Displaying items by tag: Garinish Island

2nd October 2011

German Cruise-Goers On Anchorage Call to Glengariff

As the cruise season draws to a close, passengers from the German 28,856 tonnes Amadea, visited Bantry Bay, west Cork today, writes Jehan Ashmore.

The former Japanese cruiseship launched in 1991, anchored off picturesque Glengariff and neighbouring Garinish Island. Amadea had called to Waterford Estuary yesterday and before her first Irish port of call she called to Dartmouth en-route from embarking passengers in Bremerhaven.

At 192m in length, the 600-passenger capacity cruiseship is operated by Pheonix Reisen. The German based travel agency also runs fleetmates Albratross and Artania. The later Finish built vessel was best known as Princess Cruises Royal Princess, when launched by the late Diana, Princess of Wales in 1984.

Apart from the handful of cruiseships that call, Bantry Bay is otherwise used by oil tankers bringing supplies to the Whiddy Island Oil Terminal. The terminal consists of an offshore single point mooring, tanker Jetty, and an onshore tank farm. The bay runs some 35kms long and is 10km wide at its broadest at the entrance and steadily narrows to 3-4kms at its head. In addition the bay is largest of the main inlets in the south-west.

Glengariff in recent years has also welcomed another German operator, Peter Deilmann's Deutschland (1988/22,496grt) and the UK based Cruise & Maritime Voyages Marco Polo (1966/20,080grt). To read more on this vessel which regularly calls to Irish ports click HERE.

Published in Cruise Liners

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Competitions

The most significant events for the Half Ton Class has been the annual Half Ton Cup which was sailed under the IOR rules until 1993. More recently this has been replaced with the Half Ton Classics Cup. The venue of the event moved from continent to continent with over-representation on French or British ports. In later years the event is held biennially. Initially, it was proposed to hold events in Ireland, Britain and France by rotation. However, it was the Belgians who took the ball and ran with it. The Class is now managed from Belgium.