast Ferries have spent a fair amount of money on her. Early signs of traffic are rather on the low side but if course we're talking about a brand new ship, in a brand new route for her owners as well as a departure time from Piraeus which is a novelty. So the jury is still out. For myself I have to admit I loooove her name. - A very bad development for the Aqua Blue, the ship has now completed an entire week without sailing between Lavrion - Agios Efstratios - Limnos and Kavala. The reason is some serious engine issue which rumour has it took place due to human error and has nothing to do with the levels of maintenance of the ship which are admittedly high. The problem is so serious that Seajets have relocated the Superrunner Jet to take over the sailings of the Aqua Blue, with the Champion Jet 1 coming out of lay-up and moving to Thessaloniki in order to sub the Superrunner Jet in the Sporades Islands route. This will remain so until July 20th at the earliest. Needless to say that this is a major issue. In terms of passenger and car traffic, the Superrunner Jet can cope, at least for the Lavrion - Agios Efstratios - Limnos part, I have my serious doubts about the Kavala part. Problem is though that many of these passengers had cabins on the Aqua Blue, while the Superrunner Jet does not have cabins. So imagine an overnight sailing while you're tied on an aircraft-type seat and possibly with severe rolling motions from the highspeed craft.. I would change my holiday destination. And of course there is the small question of the lorry traffic for Limnos(apparently the Aqua Blue was carrying 10-15 lorries in every sailing ex-Lavrion) which begs a solution. - Seajets would wish they had the former Express Santorini in their service already so that she could sub the Aqua Blue. But the ship remains in Dubai and is still being prepared for her long voyage to Greece. She has now been renamed Aqua Myth and is flying the Comoros Islands flag. - On other serious engine trouble news, the Symi has fallen victim of engine issues that have forced the hand of ANES Ferries to charter in a replacement ship. The Symi was sailing between Agios Konstantinos, Skiathos, Skopelos, Alonisos and Mantoudi, her sailings have now been taken over by her fleetmate, Agios Nektarios Aiginas. The latter was sailing between Piraeus and Aegina island, to replace her ANES have chartered in the landing-craft type Eleni from Kerkyra Seaways. Again here we're not sure for how long this will go on, it seems as if the Symi situation is proving very hot to handle. Both in the case of the Symi and the Aqua Blue, we're talking about very elderly tonnage and I would imagine suitable spare parts are not easy to come by. - Sometimes of course the age of the affected tonnage is irrelevant. That's the case of the Flyingcat 3 which is now already out of action for 2 weeks from her Rafina sailings, being substituted by the Flyingcat 4, with no sign as to when she will be back in action. This has caused a bit of a domino effect with Attica electing not to send the Flyingcat 5 in the Volos - Sporades islands service, as she is now needed in the Piraeus - Saronic Gulf(Aegina, Poros etc) service. I think the competition from the Speed Cat I is also playing a part in such decision making. - Arkoumanis have finally said goodbye to their Prince which had been laid up in Katakolon for more than a year. She has been renamed Princess and allegedly she has been sold on for further trading by Sri Lankan interests, departing under tow from Katakolon. - The poor Saonisos has finally and definitely failed to secure the necessary paperwork from the Coast Guard inspectors in order to commence sailings in her subsidised route, a route which is now being re-tendered and is destined to end up with a Seajets ship sometime in the future. The Saonisos is now laid up in Lavrion and her future has now become a considerable question mark. - In a surprising development, Cobelfret's Severine has now commenced regular sailings between Thessaloniki and Limassol in Cyprus, apparently chartered by a major Greek road haulier. This means that Salamis has now a significant competitor to their service between Thessaloniki, Limassol and Haifa while surely a pretty decent amount of traffic has switched over to the competing vessel. A very interesting one to watch, no details have emerged as to the length of the charter. - At the same time Salamis Lines has now introduced the former Baltica, now renamed Vassilios in honour of the founder of the company. The ship spent a few days in Perama repair area and then was swiftly drydocked in Syros from where she sailed for Thessaloniki and took up sailings immediately. The Akritas is now headed to Piraeus for her annual refit and survey, I presume the Alexo might follow suit. Once both ships have completed their annual refits, it will be super interesting to see how Salamis plan to play it with a 3-ship fleet at their disposal. - Check out the vintage Iosif K in Santorini during a rare call there. - The Eurocargo Napoli has stopped sailings between Brindisi and Igoumenitsa, ending up sailing now between Porto Torres and Genova. The interesting thing here is that Grimaldi have not dispatched a replacement ship for her in the Brindisi route, which seems to indicate that the lorry numbers were not sufficient for that. It seems the Golden Bridge has made quite an impact in this route. At the same time, one of our members is offering intelligence that Grimaldi are planning to revive their sailings to Ravenna with their ro-ros, sometime in the near future. I wonder whether this means switching their Italian home port from Venezia or Ravenna will appear as an extra call. - At the same time in the Patras - Igoumenitsa - Ancona front, we're seeing the same unprofessional and disgusting summer practice with the ferry companies knowingly misrepresenting their timetables. Like every summer in my memory bank, the ships cannot cope with the summer traffic with winter timetables and this results to horrendous delays that are messing about with the holidays of the passenger public. While Grimaldi is winning the Euro in this category, ANEK and Superfast and not far behind, all of them with multi-hour delays that can only be recovered in the single overnight the ships have during the week. - More news on international routes, you may remember me during the winter mentioning at length the possibility of a subsidised ferry service between Greece and Cyprus. While the initial tender proved to be unfruitful, it seems there are some people in the 2 countries who seem to be hell-bent on spending public money for this service. This time there was again press about this, with Piraeus Port Authority now singing the subsidy song, out of the blue. I bet you my mortgage, there is very juicy stuff going on behind the scenes here and a lot of money to be made by more parties than the owner/operator of the ship. - Check out a video from the Champion Jet 1 in Skopelos from our Youtube video gallery. That was her maiden call. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted July 22, 2021 Author Share Posted July 22, 2021 Thursday, July 22nd, 2021 The Greek summer is progressing in a very strange atmosphere, with the numbers relating to the pandemic looking very grim indeed. The country and the government is on a tight balancing act between public health and the economy, just about like every other government on the planet. Amidst all this, I believe the summer traffic numbers are better than most of the ferry operators expected. - Let me start this week's commentary by encouraging you to use the Create New Stream function of the forum's software. There, under "Content Types" you can click on "Images" and by setting the "Time Period" function to the time frame you want, you can save your Stream and see the latest photos of the gallery. Especially over the last 3 weeks, several members have posted photographs from their summer travels, featuring every type of ferry, from biggest to smallest. On top of that you can see content from locations such as Tinos, Andros, Samothraki, Alexandroupolis, Keramoti, Ouranoupolis, Trypiti, Lefkada, Mykonos, Lemnos, Lavrion, Piraeus, Heraklion, Skopelos and so on, and so forth. All this without annoying watermarks and in good quality, well worth your time I would say. - As I mentioned earlier, my gut feeling is that the summer is proving to be a bit better than everybody expected, in terms of traffic. At least the month of July. The very popular destinations are attracting levels of traffic that resemble pre-pandemic seasons and in the end of the day the majority of the people want to at least enjoy a normal summer. Bad news is that the anti-covid measures are for the most part not being followed and as a result you have pockets of high covid activity at certain locations. All in all though, it seems as if one way or the other the summer ferry traffic will be a notable improvement compared to least year. - Sailed on the Superferry last week for the first time and I have to say I was mightily impressed. Hands down, she is the number one in Greece in terms of the spacious, nicely decorated, luminous and luxurious interiors. Her economy class lounges would qualify for distinguished class in most other ferries. Great quality in the bars as well, nice open decks with the forward one being covered from the sea spray, in short all the ingredients for one to enjoy ferry travel are there. Attention to detail also in the garage, separate driver exits exist at the level of the extra passenger car deck, so that drivers won't co-mingle with the passengers and the loading/unloading of the ferry is conducted quickly. The downside is the limited capacity for lorries and the speed which tops at something like 19.5knots. All in all, highly recommended for those of you who visit Greece. - Again very good impressions from the Adamantios Korais, a ferry that I sailed on to and from Samothraki island. Bearing in mind the ship is a former small Japanese roro, the way they took advantage of her limited space and created spacious and luminous interiors(for the most part), was a masterclass in interior design. Despite her many years of service now in Greece, she is being maintained at a high level and for the standards of her subsidised service to Samothraki, she is a little gem. She's not the ferry which will be able to compete against the larger, faster and more modern Blue Star ships, however in a regional line such as Alexandroupolis - Samothraki, she provides a great level of service. - Speaking of the summer traffic, we are hearing very positive signs also from the Thessaloniki - Skiathos - Skopelos - Alonissos - Mantoudi route. To the point where is makes one wonder whether it is necessary to spend public money on a subsidy for the 3 months of the summer. By the way the Champion Jet 1 is still in that route, deputising for the Superrunner Jet who is in turn deputising for the Aqua Blue. No news from that front, other than that the Superrunner Jet also suffered some engine trouble on Tuesday, which infuriated -and rightly so- the inhabitants of Lemnos and Agios Efstratios, as well as the tourists. - Other news from the engine trouble bulletin include the Flyingcat 3 which resumed service from Rafina to Tinos, Mykonos and Naxos earlier today, releasing the Flyingcat 4 for Saronic islands service. The Superexpress was also a victim of some trouble, she had to offload her passengers and cars in Mykonos last Tuesday and miss entirely her sailings of Wednesday, resuming service only today. Her passengers and cars were forwarded to Rafina by the Ekaterini P. - As you may have read in this forum earlier this week, the Azoress Express is to be renamed Aqua Star and may even be taken over already by Seajets, confirming our information and articles of several months back. The general consensus is that we will see her in action in Kythira island, releasing the Aqua Jewel for intra-Cyclades subsidised sailings. - Last but not least, have a look at several new entries in our video gallery from very recent trips of ours. You can Check out the Fast Ferry Andros departing from Rafina, the Achilleas manoeuvring in Skopelos, the Superferry II sailing off Tinos and finally the Blue Star Myconos sailing from Lemnos, using her distinctive horn. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted August 10, 2021 Author Share Posted August 10, 2021 Tuesday, August 10th, 2021 The better part of 3 weeks has passed since our last update, I guess this is why they call it a summer lull. At the same time the season has progressed enough for us to have a pretty decent idea of what has gone on in the ferry sector so far, therefore let's comment on it. - In the end of it all it looks like a pretty good summer in terms of traffic levels both for the islands themselves but also for the ferry companies. A summer that started with a lot of uncertainties and fears for a season like the subdued previous one, is turning out to be pretty much better than anyone expected. Most of the islands are reporting very decent traffic numbers and a look at the availabilities of the ferries, even for intra-Cycladic routes tells you all you need to know. It's basically a snapshot of what it used to be before the pandemic. I think therefore that everybody's happy so far. - Did I say everybody? Not quite. It looks as if there's yet more bad news for ANEK Lines who appear to be losing significant ground to Grimaldi in the Piraeus to Chania route. The Kydon Palace is achieving great numbers also with the aid of Milos, while on the Elyros and the Blue Galaxy you struggle to see a full garage as late in the season as August. This is amazing actually, in a region which is the homeland of ANEK Lines and where in decades past the locals would have defended ANEK to the last. Their bad strategic choices have swinged the public opinion dramatically, in a way similar to half the amount of the Arsenal fans starting to support Spurs. The success of Grimaldi is such that there is speculation the Kydon Palace will have a fleetmate in this route soon. Could this be the Cruise Ausonia? On of our members is also reporting about the possibility of the Ciudad de Mahon, former Zurbaran, seeing action in the Adriatic in Grimaldi colours. - On the fast ferry front, again Minoan here appear to be doing very well with the Santorini Palace. I have watched her in Mykonos, Paros and Naxos and the amount of traffic on every island amounts to 100s of passengers and several dozens of private cars. Business is so good that again here there is speculation we might see a second fast ferry next year in the same route. Could that be the Highspeed 4? Other fast ferries are also blossoming in the intra-Cycladic routes, the traffic figures are very encouraging for the companies. The Superexpress is doing very well and so are the WC Jet and Power Jet, despite the standard delays of 1+ hours that the latter is having on a daily basis. The Thunder is working well with Naxos as far as I can see, the numbers to and from Mykonos are not that great, I believe. But she is a newcomer and the fact that for the last week or so she's running at reduced speed(25kn) is not helping her image. Overall the negative publicity for almost every fast ferry, are the repeated engine issues which often prevent them from sailing at full speed, causing delays and complaints. - Attica's ships are sailing full, but what is also full is the compaint box from several islands about the timings, frequency and space available in some routes. Granted, this industry is a very seasonal one but the fact Attica's network is built around subsidised routes first, is creating many paradoxes and route design flaws. Just one random example is the connections between Mykonos and Chios, Mytilene, Kavala. To sail from Mykonos to these destinations, one has 3 options every 7-day period. To actually come back from these destinations to Mykonos or the Cyclades in general for that matter, there is only the Nissos Chios every Saturday night from Sigri, Lesvos. It's an absurd situation every way you look at it. The lack of space on Attica's ships is so desperate that they were forced to charter the Pelagitis for 2 sailings to Kos and Rhodes(on the first she loaded 90 lorries) while for the island of Paros, the majority of the lorries are being pushed to the Saturday morning departure of the Ariadne from Piraeus to Paros, Naxos and Santorini. I was even told locally that specific products are not available due to this bottleneck. The Blue Star Paros is ending up performing several extra night sailings to Paros and even one to Syros alone, which is something I have never seen before. I think it may not be long before we see a Blue Carrier 2 in the fleet. - The situation described above has helped other companies such as Creta Cargo Lines, achieve very healthy traffic numbers with the Iosif K ending up dropping Mykonos from her normal Monday rotation(Mykonos - Kos - Rhodes) to cope with the demand for Kos and Rhodes which are pretty much at the mercy of the monopoly of Attica. During her last sailing, even the top customer of Attica was observed loading a couple of dozen of lorries for Kos and Rhodes. The Kapetan Christos was not lucky enough to capture some of the traffic, having spent several days idle due to technical problems, with her owners ending up chartering in a landing craft type ferry, in order to fulfill their contractual requirements towards the fuel suppliers they serve. Similar fate for the equally elderly Armenistis which is now languishing in Mytilene for several days now with serious engine issues. Rumour has it she can only be towed to a shipyard from where she is. - One other ship which was not able to capture decent traffic is the Olympus, with very low numbers in her revised summer schedule, a fact that lead her owners to revise it yet again in August, with morning departures from Piraeus. She did complete a couple of sailing to Lemnos though, under charter to Seajets. The news here is that she is set to try and capture the subsidised sailings the Prevelis is performing for ANEK Lines. A very interesting one indeed, both for the future of the Prevelis and about whether she could cope with the port infrastructure of that route. - Speaking of Lemnos, the Superrunner Jet is still continuing her sailings in that route, however it will not be long before she is replaced by the former Azores Express, now renamed Aqua Star. Earlier in the year we have reported about this purchase as soon as it took place, now the reactivation process has been sped up to the max in order for her to commence sailings even this week, or by Monday at the latest. Admittedly Seajets are doing it in record time, let's see how she will cope. As for the Aqua Blue, repairs to her severely damaged crankshaft are underway and it looks as if eventually she will be back in action. The Superrunner Jet will then presumable go to Thessaloniki for the Sporades route which is proving a massive -subsidised- success. Raising questions of course as to how and why this route ends up being so. - Some summer images from our gallery. The Hellenic Highspeed in Kos, the Prevelis in Diafani, Karpathos island and a glimpse of the summer traffic in cosmopolitan Mykonos. - Don't forget to subscribe to our Youtube gallery which is very active this summer. One can encounter the arrival of the Superrunner Jet in Skopelos island, the manoeuvring of the Adamantios Korais in Myrina, Lemnos island, the difficult movements of the Theologos P in Andros island, the onboard view of the manoeuvre of the Aqua Blue in Agios Efstratios and last but not least the heavy seas crossing of the Hellenic Highspeed in Mykonos. Been a while since the last update but I thank you for the patience and do hope the content is satisfactory. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted August 24, 2021 Author Share Posted August 24, 2021 (edited) Wednesday, August 25th, 2021 Nina Simone used to sing "Summertime, and the living is easy". But that's not so for some of the Greek ferry operators and a host of passengers who use them. Let's see what has happened over the last couple of weeks. - Seajets have had a roller-coaster 2 weeks. On one hand you have great traffic numbers and ships sailing full back and forth between the Cyclades islands and Crete. But at the same time, various issues and practices that we've seen them face and engage in, have re-surfaced in a rather bad manner. Starting with the Aqua Star, she was rushed into service in the place of the Aqua Blue following 4 years of lay-up. As one can imagine, she faced some teething problems with her fuel pumps, governor and stern ramp in 3 different occasions, causing delays, complaints and embarassment. If you ask me, these were only to be expected and were rather minor, the ship seems to be in pretty decent shape for her age. The problem is that these issues surfaced at the busiest time of the year and in the event when Seajets were trying to appease passengers and local communities with the introduction of the Aqua Star and following the issues on the Aqua Blue. As one can imagine, local communities and media went completely bonkers and I have to say I can see where they're coming from. The island of Lemnos has had their tourist season practically ruined because of this situation. In the meantime on the Cyclades front, we saw the introduction of the Caldera Vista in a mixture of intra-Cyclades subsidised sailings(in the place of the Saonisos) and a shuttle service between Paros and Mykonos. She had also been laid up for 6 months and the inevitable teething problems forced her to miss a sailing last Saturday from Paros to Mykonos. Here came into play the way this was handled by Seajets. The WC Jet was diverted to Paros in order to pick up her passengers after having sailed from Syros. Pretty swift reactions. What was not nice, was that the only reason why there was ever an announcement made on board was because the passengers for Mykonos started asking questions at the reception about why the ship is headed to Paros. And when the announcement was made, the diversion was attributed to the Ministry of Mercantile Marine making such a request for unknown reasons. This shows no respect to their passengers and their mental ability. On top of that, the number of people that went on board in Paros, we will never know but eye-witnesses are saying that there was a chaotic situation on board with passengers standing on the corridors in a bus-like manner. On top of that and in usual Seajets fashion, the Paros passengers were let on board, filled up the garage and then the ship sailed immediately to Mykonos in pretty rough weather. Ticket control took place with the bulk of the passengers in the garage while the ship was hit by heavy seas, resulting in passengers starting to vomit in the garage. I don't know which country the above reminds me of, but it's certainly not in the European continent. Anyway, back with the Aqua Star here you can see some external photos plus the full monty of her interiors. By the way, the Aqua Blue is receiving attention and will be re-activated, she's not to be scrapped just yet. The sudden activation of the Aqua Star together with the Caldera Vista, left Seajets high and dry in terms of crew availability, to the extent that they had to bring back all non-essential crew from the Aqua Myth in Dubai. As one can imagine this created a lot of speculation about the future of the Aqua Myth venture, with some people even suggesting that she will never make it to Greece. I respect that, from within Seajets the message though is clear, the delivery of the Aqua Myth is merely put back due to non-availability of manpower, it is by no means cancelled. - Enough with Seajets, turning our attention to the 'enfant terrible' of the industry, ANEK Lines. A fresh batch of rumours has surfaced this week about the future of the company, similar to what we had reported a few months back. The latest version suggests that ANEK will be taken over by Attica/Blue Star Ferries while at the same time the latter entity will be offloading Superfast Ferries to Grimaldi. Plausible scenario and good for the 2 major players, very bad news for the passenger public with a potential monopolistic situation in the Adriatic. Not sure how the deal could look like in reality and I would like to reserve my commentary till the full details have been disclosed. One thing is for sure, something will have to happen with ANEK. - Those of you who may have travelled within Greece have surely seen the sorry state of the port infrastructure on the islands. This was taken to new heights during the last 3 weeks with the Ariadne making extra calls to Paros, Naxos and Santorini, creating havoc in the ports and to the timetables of other ferries who happened to call in these ports shortly after her. The queues of cars especially in Naxos reached kilometres in length, the ports and adjacent towns came to a complete standstill for quite some time and till the queues were cleared. Such size of ships are just too big for the existing infrastructure, at least in the Cyclades, and it's a travesty for them to be allowed to call there during peak times because that's the way Attica wants it. But no news here, the Ministry and the Coast Guard are mere spectators while the safety of ships and people is at stake. - On the engine trouble front, the Thunder is back to normal speeds for the most part and hopefully she is over and done with engine issues for this summer. Sailed on her recently and I promise to share my impressions with the next update. - Bad news for the roro Armenistis who remains laid up in Mytilene for the 3rd week in a row due to undisclosed issues. The talk of the town is that one of her propellers may have hit the pier and be seriously damaged but this is not something her owners are confirming. I know of at least 2 efforts to make some repairs(not in the propeller area) with no real result. Her proximity to the Aliaga breakers makes everybody think that this might be the end of the line. - Repeated engine issues for the roro Kapetan Christos as well, she has now been out of service 3 times in 3 weeks. Not good. Vintage tonnage may be cheap to buy but needs TLC all the time. - The Ventouris fleet is now minus two ships. The Roger(former Bore I, Ilych, Anastasia V, Baltic Kristina, Rigel, Rigel I) has been sold to breakers while information from our members suggest the Bari will be hot on her heels. I have the impression Ventouris have been hit hard by the pandemic. - Last but not least, check out an impressive crossing by the Hellenic Highspeed and a manoeuvre by the Superferry from our video gallery. Best wishes, Nikos, Piraeus. Edited August 25, 2021 by polmyt Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted September 10, 2021 Author Share Posted September 10, 2021 Friday, September 10th, 2021 The summer is gone if you look at the calendar, it ain't over till it's over if you ask me and a few more people who are still holding the fort on the beaches, sunbathing and sipping cocktails. Thus the not so regular updates. But for the ferry companies, the mood is already an autumnal one as they look ahead to a rather difficult winter. - But let's start on a positive note with a detailed presentation of the interiors of Fast Ferries' Thunder. I think they have done a great job with their interiors and I have thoroughly enjoyed the 2 crossings I have already done on her. Garage wise she is pretty simple and cars can roll on and off without having to perform any complex manoeuvring, they are just circling the garage both on the main garage as well as on the hoistable deck. The advantage of this fast ferry is that it is very well lit from natural sources, which creates a great atmosphere on board. The seats are spacious and at a distance from each other, with gaps for the luggage. Only at the stern area there are rows of 3 seats, where one may find himself sandwitched between 2 other people. Apart from the 2 weeks when she was at reduced speed, the rest of the time she is performing quite well. In one of my crossings from Mykonos to Piraeus she even arrived 15 minutes earlier than scheduled, acheiving a speed of 35 knots on a full main garage. The timetable for an early night(2140) arrival in Piraeus is just great, overall very positive impressions. Fast Ferries are taking very careful steps -I could even call them too cautious- but they are delivering. - The Ariadne(great ship, impressive but very expensive to operate) was the first ferry to go on winter lay up, a lay up which is only postponed because of the engine trouble the Blue Carrier 1 is facing. The latter performed sea trials with the hope of the problem being fixed but she limped again back to port. Attica are looking for a drydock slot in the vicinity, it seems the issue is far more serious than initially thought. The Diagoras is also sidelined in Perama, together with the Blue Star Myconos which is undergoing emergency repairs in the area of her forward hoistable car decks which suffered some serious damage last week in Samos. The Hellenic Highspeed has also discontinued her summer sailings. - Before any Attica ship, the Olympus took the lead in stopping sailings for the winter, already in late August. This ship is yet another scandalous chapter in the sinful history of Greek coastal shipping, appearing only during the summer and collecting subsidies whenever these are around. Now she will let again other ships take the winter losses while the rumour concerning her is that she will be -successfully- applying for the subsidised service which the Prevelis is currently performing. A completely unsuitable ship(single rudder, no pitch) in a very demanding route. Anyway, let her be awarded the route and we have all the time in the world to bitch about this. - Have a look at the interior of the Festos Palace, former Europa Palace, Amsicora, Mykonos Palace). Speaking of interiors, here is the full monty of the Benchijigua Express of Lineas Fred Olsen, following a recent crossing by one of our members. - On the Seajets front, the hoo-ha is still going on about the Aqua Star and the problems in the Lemnos route. I mean fine, the locals have every right to protest but choosing as a means of protest to not allow the ship to dock in Lemnos, goes beyond my comprehension. Whether they like it or not, this ship is the only lifeline with the mainland. Not allowing her to berth is more like punishing yourself rather than anyone else. Thank God, the more moderate voices appear to have prevailed and it looks as if tomorrow the Aqua Star will be berthing as scheduled. Other than that, the Caldera Vista is now on drydock in Chalkis and shows no sign of returning to service any time soon, kicking off yet another domino of ships in the fleet. Suffice it to say that in the Heraklion - Santorini - Ios - Naxos - Mykonos - Paros route, Seajets have used no less than 5 ships since the beginning of the year. The Naxos Jet is now doing a combination of subsidised sailings with a touch of Paros - Mykonos. - Yet another set of rumours have surfaced about the fate of Attica and ANEK, I think it's pointless to comment on scenarios or wishful thinking by part of the "impartial and unattached" Greek shipping media. The gist of it is that something dramatic will happen during the winter. And while it may be good for the bottomlines of the companies involved, I highly doubt it will do any good to the public and the islands. Attica's already rat-bitten profile is further tarnished by the fact that their loyalty programme Sea Smiles is falling apart. Holders of the loyalty cards are advised that their miles ought to be cashed in by the end of October or they will be lost, while any points collected as of December will have a limited validity of 2 years. Needless to say that the amount of points needed for a free ticket has increased to the point where realistically you cannot obtain free tickets unless you are a very frequent traveller. In classic fashion, they believe that the shortcomings of a sub-par management, can be rectified by making cuts in the loyalty programme. - On a similar note, in terms of what has to do with the amount of respect the Greek ferry companies are showing to their customers and their intellectual capacity, Minoan Grimaldi announced to the public that last Monday's sailing of the Santorini Palace was not going to be performed due to severe weather conditions. Letting alone the fact that all the other ships sailed as usual on that day, the Santorini Palace limped to Piraeus at reduced speed the previous night. And then of course the next morning the Coast Guard formally announced that Monday's sailing was not performed due to engine issues. A pretty huge communications blunder if you ask me, Grimaldi probably think the passenger public are baboons. - There was also a sudden stoppage of service between Brindisi and Igoumenitsa for Arkoumanis, with the Golden Bridge having been suddenly chartered out to GNV for Bari - Durres service, with a purchase option. Too bad, this owner never seems to be keen on some continuity, he will flip ships to other owners if the money is right and with no view to the future. In the meantime let's have a good taste of the interiors of the Golden Bridge, while mentioning that the Sea Wind is rumoured to be one of the possible replacements they are looking at. - Similar news for Ventouris Ferries with the former Rigel I sailing for the breakers, while the Bari is said to follow suit. Cash is more than likely to be needed here too. A touch of positive news is the fact that the sailings of the Rigel VII from Bari to Igoumenitsa and Corfu have been extended to the 19th of September, as a result of the strong tourist season in the Ionian Islands. - Another sudden departure is the Celestyal Experience which is hotly tipped to have been sold for scrap. It seems Celestyal Cruises is still into a heap of trouble with Covid with the Celestyal Crystal and Celestyal Olympia stopping their sailings suddenly in the end of August. So I think the sale of the Celestyal Experience is a desperate attempt to collect some decent cash. It's a great pity because the ship would have been a good upgrade for them. - Last but not least, here is an impressive video of the Champion Jet 1, battling heavy seas in the vicinity of Mykonos. Best wishes, Nikos, Piraeus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted September 29, 2021 Author Share Posted September 29, 2021 Thursday, September 29th, 2021 It's been the better part of 3 weeks since our last update, I'm afraid that a combination of holidays and working from home kinda put me off track. But the autumn is knocking on our doors so we shall go back to more regular, weekly updates. Not that you missed something dramatic other than several ferries signaling "finished with engines" for the winter. I won't go into detail about which ones are out of action, you can see that in great detail here. Looking at which ferries are these and in which routes they were operating, you can deduce which are the routes where the traffic has diminished, as well as which ferries are the costliest ones to run, if you are looking at large fleets of ships like Attica and Seajets. - Apart from "finished with engines" though, we saw a couple of notable "full ahead" as well. Ro-ro Armenistis was one of them, having been laid up for almost 2 months in Mytilene and while her owners were confirmed to have been out in the market looking for a business, direction India. Turns out the repairs they did were successful and for the time being are holding up so my guess is that her owners will attempt to keep her in service for as long as they can, even if she's hanging on by the skin of her teeth in terms of mechanical reliability. The Pelagitis is pretty much in the same shape, having been the victim of serious breakdowns which kept her sidelined for considerable periods of time in the past. Obviously under this modus operandi, no wonder why Ainaftis is scraping for a living out there. - The other notable comeback is the Aqua Blue, just in the nick of time before she was declared out of the subsidized service she is employed in. What happened this past summer was a great pity for her and her owners. The trouble she ran into had nothing to do with her age or standards of maintenance, it was pure human error which unfortunately created a frustrating and bitter situation for everybody involved. With her age and wear and tear taken under account, she is actually in pretty good shape and Seajets have actually spent a considerable amount of money on her. I believe her to be a great fit for her service and I do hope she has better luck from now on. - Talking of Seajets, another incident for the Caldera Vista which came to contact with the quay in Syros and ended up spending a few days at Neorion Shipyard in order to rectify the damage. This forms part of a summer for which Seajets ought to do a lot of endoscopy, as they relapsed to summers past in terms of bad practices and incidents. In more positive news, they have now taken delivery of the Supercat Jet(former Supercat) and the Superspeed Jet(former Superspeed) under the agreement they have concluded with Golden Star Ferries. Last but not least, the Superferry II will be handed over on/about the 12th of October. In the meantime the subsidised service between Crete and Rhodes has been won by Hellenic Seaways so the Superrunner Jet was laid up for the winter earlier today. Last but not least, you can see extensive photographic evidence of the interior of the Aqua Jewel, taken in a recent trip from one of our members. - Come to mention Hellenic Seaways, the Hellenic Highspeed has taken up sailings between Crete and Rhodes via Kasos and Karpathos in the place of the Superrunner Jet. Basically a like for like substitution, just different logos. The rumour mill about Hellenic Seaways, ANEK and Attica in relation of a possible sale to Grimaldi keeps on going, I think it's pointless to analyse rumours which in certain cases include a lot of wishful thinking. The Greek government has a hot potato in their hands because ANEK is still popular in Crete and has a lot of emotion(and votes) attached to it, even if this is not what it used to be. Just handing over the keys of all or some of the above mentioned companies and ships that go with them to Grimaldi or anyone else is not that easy either, both in terms of competition rules(if such a thing still exists in Greece) but also in terms of intra-Greek politics and prestige. The gist of it is that those people who lead the big Greek ferry outfits for the last 15 years or so, proved to be unworthy of the country's tradition in shipping and ended up literaly handing over everything to foreign interests. I think the only reason why Attica and ANEK are still out there, is because Grimaldi does not want to finish them off. Amidst all this, the installation of a scrubber to the Nissos Chios has been put on hold not only because there is developments due to take place over the coming months but also because the funds just cannot be spared. - A couple of new views on your screens, the small cruise vessel Elysium in Rafina and the freshly painted Panagia Skiadeni of Dodekanisos Seaways in Piraeus. - On to a couple of unusual visitors in Greece. First of all the Saga which was drydocked recently in Perama, you can see views of that over here. The latest on her is that she will be installed with even more cabins in order to serve as a floating hotel in the Philippines. The second one is not really a visitor but rather a passer-by, here is the Apollo of the famous Papenburg sisters, on her way to Aliaga. - The former Costa Romantica, after having spent an idle year as the Celestyal Experience has finally been sold on, most probably for further trading although details of the sale have so far been scarce. A pity for Celestyal Cruises, this would have been a significant upgrade in their fleet. The fact that both the Celestyal Crystal and Celestyal Olympia cut their seasons short at the end of August shows you how much they have bled and how dire is the need for cash in the company. - Now here is something representative of the brand new technologies in recent photos from Spain, as well as something older but very pretty, one of the most beautiful Greek ferries ever built in recent photos from Skopelos island. - Last but not least, here is a summer video of the traffic on any given day in Mykonos. Regards, Nikos, Piraeus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted October 7, 2021 Author Share Posted October 7, 2021 Friday, October 8th, 2021 You don't need a calendar to tell you which is today's date, all you have to do is take a stroll in Piraeus and see how many berths are now full with ferries that have now started their winter sleep. So I think it's high time we took a look at the main players of the Greek ferry scene and try to recap what kind of summer they have had, in a few words and always according to my humble opinion. Grimaldi: There's a Greek expression used to denote someone for whom everything is going well, it goes something like "if he had a rooster, even the rooster would be laying down eggs". Another great season for Grimaldi in other words, Greek ferry shipping is at his mercy. Literally. His competition -by name only- are running behind their tail and he can pick and choose whether he buys out the whole lot of them, or one of them, or his preferred collection of ships and lines from both of them. At the same time as per his own statement he's the hot favourite to buy the ports of Igoumenitsa and/or Heraklion, he looks unstoppable everywhere in Europe. In the Piraeus - Chania route the Kydon Palace is de facto the busiest ship of the service, the swing of the traffic from ANEK is phenomenal and even the main core of lorry companies who used to support ANEK/Blue Star are now filling up the space of his ships. The Heraklion route was obviously very successful with the calls in Milos filling up the ships on their daytime sailings while there is certainty that the Santorini Palace will be paired with another fast ferry next year, in order to capitalise on it success. Grimaldi can look forward to a winter which will change the Greek ferry landscape, with them calling the shots. Attica (Blue Star Ferries & Hellenic Seaways): Nothing different than what we've seen from them the last few years. Schedules built around the subsidies they receive, capitalising on the monopolistic character of some of their routes, mixing up routes in an attempt to fill up ships, rendering their own loyalty scheme pointless in an attempt to save pennies. And in the end of the day, an increasing amount of dissatisfaction about the services they offer in most cases. On the positive side a trouble-free summer for the most part if you take out the engine issues and grounding of the Flyingcat 3, having said that over the last few years the near misses they have had are more than I can remember. So the alarm bells ought to be ringing. Profit wise I believe the summer must have been pretty good, is it enough to cover the losses of the remainder of the year? We shall see. Of course, trying to put myself in their shoes, they're trying to run a company which everyone knows is up for grabs. There's no strategic direction and decision making therefore, they are just trying to manage a situation until the point when the white knight comes in. ANEK: They lost the battle of the Chania route to Grimaldi, they barely survived in the Adriatic, the Prevelis soldiered on for another summer but now her damage seems very serious, time consuming and costly to repair. Only bright side is the Heraklion route I believe, where the ships were full and they maintained their market share. There are no 2 ways of going about it, their time is up and decisions will be taken by the banks over the winter. It remains to be seen whether their insignia will be around come next summer and if so, on how many ships and which ships these will be. If we want to look at the bigger picture about them over the years, they have fallen victims of relying too much on the protectionism of the governments as well as preferring to hire local people or people on some way connected to them, rather than hire competent people. Levante Ferries: Not much to say about them. What can you possibly say about a company which enjoys a Soviet-type monopoly in Zante and to a very large extent in Kefalonia and Ithaca as well? On one hand their ships are in a very good shape, on the other hand the complaining voices from the islands are becoming stronger especially in terms of the timetables. Speaking of timetables, this was yet another year of complaints about them not respecting the labour law in terms of rest hours for the crew. And by the way, we're eagerly awaiting for the new set of graphic images of the interior of the Smyrna. Fast Ferries: Exactly as we were speculating when the Seajets - Golden Star pact leaked out, they were the winners of this war without firing a single shot. Most probably a bigger piece of the Rafina pie for them while the extensions of their service to Koufonisi, Naxos and Paros apparently worked very well, as did the early evening departure from Mykonos on the Ekaterini P. The debut of the Thunder was a partial success. I believe overall it went better than they perhaps expected but my opinion is it could have gone a lot better with some more aggressive advertising as well as tweaked timetables on specific days. The prolongued engine issues did not help either. Good show overall for them, they are a well managed company. Seajets: Overall I believe this must have been a very profitable summer for the company under normal circumstances. If you look at their fare prices relative to the sailing distances, it already gives you a hint. Especially intra-Cycladic sailings must be making them a fortune. I just don't know how much of a hit was the Aqua Blue story and the money they spent on repairs, substitutions, getting the Aqua Star ready etc. But all is not rosy in their garden if you ask me. We saw practices and issues that we have seen from them in the past and which were preventing them from being considered as top-notch operators. Several serious engine issues, delayed ships/unrealistic timetables, continuous juggling of the ships in their fleet to the point when one did not know which ship was sailing to where, lack of respect for the passengers. The fact that the Heraklion - Mykonos route ended up being served by 5 different ships this year, tells you all you need to know. Reliability is the key thing they need to improve for next summer. Golden Star Ferries: Well these chaps are always in the news. Personally I think they did the right thing by consolidating their operations and calling it a cease fire with Seajets. It did them well to focus on their own business and the signs are that they did very well this summer. Only the fact that the Superexpress' season is extended up to early November, is a sign that the summer was profitable and the traffic is still there. Also the Superferry II did very well in her morning departures from Paros to Rafina, they were amongst the winners of this summer. Aegean Speed Lines: A single-ship owner dedicated to a specific route for so many years now. The simplistic thought is that from the moment they keep coming back, they must be making money. At the same time for me, I don't see the growth, I don't see the vision for the future. And I would be curious to hear whether teaming up with Grimaldi did them any real good in their bottomline. It must have been a profitable summer though and the good news is also that the Speedrunner III faced no engine issues at all. Zante Ferries: They have finally managed to consolidate their position and end up in a situation where their ships are making money. Perhaps not loads of them but enough for them to survive. The Adamantios Korais is offering stellar service to Samothraki while the Dionisios Solomos is now established in her route. We did not hear anything over the summer from them, signs are that they did well. Ventouris Ferries: Not easy to gauge their season but the fact that they chose to scrap two of their ships without attempting to use them even briefly, tells me that they needed the cash. One positive sign was that the sailings of the Rigel VII to Igoumenitsa and Kefalonia lasted till end September, at the same time I have no idea how good or bad was their summer in the Bari - Durazzo route. Another well-managed company here in terms of survival, but is this enough to bring them growth? Arkoumanis: For me both the positive and the negative surprise of the year. Positive in that they showed one can compete against Grimaldi using the right tools, the fact that the Golden Bridge was scoring very high volume numbers in lorries was indicating they have something going on. At the same time and while the discussion about them ought to have been about capitalizing on that success, they stop their Brindisi - Igoumenitsa service overnight, chartering out their best ship with an option to buy(for the charterer). It was proved again here that they are just not interested in building something for the long run, they will maintain their business model centred around asset play and short-term summer sailings. Cheers, Nikos, Piraeus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted October 15, 2021 Author Share Posted October 15, 2021 Friday, October 15th, 2021 Last week we did a bit of a special feature recapping how the summer looked like for the principal Greek ferry companies, let's keep on singing this tune and have a look at the ferries which stood out amongst the Greek fleet. I feel the need to clarify that my comments in both features represent what those ferries/companies did during the last few months of the high season, not their historical presence over the years, which is a completely different story. Aqua Blue This one is on top of my list for the mere fact that this came as a result of its absence. She wins therefore the title of the most missed ferry of the season. Joking aside I believe she's a great fit to her service and she was bound to have a great season. She is well maintained for her age, however human error set in motion a very different sequence of events which we have mentioned in length here. She's back in action now and hopefully she'll be running trouble-free. Superferry II She's earning a lifetime achievement award. Retired from the Rafina - Andros - Tinos - Mykonos route after 28 years of stellar service and good money in the pockets of her three different owners during this time span. You'll be hard-pressed to find someone who's not fond of this ship, a credit to Strintzis Lines who refitted her initially and to those who owned her with great care and respect. Now everyone is in the hope she'll be the recipient of the same TLC from Seajets and that she'll be around for a few years more. Kydon Palace I believe she's the most improved performer of the season. For the better part of 20 years there have been several attempts to penetrate the Piraeus - Chania market, the stronghold of ANEK Lines, all efforts met a bitter end. Perseverance, creativity and deep pockets pay off though and from the 25-odd lorries of last year the Kydon Palace now is the de facto leader of the pack in this route. Iosif K The Piraeus - Chania route though is not only about impressive cruise ferries, it's about overaged ro-ros as well. More than a year ago, when the 41-year old Iosif K entered service twice a week in the Chania route(and once a week in the Mykonos - Kos - Rhodes route), nobody would have thought that a year later she'd still be operating trouble-free and with absolutely great loading factors for her owners. After having spent many years in the hands of not exactly first class owners and knowing the state she was in when she arrived, this turnaround earns her the comeback of the year award. Kefalonia The Superferry II of the Ionian Sea, 26 years of consecutive service in the Ionian Sea. Fast(when her owners decide to rev her up), reliable, beloved in that part of Greece for her looks and her impeccable service. Well looked after for the biggest part of her carreer, if we were to look at the part of the Greek fleet above 40 years old and choose to keep 2 ships in service, the Kefalonia and the Superferry II would win the contest, hands down. Ekaterini P Back for good, spotting new engines and cpp, more manoeuvrable and equally economic in terms of consumption, she had a great season linking her usual Tinos, Mykonos and Naxos route with Koufonisi. I believe she'd be plug-and-play in a number of routes in the Aegean which she could serve with consistency and profitability. And I do wonder when/if her owners will take the bold decision to expand using her in a new route. Flyingcat 3 Moving on to some ferries which distinguished themselves for the wrong reasons. The Flyingcat 3 was one of them, having had to suffer one serious engine issue which kept her out for quite some time and a very serious grounding which could have had dramatic repercussions. Two major safety incidents therefore, in the span of 3 months. Not good. Armenistis Tantalizingly close to her 50th year of age, the Joan Collins of the Greek ferry scene one could say, she spent the better part of 2 months laid up in Mytilene with serious engine issues which were shrouded in mystery for the most part. Her owners actively shopped around in the spot charter market for a cargo direction India/Pakistan, yet in the end she's still with us after repairs that only the All-Mighty knows how long they will last. Whichever way you look at it, I think she's sailing on borrowed time. Panorama After a whopping 45 days of summer season she is again laid up, following a 10-month lay up she did last year. Her owners are actively trying to sell her, I mean come on. One could say she is the most neutral ferry in the last 30 years or so. No haters, yet no lovers and a completely undistinguished career in Greek waters. I do hope she finds a good home somewhere else. Saonisos Those of you who are regular readers, will have followed the story of the poor Saonisos over the last few months. She did not manage to gain permission to sail due to some technicality over the significant wave height she's supposed to be able to sail at and now she's laid up in Lavrion. She looks lovely from the outside and I hope 2021 finds her a good home with plenty of traffic. That's all folks, next week we go back to the regular news commentary. Those of you who feel the need to ask for some specific content to appear here, you can make your proposals here or by personal message. And we'll see if we can make it happen. Best wishes, Nikos, Piraeus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TomJ Posted October 20, 2021 Share Posted October 20, 2021 What about Talos? She is worked really hard. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted October 20, 2021 Author Share Posted October 20, 2021 She did but that's no news. The Iosif K was news. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted October 23, 2021 Author Share Posted October 23, 2021 Saturday, October 23rd, 2021 Following the special features that had to do with the past summer, now we're going back to the usual commentary mode. Only problem is, there's nothing much to comment on, the last couple of weeks have been rather quiet. Apart from the ever appearing rumours about the future of ANEK-Attica and the involvement of Grimaldi that is. It seems however that there are so many people circulating these, mixed with their own wishful thinking, that I really don't think it's worth commenting upon. Let's see what actually happens and then we can write an essay. - From a sentimental point of view, I guess the biggest event of the last few weeks was the "finished with engines" of the Superferry II. She served the Rafina - Andros - Tinos - Mykonos route for 28 years in a row which in today's environment is remarkable. Now she has been renamed Superstar and is laid up in Rafina, awaiting to be reactivated by Seajets, presumably in one of their subsidised routes. If she gets half the TLC she's been receiving so far in her life also from Seajets, she'll be around for a few more years. - Speaking of ferries that may be with us for the next few years, our members insist the Aqua Myth/Al Salmy 4/Express Santorini/Chartres will soon be officially delivered to Seajets and sail back to Greece. What sounded like an April's Fool joke may actually become true. If Seajets had a sense of humour, they would rename her Aqua Lazarus. - Quick peek at the location where the grounding of the Flyingcat 3 took place this last summer. I think you can see for yourselves the shallows of that part of Mykonos and why the easiest way would have been to sail around this area, with minimal loss of time. A very silly way of taking chances with one's passengers. And what is infuriating is that the Greek version of the MAIB(Marine Accident Investigation Branch) is not even looking into the incident, it's as if it never happened. The Coast Guard Officers who lead that service have once again made their employers proud. Why am I surprised though, we are talking about the same service which never investigated the near wreck of the Blue Star Patmos a few years ago in Ios. You get the picture of what happens in our banana republic. - A measure of how the season has gone so far in terms of traffic is that the Superexpress is still sailing in the schedules of the Superferry who actually replaced the Superferry II. And at the same time, the Champion Jet 2 will be there throughout the month of November apparently, sailing between Piraeus - Syros - Mykonos - Naxos and Santorini. In both cases we're talking about either daily sailings or 6 times a week. - Last but not least, something which has caused a bit of a stir here in Greece is that Attica have announced yet more increases in ticket prices, citing the recent increases in fuel prices as the reason. That's nice and dandy, however in a few months from now when the prices settle down again, we won't see those increases go away, will we? Again here you see the shining absense of any sort of government control over what increases are imposed, in which way and how these are calculated. The argument of course is that this is a free market which regulates itself. Well no, it's not a free market. From the moment the ferry companies are being subsidised by the State, it's a distorted market thus the State ought to be able to intervene when it sees fit. That's in European countries of course, I forgot. - And from our video gallery, the final departure of the Superferry II from Tinos. Regards, Nikos, Piraeus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted November 1, 2021 Author Share Posted November 1, 2021 Monday, November 1st, 2021 Another rather quiet week in Greece, more ferries are being tied up for their winter sleep. For some of them we wonder under which ownership they will wake up. - I guess the most spectacular piece of news this week has been the fire on the Superfast XI in Patras. There is no official announcement as to the cause of the fire but the fact that the Fire Service was involved, leaves a glimmer of hope that we may get to know what happened. I'm saying this because starting from the near sinking of the Blue Star Patmos in Ios a few years ago, no incident or near miss involving an Attica ship has ever been investigated by the Coast Guard. I think you catch the drift about how things have been working in this respect. Luckily the incident happened while the ship was alongside and shore help from the Fire Service was immediately available, she is being towed to Piraeus for repairs. Attica's intention is for the Ariadne to step in as her replacement, early signs is that she will be out for at least a month. The bigger picture here for Attica, is that this is the latest in a string of several serious safety-related incidents concerning their ships. This company used to be the standard in Greece in years past, over the last few years we have been witnessing the decline in their standards in spectacular fashion. I have actually began to wonder, whether there is even acknowledgement of this fact within the company, or it's business as usual. - Creta Cargo Lines with their vintage tonnage is definitely one of the most interesting companies in the Greek scene. The Talos is now out of action for her annual refit, a refit which will last till December 31st at the earliest. The Iosif K therefore will be carrying the load, sailing to an array of destinations between Monday and Wednesday, followed by 2 sailings to Chania. In these sailings to Chania, intermediate calls in Santorini are also introduced on some of the days. Last Friday the Iosif K did Syros - Tinos - Mykonos - Paros - Naxos - Santorini - Chania. I spotted her in Paros almost fully laden during her return leg, it seems as if there's a very healthy cargo base available to the ship. And I wonder when she will stop for her annual refit, whether the Talos can cope. Early signs is that the investment on the Iosif K appears to be paying off and I wonder what thoughts this may be creating to her owners. - Here is some photos from the SuperStar, now being repainted in Rafina. - Speaking of overaged roros, the Armenistis is in the news again. Our members are saying that she will be doing her last sailings in Greece this week. It's not exactly clear at this point if we're talking about a purchase or a charter but she is expected to depart from Greek waters. Regular readers will remember she spent the better part of 2 months in Mytilene with serious engine issues. - We don't only have overaged roros in Greece, here is a few photos of the Severine in Thessaloniki where she is sailing in a service from Thessaloniki to Limassol. - Another interesting case is the Nissos Aegina, the small former Dutch ferry that the Leventakis family bought for service from Piraeus to Aegina. Following conversion for the last few months and consequent sea trials, she was spotted by one of our members entirely missing her landing craft-type bow. It is anyone's guess how the final product will look like. The fact though that at a very late stage in the conversion and following sea trials, they removed the entire bow section seems to indicate that something has gone very wrong. What a 47-year old ferry of this configuration is doing in Greece is a very good discussion point. Moreover when her owners are spending money in what looks like a very costly and complicated conversion. And in order to commence service when, in the midst of the winter season? Several questions here, with no apparent answers which make any financial sense. - The winter might be approaching but still there is some summer spirit to go around, aided by a couple of holiday shots from Mykonos. - Last but not least, the Superexpress in Tinos from our video gallery. Regards, Nikos - Piraeus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted November 7, 2021 Author Share Posted November 7, 2021 Sunday, November 7th, 2021 A quiet few days have passed in Greece but there's always talking points in this industry, let's try and dissect them for you: - Let's start off with a great photo of the Ariadne from our gallery, very recently captured via the drone of one of our members. - Speaking of the Ariadne quite a bit of discussion going on around her usage and how successful she's been since she arrived in Greece. The facts are that apart from a relatively short period of time when she was occupied in the Chios - Mytilene route, she never got to have a stable employment in Greece. She's done charterers in Greece and abroad, she's been plugged into several routes whenever there was need but nothing stable. And come September, she's the first one to be deactivated from the fleet, a measure of the cost of employing her. Some might say she's successful by virtue of doing exactly that, being the passe-partout of the fleet and step in when needed. Others might say that the fact she's being used everywhere shows that she's not a good fit anywhere. I like the ship from the exterior, she's very impressive. But I tend to take a more capitalistic view of these things. For a ship which is not filling up all the time or not producing income from charters out to other operators at a steady pace, I could not call her entirely successful. Filling up holes in the network of routes is a job that could be accomplished with a ship perhaps not so big but at the same time a lot cheaper to operate. The fact she's the first ship to be deactivated every year, shows you what her owners exactly think of her. Anyway, it's a personal opinion for anyone to have, what I will add to the discussion is the fact that in a couple of year's time her owners(and the owners of every ship above 5 thousand tons gross) will be required to pay extra money for her CO2 emmissions to the EU. And I do wonder what this will all mean for tonnage of conventional technology across the board. - As of last week the Ariadne is employed in the Adriatic, filling in for the Superfast XI which is now in Perama for repairs. Mentioning the Adriatic, again passengers and cargo are suffering from multi-hour delays across the board with Grimaldi(Florencia) being predictably the champion of this. For those of you who follow the Adriatic market this is a commonplace especially in the summer months. The advertised schedules are way off reality and the ships cannot possibly cope with the volumes of traffic and the congestion they face sometimes in port. Three years ago in Igoumenitsa, I witnessed scenes in the hotel where I was staying with stranded passengers of a Grimaldi ferry desperately seeking for rooms. The reason was simple, a departure which was scheduled for midnight, ended up taking place early afternoon the next day. You can't have the wife and kids spend one day on the dock. What obviously begs an answer is why on earth from the moment the companies know about the real situation in these routes, they do not orgsanise their timetables in a way in which they can be kept. And for the life of me, all these years I cannot come up with a logical answer. - More rumours and discussion on the Aqua Myth and on whether she's been actually bought by Seajets. Some people are even questioning the fact that even if she's indeed bought by Seajets, she will ever reach Greece and won't be beached in nearby India. Don't have an answer to all this, what I can say is that sources from within Seajets insist there will be a Seajets crew flying over to the UAE for the takeover of the ship, within the next few days. - On another ship bound for the scrapyard, the Altair(former Bari, St Anselm, Stena Cambria) having called in Djibouti, performed a further call in Salalah, Oman from where she sailed a couple of days ago "for orders". Now she is out of AIS range, remains to be seen which country's scrapyard is her final destination. I am personally having a laugh with the European Union over this. They have passed a legislation which is impossible for them to enforce, ships are being scrapped the same way they have always been and what's left behind is a bunch of politicians looking as complete idiots. No news there, of course. - Here is an assortment of photos of the Celebrity Apex in Mykonos, taken last summer. This is a remarkable and impressive class of ships. I would stop very short of calling them beautiful, however they have a commanding presence. - Yet another piece written about the Greece - Cyprus potential sea link and it has to do with the fact that the Cypriot government is hell-bent on making this work. Now the subsidy will be made available on a 3+3 year basis(used to be just 5) and the sailings will be restricted between April/May and September/October, while maximum fare levels are prescribed in every category. So it appears now their target is clearly not freight but the tourist element of the summer months. Some 5 million for 3-4 months worth of sailings does not sound that bad, let's see if anybody eats the cheese. If the ship stays on for the full 6 years, we're talking about a 30-million bill. I believe they could have found much better use for this money and I wonder why Cyprus is so determined to spend it on this. - We reported last week that the Armenistis is on her way out, her employment in Greece took a few days extra duration till tomorrow. I think this is when the Pelagitis comes out of a mini refit session, let's see what's next for this veteran. There is a rumour about the Dada Star having been bought by a Greek operator but it does not seem to be related with Ainaftis, owners of the Armenistis. - Last but not least, you may be interested in a trip report I did on the Stena Saga. It's in Greek obviously but easily translatable in Google, in there there are links to a host of photos and videos from that crossing. Till the next one, Nikos, Piraeus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted November 14, 2021 Author Share Posted November 14, 2021 (edited) Sunday, November 14th, 2021 Several tid-bits of news and gossip this week, let's go through it: - Finally it has been confirmed that a full takeover crew is now on board the Aqua Myth, there are even photos of the ship still painted in SAMC colours. The whole handling of the takeover does not indicate a desire to re-sell the ship to the breakers. I guess we'll see her in Greece sooner rather than later, her name and port of registry(Moroni) is now painted over on the hull. We thought it's all over... - At the same time the Armenistis appears to be headed the other way. Last Monday the ship stopped sailing and was moved to the Drapetsona repair area, allegedly preparing for the breakers. I guess here we will also see the routine of her calling in a couple of ports prior to being beached. - The Altair(former Bari) is doing just that although here i believe this has to do a lot with her engines. Having sailed from Salalah, Oman she is now languishing at Colombo anchorage for the last week or so, having limped at 6kn to get there. So I would assume she will be patched just enough to make it to Chittagong, from where she is now this is the logical course of things. - Here are a couple of ships that are scrapped already and we need not worry about them, just reminisce. Here is the Ialyssos of DANE Lines and there is the Kydon of ANEK Lines. - On a similar note, the Antares Express(former Costa NeoRomantica/Celestyal Experience) despite being allegedly headed to China she is now sailing to Dubai. So serious doubts about her future also here. - Doubts over the future of the former Golden Iris, Cunard Princess. She has now been renamed Gold Club and of course our minds go to something similar to Gadani beach. At the same time, her funnel has been repainted which is not a practice I have seen in the past from breakers' crews. Unless of course her previous owners asked for this, which is also a possibility. The odds are stacked against her for sure. - Also, as per our members the tailshaft of the Prevelis is being repaired ashore. The ship remains in Perama though without any signs of life/repair and the crew has been signed off. Let's see what finally happens with her, she is a source of income for ANEK Lines so I would imagine she will be repaired. Unless of course something happens with ANEK Lines in the meantime. - Another survivor for you, the Iosif K looking pretty impressive in a recent call of hers in Mykonos. - News about the Aqua Star have also surfaced this week, during a tourism/hospitality exhibition which is took place in Greece this last week. Seajets participated there and are advertising the Aqua Star to be linking Volos and Skiathos, Skopelos, Alonissos during summer 2022. No further details have been disclosed but it looks as if she will be competing in the open market. - A significant accident took place in Chios during last week, with the Nissos Samos hitting hard against the quay and causing considerable damage to it. This can happen, nothing unusual. What's unusual is of course the way this was handled. For a couple of days the ships were diverted to Mesta port(on the other side of the island) and the ships were advised that they can call Chios main port "at their discretion". This was so because first of all the Coast Guard or the Port refuse to take any responsibility or offer any assurances whatsoever, for the port which they are supposedly responsible for. At the same time, the other possible berthing spot in Chios was virtually impossible to be used for the unbelievable reason that the mooring dolphins were left outside port limits, look at this. And of course now they are scrambling to rectify this. This is useless civil service for you, there is absolutely no reason for the tax payer to be sustaining this clearly incompetent bunch of people. - Last but not least, a fresh video from our gallery. Nikos, Piraeus Edited November 14, 2021 by Nick the Greek Prevelis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted November 19, 2021 Author Share Posted November 19, 2021 (edited) Friday, November 19th, 2021 Let's round up this past week's action, it has actually been pretty interesting: - Again more rumours and articles in the Greek electronic press about a possible Attica deal, about a done sale etc. It's the usual articles without signature, no point in making comments unless something concrete comes out. - News on the Ariadne and the Nissos Rodos, as of April next year it appears as if the intention is for the former to revert to the Chios - Mytilene route, while the latter will take on the role the Ariadne had last year, as a second ship in the Dodecanese, together with the Blue Star 2. The reason for the swap appears to be Nissos Rodos' bigger garage capacity. My comment here is let's see what the winter brings both in terms of the ownership status of Attica(and ANEK for that matter) but also in terms of the international charter market. I have the impression that Attica would not refuse any lucrative charter proposal, regardless of which unit in the fleet we're talking about. - Bit of a discussion going on around the future of ANMEZ and the Dionisios Solomos in particular, if she were to lose the right to perform the subsidized sailings to the Western Cyclades she is currently performing. Rumours have surfaced about a potential interest both from Seajets and Golden Star if that were to happen. The large garage space on the ship is of particular attractiveness, at the same time her relatively modest speed of 17kn is not ideal in a very competitive environment. The interior is also nothing to write home about but of course this is the easiest thing to fix, if everything else makes sense for you as a buyer. I fancy more Seajets as a better candidate, she could fit very well in their network of subsidized services. Golden Star are fresh off their big-time move to divest, plus the Dionisios Solomos would find it very tough to compete in the Rafina to Mykonos route, primarily because of her speed. - We will also have a new arrival in Greece, she is the Orcadia, former Saturn of Caledonian Mac Brayne. The Greek owner behind this is Creta Cargo Lines, the owner's name is Koukianakis(try pronouncing that) and they have business in West Africa which is where the former Nearchos(now Marilu) is. I understand the intention for the Orcadia/Saturn is to end up in the same area. I'm pretty sure we will see some sort of conversion on her prior to that though. - As we discussed last week, the roro Armenistis is now in Drapetsona and currently is flying the flag of the Cook Islands. All this is condusive to a trip to the breakers, however her owners are allegedly aiming at performing a couple of spot voyages in the area or beyond, before the ship meets her maker. - On a similar note and as we said last week, the Altair(former Bari) is now headed towards Chittagong, Bangladesh in order to be scrapped. I know the term recycled is somehow the prevailing terminology in these situations, in my mind it does not matter as long as we are describing the same process. Again here the process of this sale makes a mockery out of EU rules and regulations. - News about the Saonisos as well, she finally received permission to sail in specific sea conditions that were required for her previously awarded subsidized service. Problem is, this is no longer available for her. But thank God(if you're an owner that is) the Ministry is as creative and generous as ever when it comes to spending public money for the sake of closely associated to the Ministry owners, in routes that serve no particular practical purpose. And SAOS have traditionally been observed to know very well their way around the corridors of the Ministry, I am therefore optimistic that the lovely Saonisos will find a subsidized home. And the tax payers, another black hole where their money are dropped in.. - The Aqua Star is also confirmed to commence sailings from Volos to Skiathos, Skopelos and Alonissos as of next February. So this is where presumably we will be seeing her also next summer. A very interesting development and i'm very curious to see how this one will pan out and what this will mean for the competition in this route. - Touching on Seajets, it has been confirmed that crew has travelled to the Caribbean area to take over their newly acquired high speed ferry. What has not been disclosed is which is this ferry. But chances are we are talking about the Croazia Jet that has been laid up in Venezuela for the last few years and has been very recently re-flagged from Venezuela to Cyprus. I know what you're all thinking, what on earth is Iliopoulos going to do with all these ferries. I don't think anyone outside Seajets has a good idea about this, even if they try to convince you of the contrary. The facts are that another abandoned high speed ferry has been snatched by Seajets, what they do with her apart from the obvious trip to Greece, is anyone's guess. The situation resembles a lot how NEL was picking up either as a purchase or as a charter, every single ferry in the market. Definitely one to watch our for. - Check out the recently departed from Piraeus, Saga in our gallery. - And also have a look at the Aqua Myth which is being prepared to sail from Dubai to Greece. All the best, Nikos, Piraeus Edited November 19, 2021 by Nick the Greek Spelling Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted November 29, 2021 Author Share Posted November 29, 2021 Monday, November 29th, 2021 Bit of a slow-moving week in the Greek scene, let's sort out the highlights: - As we had mentioned a couple of weeks ago, the Cyprus - Greece link is again in a tender stage, proclaimed by the relevant Ministry in Cyprus. Realistically we will have more news towards the end of January/early February. These politicians are hell-bent on spending public money that could have been used in other, more useful areas. - A couple of juicy incidents that occurred last week now: first of all the Pelagitis was controlled by the Coast Guard in Mytilene and was found to be employing a crew member who was already retired and one crew member who was of foreign origin and was not declared anywhere. This was reported by the union of seamen and shows you how illegal work is so widespread in Greece. Secondly, about a week ago the Blue Star Chios was spotted in Piraeus main port, encircled by an anti-pollution barrier with and anti-pollution craft performing cleaning operations in the area around the ship and in the central basin of the main ferry port. The common denominator between the two incidents? The fact that neither incident was officially communicated by the Coast Guard, as if they never happened. The Coast Guard chooses to formally advise the public for anything under the moon, like somebody being caught for driving in the port without a lisence. But then on cases of pollution and breaking labour laws, it chooses to remain completely silent. Which gives you an idea of the entanglement between the Coast Guard and ship owners. Disgraceful attitude by the State which leaves the field wide open for every interpretation. And of course kills any trust there may be to the Coast Guard. - One of our members did a couple of trips on the Nissos Rodos to Heraklion and on the Blue Galaxy from Chania. In these links you can see a very extensive photo report of their interior. - Age and the new environmental regulations are rapidly catching up with a host of traditional ferries, which we grew up admiring. The latest in line is the Express Pegasus, which is no longer spotting Hellenic Seaways insignia. We've not seen the usual name change or re-flagging yet but it's only a matter of time before she says goodbye for good. Her best years for me were by far when she wore the Ventouris Ferries colours, that sparkling white and the royal bow, are hard to forget. - It appears as if, according to our members, the Aqua Solution is about to follow the same path. No surprise here, she was completely abandoned for so many years now, it was clear Seajets had no use for her. One wonders if they actually mad any money over this purchase and sale. - In the meantime, the former Express Aphrodite, St Columba, Stena Hibernia is now beached in Pakistan. I have the impression she's one of the most loved ferries both in the UK and Ireland but also in Greece. She's a ferry that could have been earning a living in Greece to this day, unfortunately she was disposed of too early for my liking. And truth be told she never received the extensive interior refit that could have rendered her an even bigger success than what she was in Greece. - In more positive news, the repairs on the Prevelis are proceeding slowly but surely and it looks as if she might be ready for a comeback around Christmas time. - See the Nissos Halki, a lovely small ferry in the Dodecanese from the camera lense of one of our members. - And the last departure of the Superferry II from Mykonos, part of our video gallery. Best wishes, Nikos, Piraeus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted December 6, 2021 Author Share Posted December 6, 2021 Monday, December 6th, 2021 Another very quiet week in Greece, here are the few notable developments: - Let's start with the arrival of new tonnage in our neighborhood. The first arrival is rather young for Greek standards, it's the Mishi, a 20-year old small ferry bought by SAOS and intended to compete for subsidised services in Greece. She is due to receive a sizeable conversion, SAOS do have the know-how when it comes to that. Her characteristics suggest that with the right conversion she'll be a pretty decent addition to an ageing Greek fleet. - The second arrival is the rather well-known to the British public, Orcadia(former Saturn). As we have already reported here, owners' intention is for her to find a permanent employment in West Africa, where Creta Cargo Lines appear to be well connected. For the life of me, I just cannot understand the buzz around this arrival especially. In an industry that 20-odd years ago was eagerly expecting newbuilding after newbuilding, now we're waving the flag for a 44-year old small ferry. Which is kind of a parallel to the economic and social developments that have taken place in this country over the same period of time. I do hope she finds a good home in West Africa and not in Greece. - Speaking of West Africa, it appears that following her spell in Tunis, this is where the Armenistis is headed and more specifically in Cameroon. Obviously the information about who and what in that part of the world are hard to come by but it's a very interesting one to follow up on. - Departure time also for the former Express Pegasus, now Pegasus X. Unfortunately it's the breakers and she's due to sail rather soon. - Chances are she will be followed by the Aqua Solution(former Prinsessan Christina), the ship's AIS system is working again. - Think most of you will have seen by now the video of the Express Scopelitis in Schinoussa, attempting to disembark passengers in atrocious weather conditions for her size and for the available port infrastructure. Obviously the Master and crew took a huge risk there and luckily nobody was injured. This is a case which demonstrates all the issued the sector faces. Complete lack of port infrastructure on the islands and total absence of the so called Coast Guard who is supposed to be regulating the ports and protect common interest and safety. This was a call that probably should have never taken place under these conditions. The self-sacrifice and skill of Master and crew is commendable, at the same time this is just not the way forward. Greece needs a colossal port infrastructure investment project. - Check out a photo of the Silver Paloma from our gallery. - Last but not least, some of you may have noticed the Sea Jet 2 wondering around in the Aegean in the middle of the winter. This is so because the Ministry in a -yet another- photographic decision allowed ships of exactly her specifications to perform sailings in this specific subsidized route. So now the public, apart from having to contend with her size and issues she has in rough weather conditions, also has to put up with the fact that she cannot carry vehicles or cargo obviously. But who cares in the corrupt Greek state establishment? What worth is the public interest in front of Seajets' P&L? Kind regards, Nikos, Piraeus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted December 13, 2021 Author Share Posted December 13, 2021 Monday, December 13th, 2021 One week closer to Christmas with quite a few items worth commenting upon, many of them being a stark reminder of what we call "Greek reality", a term similar to virtual reality. And come to think of it, the two are actually not far off. - Biggest event of this past week is the ongoing strike by part of officers and crews. The strike is actually declared by the Panhellenic Seamen's Union and the aim is to secure a 3% pay increase in the collective bargaining agreement for next year. We're talking ferry sector here, so an instrument of potentially strong pressure towards the government. By the way this is only enforceable in the 2-3 major ports where the Union can summon enough people to support the action, ships sailing to and from islands or peripheral ports are sailing as usual for the biggest part. One can argue about the effectiveness of such industrial action in today's society but that's another discussion. The case here is that the Union kinda scored an own goal in the sense that their strike coincided with a 3-day period of extreme weather phenomena in Greece, during which the ferries would have been tied up in the ports anyway. Something which obviously played right into the hands of the ferry owners who not only saved 3 days' worth of fuel but also saved on wages. Thing is, the Union realised the situation very late and are now considering the continuation of the action, pending a new round of negotiations with the owners. Already there are signs of shortages in some items on the islands, especially the smaller ones and there is even discussion that the government might mobilize the seafarers. I consider this an extreme measure under any circumstances. At the same time, one has to consider the environment under which these people are working and living. Already, according to the Able Seamen's Union, Seajets, ANEK Lines and Zante Ferries have not paid November salaries to the seafarers. All 3 companies are part of the subsidized network of services and are receiving subsidies. Receiving? Not exactly the right phrase. The correct phrase is "being owed" subsidies, because right now there is a total amount in the region of EUR 70 million which is owed by the Greek government to the ferry companies. So you get the full picture here, none of the wheels of the system are turning. But then again that has traditionally been the fate of companies who base their success on State subsidies, we have seen this in the past with GA Ferries and SAOS. - Check out some vintage views of the N. Kazantzakis from our gallery. - The weather conditions of the last few days in Greece caused havoc and contributed in the grounding of the Aqua Jewel at the port of Gytheion. She grounded on soft sand bottom though and was refloated rather easily, suffering only minor damage. We nearly had a similar situation in Piraeus as well. Saturday evening, 9bft scale winds and 3m waves in the Saronic Gulf, with the Blue Carrier 1 approaching Piraeus for her usual berth in Drapetsona. At the same time you have the Iosif K which was already berthed slipping from her moorings and turning to port, while from the dock next to her, several cement blocks have broken loose and are hitting the Iosif K. After a couple of hours of chaos and intense efforts, a small flotilla of harbour tugs got the situation under control and the Blue Carrier 1 was finally berthed safely. This was a classic demonstration of how the Greek system works, or in actual fact does not work. You have a potentially dangerous situation like this and nobody flinches. The Piraeus Port Authority does absolutely nothing other than try and collect the cement blocks and does not even consider sending the Blue Carrier 1 to another berth. And there were plenty available that night. Of course the elite force of the Greek government, the Coast Guard, those guardians of safety are nowhere to be seen either. They do not make use of their discretion to order ships in and out of port or allocate ships different berths. Then again this is not why they are truly there. They are there to make sure first and foremost that not even a hint of liability falls upon them, if something goes wrong. But I shouldn't be too harsh on them. As those of you who've been to Greece know, they're pretty good at blowing their whistles though. - Here are some more vintage views, recently uploaded in our gallery. Here is the Symi as the Eftychia, the Ephesus and the Kriti. - Loads of discussion this past week about Grimaldi again, for the wrong reasons though. Apparently at around 2130 on Monday night(half an hour after sailing from Piraeus for Heraklion and Chania), the passengers of the Festos Palace were advised that due to adverse weather conditions the ship would stop at Heraklion and not continue to Chania. As it happened, a couple of our members were on board who ended up arriving in Chania on a Grimaldi-chartered coach, reporting that the weather conditions were just fine and that the ANEK ship actually had absolutely no issues in berthing at Chania. Guess what, there was a huge debate about why this happened, the majority citing reasons of saving on fuel. As per my calcs based on educated guesses, I believe she may have saved something in the region of 10k. This is a small amount for Grimaldi's standards, something tells me that the cancellation of the sailing took place because the Master genuinely thought he would not make it. Of course the whole handling on their part leaves room for a lot of improvement, if they knew that early, they should have advised the passenger prior sailing and give them the opportunity to sail with ANEK. - Repairs on the Prevelis are going ahead, the ship is now on drydock and hopefully we will see her back in action just before Christmas. - Another ship that her owners are hoping to see back in action is the Smyrna. She was in the news big-time, even on the front page of a popular Turkish newspaper, the story being that Levante Ferries aim at commencing sailings between Thessaloniki and Smyrna(Izmir) around April 2022. Levante went as far as promising they would employ a second ship very soon. The story of a possible ferry link between Turkey and Greece goes back decades and it was never met with success despite several efforts. At the same time I did not see any mention of a subsidy and that makes me a bit sceptical. The newspaper articles etc, I consider not reliable, we have seen in the past that the press will write whatever you want, if reimbursed adequately. In general, we have heard a whole lot about this ship but other than some artist's impressions, we have actually seen very little. Let's see what happens here, very interesting indeed. - A rather belated trip report from my side, it's about the former Rosalind Franklin, now Finnclipper. Easily translateable in English through google, hope you find it interesting, together with the photos from her interior. All the best, Nikos, Piraeus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted December 27, 2021 Author Share Posted December 27, 2021 Monday, December 28th, 2021 Been a silent couple of weeks from this spot but there wasn't really something exciting to comment upon. So rather than blab away nonsense, silence is a virtue and a sign of respect to the people who are honouring me by reading this blog-type column. Having said that, today's post marks the one year anniversary of this column hosted by Shipfriends.gr. And it's only fair that I extend my thanks to all of you who have been following and supporting this corner. I sincerely hope that after this year of reading you are a step closer towards understanding how things work in this country of wonders. This being also the last post for the year 2021, I will try to summarise very briefly what we've seen during the last 12 months. And the only word I can come up with, is disappointment. The rest of Europe is focusing on new technologies, new designs, infrastructure to support it, newbuilding projects and planning ahead for the next 30 years, in this corner of Europe we have other things in our minds. Subsidies, stopping loyalty programmes, conspiring with the Coast Guard to conceal uncomfortable moments, welcoming "new" overaged tonnage, several accidents and near misses, infrastructure which is collapsing for the most part. I mean which company could you vote for as "ferry operator of the year"? I guess Fast Ferries would clinch that just by virtue of doing nothing wrong, rather than doing something right. The thing of course is, the Greek ferry industry doesn't need only "steady Eddies". It needs a vision, new ideas, a technology leap and massive amounts of infrastructure. I think that sums the year up. Will we see any of my wish list in 2022? Stranger things have happened but don't hold your breath. We'll be following up on this from this spot, for the time being please accept my best wishes for a healthy and brilliant year 2022! Nikos, Piraeus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted January 21, 2022 Author Share Posted January 21, 2022 Friday, January 21st, 2022 Our little blog is now back in action for the year 2022, let's see what has transpired the last few days in the Greek ferry scene: - Without a doubt the most significant development which is expected in 2022 has to do with what will happen to ANEK Lines and whether the company will be absorbed by the Attica Group in one or the other shape or form. You may also recall that while for the last 3 months all sorts of people have been speculating in vain, we stuck to the facts over here. And while we're not any wiser as to what exactly will happen(everything you're reading is pure guesswork or wishful thinking), we now have the first real facts. And these are that the board of Piraeus Bank has approved the purchase from Alpha Bank of the loans the latter bank has given to ANEK at a significantly reduced rate presumably. In plain English this means that Piraeus Bank is becoming the biggest lender of ANEK Lines while at the same time they are the majority shareholder. The next step will most probably be a severe haircut of the overdue loans of ANEK and some refinancing in order to provide ANEK with working capital. Piraeus Bank therefore will be able to deal the deck as they see fit. This could mean a possible absorption of ANEK into Attica and/or sale of the older fleet units and/or a reshuffling of tonnage within the Attica Group which also includes obviously Superfast Ferries, Blue Star Ferries, Hellenic Seaways and Africa Morocco Line. These are details which most probably are yet to be sorted out, the fact is that most probably we won't be seeing ANEK suffer the fate of so many other companies with their ships being seized by creditors in Piraeus. - The Olympus is now officially under the hammer with a starting price at EUR 4 million, the auction to take place in late February although the owners are scrambling to prevent the auction. Sad end to what was from the beggining a difficult undertaking which was made worse by a wrong choice of ship plus unfortunate decisions when it came to the routeing of the ship. And unfortunately for them, the owners' pockets were not deep enough to sustain the venture. -The elderly Dutch lady Nissos Aegina has a new, new bow which looks like that. I'm no naval architect but something tells me that any sea state above calm, one will not be feeling very good on that ship. Regardless, the fact is that her owner seems to have spent a fair amount of money on her so it's interesting to see how she will fare. - The Aqua Star is scheduled to be dry-docked soon and rumour has it that in view of her activation in the Sporades islands area, she will be renamed Sporades. The name Aqua Star sounds pretty good to me, I think at some point Seajets need to standardise their naming. - Speaking of Aqua ships, there's the old Aqua Myth still sailing around in the Arabian peninsula. She's now been moved to a port in Oman, allegedly due to the fact that her layup berth in Dubai needed to be vacated due to works over there. But I think this is where the good news stops. Her not sailing to Greece seems to indicate for most people, myself included, that she will never do so but rather will be eventually sold on to nearby breakers. At the same time, sources from Seajets are indicating that the jury is still out for her. Surely it won't be long before we know, one way or the other. - I guess though that while there's still subsidized services to go around, there's always a hope for the Aqua Myth to sail back to Greece. And Seajets never seem to lose their touch when it comes to claiming these subsidized services. The latest news on that front is that for the Kasos and Karpathos route as well as for another couple of routes, the independent authority which examines these issues made a negative recommendation to the Minister for Seajets, given that their submitted paperwork did not fit the terms of the relevant tenders. But this is Seajets we're talking about so the Minister took it upon himself to completely disregard the negative recommendations and include Seajets in the tender process. I mean seriously? I think i can smell the stench of corruption, emanating from the corridors of the Ministry. - Still more news about Seajets, the Rapidlink Jet was drydocked in tandem with the Champion Jet 1, a sign that after 2 years of lay up she might see service in Greece within 2022. - Lots of discussion around Levante Ferries also this week, they now have 2 of their 4 ships in annual refit which means they need to reshuffle their schedules, abandoning the Patras - Sami(Kefalonia) - Ithaca route and focusing their services out of Kyllini to Zante(primarily) and Kefalonia as a second thought. This has left the local communities in both Kefalonia and Ithaca rather disgruntled about the level of service they're getting from this local monopoly. This was exacerbated by the fact that Levante chose to portray themselves as victims of external factors which dictated this situation. Only problem with that is this is the same situation for the last few years in a row now, so their credibility is rapidly abandoning them. Leaving the service to the islands aside, imagine the first sailing of the Kefalonia is at 0500hrs, which means the crew is up and working at least 45 minutes earlier. And she is on paper due to arrive in Kefalonia at 2235hrs every evening, meaning that by the time the ship unloads and the crew tidys things up, it will be 2330. at the earliest and provided the ship is on time So we're talking less than 5 hours rest with a single crew per 24 hours, I just do not know which legislation allows for that. - Another ship in the news is Calmac's former Saturn which looks like she may be not sailing to West Africa after all. Her new owners Creta Cargo Lines, have a contract with a major oil company in order to supply the Greek archipelago of islands and some of these islands are so small that the job is being sub-contracted to landing craft type ships. So it could well be in the end she may take over just this duty. Here she is on drydock in some very recent photos. - A quick look of the Golden Bridge on drydock, she has now been painted in full GNV colours and after she sorts out some engine issues that she seems to be temporarily facing, she awaits deployment in the GNV network. Take care, Nikos, Piraeus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick the Greek Posted January 29, 2022 Author Share Posted January 29, 2022 Saturday, January 29th, 2022 It's winter all around us but things are heating up in Greece, as the ferry scene is revolving around the imminent developments in the takeover of ANEK Lines from Attica. - On that front, even though there is no official announcement yet, it looks as if things have started happening. In the epicentre of the developments is the Venice - Igoumenitsa - Patras ferry, Asterion II. I remind you she is not owned by ANEK but rather chartered and managed. All the same, it looks as if this is where everything will start from. The ship is due to undergo a mini lay-up of a few days in order to perform some maintenance works. Apparently though, people from Attica have already visited the ship and have told the crew that there will be a banner painted on the ship, showing that the ship is operated by Superfast/Attica or something to that effect. This is something which is confirmed. From that point on, there are rumours which are ranging from the ship receiving a full Blue Star Ferries livery to her crew being replaced by Attica's crew and receiving also a Flocafe cafe plus extra passenger areas. The gist of it is that Attica are expecting to take over the entire fleet of ANEK, plus this chartered vessel. Nothing is really coming out of Attica at this point, they are secretive for lesser things than that. Knowing what happened with the takeover of Hellenic Seaways though, in the long term it is highly likely this will not be good news for the employees of ANEK Lines, onboard and ashore. The rumours that went around during and after the HSW takeover were that the Attica personnel were rather snotty and arrogant towards the personnel of the company they took over and eventually not many people were retained. - Speaking of Attica, in the span of a few days the Blue Horizon appears to have had a couple of considerable engine issues, with the impartial(as we have seen in other instances) Hellenic Coast Guard ending up having to report the bigger one. Since that in can incident the ship appears to be sailing to and from Crete with about an hour's worth of delay. A few years ago this would have been inconceivable for Attica. O tempora, o mores. - The latter latin saying also is applicable to the case of the Blue Star Delos. Her timetables have changed so that she sails from Santorini at 1900hrs, arriving in Piraeus at 0430 in the morning, compared to the usual and punctual 2315 of the last several years. The reason behind this in my opinion is their desire to serve their freight customers, that on one hand is good, on the other hand for non-freight traffic arriving at 0430 in the morning during the winter is not enjoyable. It's not that they have a choice though, monopoly at it's best. - Last piece of news around Attica is that the catamarans they are building in Norway for Saronic service will be named Aero Highspeed 1, 2 and 3. I mean what can one expect nowadays? Another dry and meaningless marketing name. - The saga of the Cyprus - Greece maritime link goes on and the tender offers have been opened from the Cypriot government. One of them is from an Eliopoulos(Seajets) controlled company, while the other 2 are from companies with seemingly no maritime background, belonging to undisclosed interests. No ships have been named either and what will happen remains a mystery. - The Iosif K is now under annual refit while the vintage Talos has taken her place. And even in the month of January, it looks as if they have captured traffic that the Talos is too small to handle. At the same time, the former Saturn/Orcadia is now under intensive works in order to prepare her for Greek island service, sounds as if the Talos needs some help. - Speaking of vintage tonnage, rumour has it that Arkoumanis' Galaxy is headed for a beach of no return. - An array of vintage photos in our gallery over the last week or so, make your pick from a tasty selection which includes the Zakros, the legendary Panagia Tinou both from above and also from sea level, the Olympia I, the Blue Aegean and the Nostos. Take care, Nikos, Piraeus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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