Irish Ferries Fleet movements

[Ferriesbetterfastercheape]

Balearia choose actually famous ladies as names for their new big Catamarans, as f.ex. Margarita Salas, Eleonore Roosevelt etc. .

Why not for an Irish company famous Irish Seafarers ?
I can find William Brown, Ernest Shackleton, Francis Beaufort, John Barry, John Philip Holland.
For a Dover-Calais ferry an English or french seafarer / explorer would work very well too.
Shackleton is also known in Germany at the people with better education and Beaufort - there will everybody say "he has maybe something to do with the wind..." .

Especially for international ferries with a lot of tourists i would choose - so far as possible - really famous names. Christopher Columbus, Marco Polo, James Cook, Francis Drake, Vasco da Gama, Amerigo Vespucci, Ferdinand Magellan f.ex. has nothing to do with the routes from Irish Ferries - but everybody from every country has heard about these persons. So they can much better remember to ferries with these names also many years later  "oh Grandma, look here the picture - our little John onboard of the Cristopher Columbus ferry" - maybe also the person painted big with a rendering on the ship-sides as Nils Holgersson at TT-Line. But who in f.ex. Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Swiss, Austria, Denmark or France knows Oscar Wilde, WB Yeats or Lady Gregory ??? There they know more Goethe, Schiller, Wagner, Beethoven etc. .

In Northern Countries also king-family-members and presidents was / are popular - f.ex. Scandlines has / had a "Karl Carstens" (German president in the 70ies/80ies), "Kronprins Frederik", "Prinsesse Benedikte", "Prins Richard" etc., Color Lines "Kronprins Harald" was later the first Oscar Wilde ferry. Lufthansa has had a plane "Konrad Adenauer" (German chancellor in the 50ies/60ies). Not to forget Stenas E-Flexer "Estelle" in Karlskrona - named after an actually kid in the Swedish King-family.

TT line has f.ex. the ferry "Nils Dacke" - he was a farmers leader fighting against King Gustav Wasa.
I thing such a name is very smart - everybody in Sweden knows him from the history-lessons in school - and he is coming from the most popular tourist-region (Smaland) where the most Germans has their holidays if they choose Sweden (the Swedish Ring of Kerry...). So the name is very well for a ferry between Sweden and Germany.

So it must not be a seafarer - also another famous historic person can it be very well too. In Germany today f.ex. Nicholas Winton and Winston Churchill are famous and felt positive by the people (there are very often TV-docus in Germany about these people). Winton has used the Harwich-ferry - would be perfect for Stena there.
But all these examples are in my opinion much much better than the next "Isle of InnishXXX"

[MatthewCartmill]

Just wondering when the spirit of Britain will go to dry dock and get her paint job shouldn't be far away as she starts in early June.

[ferryfan]

copy of letter sent to seafarers on the Spirit of Britain

[ccs]

Or is there another famous person similar to W.B. Yeats and Oscar Wilde ?

The ships were named after "Saints" in the early days, then the "Isle of..." names came in after they bought out B&I. The Irish Naval service started naming their ships after poets, playwrights and authors (nicknamed the Dead Poets by the Naval Service), so that causes a lot of confusion - there is an LÉ W.B. Yeats (navy) and MV W.B. Yeats (IF). I'd imagine they will stick with the Isle names for Dover.

That said, personally think it would be nice to have a ship named after Lady Gregory.

I think "Countess Markievicz" would be a great name for a ship.

[giftgrub]

Got to admire the PR company for announcing this launch of a new service from Holyhead to Dublin.

https://www.express.co.uk/travel/articles/1900837/ireland-dublin-irish-ferries-cork-donegal

[ferryfan]

Spirit Of Britain due in A&P Falmouth on Sunday and due to enter dry dock no 2 on Monday.

[Kieran]

Got to admire the PR company for announcing this launch of a new service from Holyhead to Dublin.

https://www.express.co.uk/travel/articles/1900837/ireland-dublin-irish-ferries-cork-donegal

That is some incredible writing to be fair!

[ferryfan]

Got to admire the PR company for announcing this launch of a new service from Holyhead to Dublin.

https://www.express.co.uk/travel/articles/1900837/ireland-dublin-irish-ferries-cork-donegal

That is some incredible writing to be fair!

Can feel a Pulitzer prize coming for that writing

[Ncol]

Theres more ads than words on those tabloid sites!

[giftgrub]

The Spirit of Britain, is on the way to Falmouth to be rebranded for Irish Ferries Dover Calais service, next stop name reveal.

[Chef]

Or is there another famous person similar to W.B. Yeats and Oscar Wilde ?

The ships were named after "Saints" in the early days, then the "Isle of..." names came in after they bought out B&I. The Irish Naval service started naming their ships after poets, playwrights and authors (nicknamed the Dead Poets by the Naval Service), so that causes a lot of confusion - there is an LÉ W.B. Yeats (navy) and MV W.B. Yeats (IF). I'd imagine they will stick with the Isle names for Dover.

That said, personally think it would be nice to have a ship named after Lady Gregory.

The Navy version is LÉ William Butler Yeats...lots of brass letters on the name plates for the crew to keep polished.

[giftgrub]

The Spirit of Britain has arrived at Falmouth, should be visible on webcams later as it comes into the harbour.

The usual webcam is offline however, these two options should give coverage.

https://falmouthhaven.co.uk/falmouth-quay-webcam/

https://www.harbourlights.co.uk/webcam/

[giftgrub]

Next stop drydock and the new name reveal.

[giftgrub]

Some images of the new "Isle of "in drydock in Falmouth

Click right from this link

https://www.flickr.com/photos/33847785@N00/53748836992/

Click left from this link

https://www.flickr.com/photos/33847785@N00/53748836987/

[Ncol]

Anyone know how the swift is doing since back in service?

Id have a fear this is the beginning of the end. Season very small now and the time advantage really dwindling due fuel bill.

I remember the hayday of the HSS and the 99min tagline!