1997
Traduction by Davide Tognolini
NorTHERN Adriatic SEA
The majestic ferry
El. Venizelos, flagship of Anek Lines,
is no longer alone in Trieste: she is backed up
by Talos, coming from Ancona, which now leaves from Trieste
on Mondays, from Patras on Wednesdays and, on
Fridays, from Trieste
to Igoumenitsa, from where she leaves on Sunday
morning. She's a good ro-pax ferry, even if she
cannot be compared to El. Venizelos.
In Venice,
there are some interesting news: Minoan and Strintzis have broken their partnership. The two companies
are now fighting each other. From Patras to Venice, Minoan Lines reintroduces
daily departures, and inaugurates the "camping on board" concept:
this chance is offered twice a week on board Erotokritos.
This ship doesn't follow the same timetable followed by Daedalus
and Fedra: she services twice a week the
Greece-Italy route and leaves from Patras at midday.
The other ferries operating the Patras-Venice route
are Fedra and Daedalus,
now calling also at Kefalonia, and the veteran (and
slower) Festos which can't keep the pace of
the former ones and no longer calls at Corfu. She berths in Venice
at 1 pm instead of 10.30 pm. Strintzis Lines,
which owns a less competitive fleet, decides to use Ionian Galaxy on Thursdays and
Ionian Island
on Saturdays from Venice (departure at 5 pm);
the former leaving from Greece
on Tuesdays and the latter on Thursdays.
ANCONA
The first operator
reacting to Superfast is Anek Lines,
which introduces Kriti I and Kriti II. It
is the most expected response, still these ferries
can't rival Superfast. We could split the ro-pax ferries in Ancona (from
1990 to 2006) into four categories: Pre-Superfast
I, which includes large, but slow, vessels as Erotokritos
and Ionian Star; the first fast ro-pax ferries as Superfast I, Aretousa and Blue
Star 1;
second-generation fast vessels as Ikarus, Pasiphae and the four new Superfasts;
third-generation fast vessels as the two last Supefasts,
Minoan Palaces, and ANEK Olympic Champion and sister. In 1997, Minoan and Superfast introduces their second-generation fast ferries,
while ANEK introduces pre-Superfast vessels:
Japanese-built Kriti I and Kriti
II have a speed of 22 knots and operate the Ancona-Patras
route in 24 hours, 29 when calling at Igoumenitsa.
There were two direct journeys and one via Igoumenitsa;
the ferries operating on the direct route landed at Ancona at an
inconvenient time, and only one direct crossing permitted to land at Patras before night. When calling at Igoumenitsa,
the journeys were the classical crossing from Greece;
differently from those from Italy
to Greece,
departure was in the afternoon (twice at 4 pm, once at 7 pm on Saturdays) and
landing at Patras was late in the night. A good thing for local hotel keepers, but not for passengers.
Superfast Ferries employs Superfast I
e Superfast II as usual, but with a new
timetable. The two weekly departures at 4 pm are postponed at 5 pm and the two
departures at 10 pm are advanced at 9 pm. Minoan Lines, which at first wanted
to use Knossos on the Ancona Corfu Igoumenitsa Kefalonia Patras route, decides to employ only Aretousa
on the Ancona-Patras direct route (22-hour crossing).
Those operators which can't put into service new ferries,
try to fight the others with lower fares. No doubt, the winner was Strintzis Lines
and the loser was Marlines. Strintzis
ferries in Ancona are the well known Ionian Galaxy,
Ionian
Island and Ionian Star; the departures are on Mondays,
Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 12 am (Ionian Star at 1 pm) and landing
at Patras (after calling at Corfu and Igoumenitsa) is at 6.30 pm. It wasn't such a good
timetable, but it wasn't inconvenient either. Departures from Greece are on
Mondays, Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays at 11 pm. Marlines uses Crown M
-- leaving from Ancona on Wednesdays and Saturdays at
4 pm and from Greece on Mondays and Thursdays in the evening -- and Duchess M
-- which sails from Ancona on Sundays at 1 pm and
lands at Patras (via Igoumenitsa)
after 36 hours! On Thursdays, she lands to Igoumenitsa
at 1 pm and sails back to Ancona at 8 pm on Fridays. The
company announced a new route to Turkey which should have begun in
1998, but never began; then tried to buy four new-built vessels but came to
nothing.
BARI
No
news in Bari. Ventouris Ferries still operates on the Bari to Patras route
via Igoumenitsa or Corfu with the superb ro-pax ferries Polaris and Venus, while Athens Express
and Vega
services on the Bari
to Corfu and Igoumenitsa
route. Pegasus was to be used too, but she eventually remained in Greece where
she operated on internal routes. Marlines puts into service Countess M
and Charm M,
after having sold the memorable Baroness M. Once a week, the Croatian company
Jadrolinija
operates the Bari-Igoumenitsa route -- on
Mondays from Bari and
on Tuesdays from Igoumenitsa -- with Marko Polo
and, occasinally, with Liburinija
and Dubrovnik.
BRINDISI Otranto
As already said,
between former partners Mionoan and Strintzis a war has begun. In summer, Minoan Lines introduces Knossos,
which follows the timetable of Strintzis Ionian Sun
(but with slower speed), on the Brindisi-Igoumenitsa
route. During off-season periods, she operates only four times a week. Strintzis Lines
puts into service the new ro-pax ferry Ionian Bridge,
which leaves from Brindisi
at 8 pm and from Igoumenitsa at 8 am. Adriatica
still uses Egitto Express, this year no longer
in tandem with Laurana but with Palladio.
Historic competitor HML uses the same ships used in 1996: Media II,
Poseidonia, Panther and Apollonia II.
The Brindisi Corfu Igoumenitsa
route is operated by Fragline with Ouranos,
Ventouris Ferries with Saturnus
-- which does not call at Corfu --, and Vergina Ferries
with Queen Vergina. The latter uses on the Patras route Brindisi and Valentino,
competing with another ro-pax operator, Med Link Lines
which, as usual, deploys on this line Afrodite II,
Poseidon
and Agios Andreas.
Photos in this page
are courtesy of Daniele Miglio,
Pieter Inpijn, Fleet File Rotterdam, Kurth Warth, Emilio Barenghi, Michele Lulurgas, Stefanos Antoniadis; other images are official photographs
and postcards.
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