Irish Ferries is also to open a new temporary Dublin-Fishguard route today (20 Dec), in response to the ongoing closure of Holyhead due to Storm Darragh's damage to port infrastructure almost two weeks ago, writes Jehan Ashmore.
The operator follows in the wake of Irish Sea rivals, Stena Line, which since last week established the alternative Ireland-South Wales link, as all sailings on the Dublin-Holyhead route are cancelled up to and including 15 January 2025.
In a sailing update, Irish Ferries are contacting customers booked to travel on the Holyhead-Dublin route in date order to outline alternative options, including sailing on the Pembroke-Rosslare route and a new Fishguard-Dublin (operated by Isle of Innisfree) route for cars operational and bookable online from today (20 December) on the Fishguard-Dublin route: 17:30-23:00 & Dublin-Fishguard 09:30–15.00).
Afloat has consulted the operator’s booking engine, where today’s first inaugural sailing on the new route from Wales departs Fishguard at 17:30 hours and arrives at Dublin at 23:00 hours, a crossing time of 6 hours 30 minutes.
The first return sailing from Ireland departs Dublin tomorrow (21 Dec) morning at 09:30 and arrives in Fishguard at 15:00, which at 5 hours 30 minutes is an hour less to the reverse route's sailing duration.
With this development, passengers have two services on the new route, with Stena Line operating a daytime Fishguard-Dublin sailing and returning from Ireland with an overnight crossing to Wales.
For further details, click on the Irish Ferries website and for all routes sailing updates, noting that the new route is not available to ‘foot’ passengers however, they can be accommodated on Stena Line’s routes from Fishguard to Dublin and Fishguard-Rosslare.
In addition, Irish Ferries also operates from South Wales on the Pembroke-Rosslare route, from where the Isle of Innisfree (above photo at the Welsh port) was recently replaced by larger tonnage, as James Joyce boosts additional capacity to assist in alleviating traffic buildup.
The Isle of Innisfree returned to Fishguard, as Afloat reported yesterday, to carry out further berthing trials and, upon completion, headed back to anchorage off Rosslare, where it had remained overnight. The ferry has since been tracked and is currently underway on a repositioning passage to the South Wales port so to open the new route to Dublin this afternoon.
For other services, see Afloat's 'Irish Sea' Ferry Guide.
