Messages

Brest is 600 KM and at least 6 hours by rail from Paris .

Less than 4 hours by TGV, not much more than from Cherbourg.

Why on earth would Cherbourg become congested? In its heyday it had significantly more sailings and traffic than it has today and with the number of berths there and the standage space available there is plenty of scope to accept an increased number of sailings.
In a no deal scenario the limiting factor will be where the authorities deploy their resources and that choice will affect all the French (and UK) ports.

I am a fan of the P&O brand, but the steady flagging out and outsourcing has become very notable.

First it was Pandoro vessels which received Bermuda (Hamilton) status, then when Pandoro and P&O European Ferries (Larne) merged to form P&O Irish Sea, all vessels were moved to either Bermuda or Bahamas register.

Then Pride of Bilbao was moved to Nassau. As this was a charter vessel, not much fuss was made.

Next was P&O's North Sea vessels - Pride of Hull and Pride of York (Norsea) transferring to Bahamas registry.  Dutch counterparts (POR and POB) remained registered in Netherlands.

And finally with Brexit, P&O stated their intention of moving Spirit of Britain (Current flagship) and Spirit of France to Cypriot registry.  When no adverse press coverage occurred, P&O decided to move all remaining UK flagged vessels to the Cypriot registry.

The result is P&O have not one vessel under the UK flag.  It would be sad, but Stena may well use the P&O strategy.

I am also skeptical about Stena's reasons.  P&O Ferries choose to flag most of its fleet in the Bahamas (Nassau) - not in the EU!  Likewise Norbay has operated for years out of Dublin with Hamilton (Bermuda) as her homeport, with no operational problems.


This could also be the start of agency / outsourced crews (similar to Irish Ferries / Matrix model)being deployed at Stena. 


It will be interesting to see the reaction. Not much fuss made when W.B. Yeats arrived with a Cypriot flag, guess Stena were observing and are anticipating little or no negative coverage.

From the pictures I wouldn't consider Stena Estrid outstanding. As for interior comfort and styling, I think W.B. Yeats easily beats Estrid.  It looks like Stena went to IKEA and got lots of cheap, hard and nasty seating.  That being said she is a very impressive vessel. Certainly her sister will be a big success for Birkenhead / Liverpool operation.  First real passenger ferry for the route, rather than a freighter.

Firstly the P&O ships reflagged since the referendum were flagged to Cyprus, not the Bahamas.
Secondly, have you been on the Yeats? The Estrid to me looks rather more comfortable we know for sure had a larger budget for interior design, fixtures and fittings.

Great to finally see Galloway Princess sailing again! Does this mean all 4 Saint Class ships are in operation, as the former St Christopher is also alive again, albeit with a shocking yellow paint job!

No the European Star isn't in service, although she is in Brindisi I think they are continuing to work on her there for now.

Baleria, Aramas, GNV and Moby would be ideal buyers for SFX

Balearia and Armas maybe although hard to say with existing newbuilding plans that they would want her.
GNV operate exclusively overnight and she's now effectively a day ship so not really suited unless they want to do a load of work.
Moby have no money and are looking to sell rather than buy.

I guess TT line are panicing , Irish Ferries are saying nothing.

I doubt anyone is panicking. Spirit of Tasmania can keep their existing pretty modern ships running as long as they need to.

Cost per combined passenger and freight unit will be lower when she is full.

WBY would have to be going some to be more cost efficient than a Visentini.

WBY has more power than epsilon and comfortably makes the voyage.

At what price in higher fuel costs?

How could the Irish government legally provide any "support" to a private sector company which operates in competition with othe private sector companies? And why would they bother given the company's approach to flagging out and foreign crews?

The ship's design isn't perfect in some ways (those awards were mostly won without the awarders actually having been on the ship). The main central section doesn't quite work as well as it could and is a bit austere when you're sat amongst it. The formal restaurant, upper bar and Club area though are good in most parts. The standard cabins are a bit underwhelming.

New ships often take time to win people over. I don't think she'll ever be a firm favourite for me given her awkward looks and slightly compromised interior - but give it 20 years and we'll be arranging farewell trips on the faithful old Yeats before she is replaced by Oscar Wilde 2.

Again... confusing... shop is on deck 11 BUT only accessible by stairs on Deck 10 with no 'signage' to indicate this !

I agree with some of the things you say but feel you may have gone out of your way to find offence.

As for the shop - how clear does it need to be?
FWIW it's also accessible by lift.

It's purely the way it's been financed. IF will not have an option to recall the ship - that's somewhat wishful/delusional thinking.
The Stena Baltica was sold in the same way to the same group.

The GNV Allegra, from Shipfriends

I was also on the WBY last weekend - on a pretty busy sailing there were eight covers for dinner at the inflated price, not including us.

The self service dinner was plentiful but of middling quality. We also took breakfast in the restaurant and that was fine.

Came back to the UK on the Mont St Michel where dinner in the restaurant was of a high quality and approximately half the price of the IF menu.

Some chat now that the OW will be replacing the Kriti 1 which is on a one year charter to GNV (from SNAV) at a cost of €20k per day.

Kriti I is chartered from ANEK. I'd find that a surprising switch TBH - certainly the Civitavecchia-Termini route probably needs the Kriti's rather more substantial freight capacity more whereas the OW is better suited to a tourist route.