Skip to main content

Thank You 500,000 readers

HISTORY - ss ARIADNE - HAPAGs first expedition cruise ship?

Was HAPAG´s ss ARIADNE their first expedition cruise ship?
by Alan Dumelow, editing by Earl of Cruise
Hapag cruises, ss Ariadne
ss ARIADNE, HAPAG, ex ss PATRICIA, SWEDISH LLOYD, in a Norwegian Fjord - postcard, own collection
ss Ariadne luggae tag
 ss ARIADNE, luggage tag - courtesy Alan Dumelow
The little ARIADNE is an oddball in my mental list of favourite passenger ships. I never had the fortune to know her first hand but, from a young age, I have always admired this petite girl in her early guise as a cruise ship. Ironically, many many years later, in the late-70’s, the company I then worked for as their Projects & Marketing Manager, were asked to produce operational management costs for the ARIADNE for a proposed cruise-liner service mimicking the British India’s “port out – starboard home” POSH run to India and back via the Suez Canal. Unfortunately, the project never came to fruition.
promotional postcard of ss Ariadne of Hapag
ss ARIADNE as HAMBURG AMERICA LINE´s cruise ship - from a postcard by Alan Dumelow
Following the early 50’s relaxation of post-war restrictions on German shipping companies expansions, it was surprising that of the three giant liner operators, only Bremen’s NORDDEUTSCHER LLOYD* re-entered the trans-Atlantic passenger trade. The once-mighty HAMBURG SÜD AMERIKA LINIE* did not resume passenger liner services to South America and, equally, the powerful HAMBURG AMERIKA LINIE* failed to show any interest in resurrecting their once-dominant trans-Atlantic passenger trade BUT, with amazing fore-sight, believed the future lay in deluxe cruising and, tentatively, dipped their toe in the market by purchasing the 7,710 GRT six-year-old PATRICIA from SVENSKA LLOYD / SWEDISH LLOYD**.
* German Wiki, English is accessable
** only in Swedish
Swedish Lloyd ss Patricia
ss PATRICIA in SWEDISH LLOYD colours - photography from a painting once displayed on board the STENA SAGA - own collection
Built in 1951 by the Swan Hunter Shipyard at Newcastle for SWEDISH LLOYD’s Tilbury – Gothenburg route, the 138.39 meter long PATRICIA was fitted with six Parsons steam engines and was the height of luxury for any “ferry” in service at the time, having first-class, second-class and third-class cabins plus four 8-berth dormitories on D-Deck, in all providing accommodation for 408 passengers. And, being a three-class ship, her superstructure was configured to embrace a plethora of comfortable, wood-panelled public rooms. And so, in winter months, Swedish- Lloyd would deploy PATRICIA on short cruises from New York to Bermuda and the Bahamas, with the occasional longer cruise into the Caribbean.
ss PATRICIA in SWEDISH LLOYD advertisings - courtesy Reuben Goossens, ssmaritime.com
By 1957, SWEDISH LLOYD eventually realised that PATRICIA was too big for the Tilbury – Gothenburg run and sold the little ship to HAMBURG AMERIKA LINIE. Refitted at Blohm&Voss, Hamburg, at a considerable expense, she re-appeared on 1 February 1958, renamed ARIADNE and, re-painted all white with her new owner’s funnel colours, she now offered luxurious accommodation for just 185 cruise passengers. 
For the next two years, the deluxe cruise ship made a wide variety of cruises around the world. These had the character of soft expedition cruises. However, the economical climate for deluxe expensive cruising was not yet ripe and, faced with poor capacities, the owner realised this fact and, in November 1960, sold the ARIADNE to EASTERN SHIPPING CORPORATION of Miami which, at that time, was owned by the McCORMICKSHIPPING GROUP.
ss Ariadne in Hapag colours
ss ARIADNE, HAMBURG AMERICA LINE’s luxury cruise ship "dressed all over" - own collection
After a minor refit that saw her capacity increased to a more commercially viable 239 passengers, and retaining her name, the ARIADNE commenced short cruises from Miami, alternating her destinations between Puerto Rico and the U.S.Virgin Islands or Jamaica and Nassau, and both the ship and cruises became very popular with American passengers.  However, in May 1961, the company was bought from McCORMICK by W.R. Lovett of Jacksonville; at that time the owner of the Winn-Dixie supermarket chain.
ss ARIADNE in EASTERN STEAMSHIP colours - postcard, own collection
 Dick Lovett didn’t change the winning formula or the name ARIADNE but, in the 1961-62 winter months, ran her on 13-day cruises to the West Indies and South America and, in the summer months, alternated her out of Fort Lauderdale to Nassau and Freeport in the Bahamas.
ss ARIADNE as Lovett’s EASTERN STEAMSHIP cruise vessel - copy from a broshure, own collection
In 1970, the EASTERN SHIPPING CORPORATION (as it had become renamed) was sold to the GOTASS-LARSEN GROUP, which also part-owned (at the time) ROYAL CARIBBEAN CRUISES. The company’s name was again changed to EASTERN CRUISE LINE, but ARIADNE was by now a popular, well-known brand identity, and her name was retained by the new owner. For the next two years, she maintained her cruise schedules out of Miami, but expanded her itineraries to include Jacksonville, Charleston, San Juan and Charlotte Amalie.
By April 1972, the continued success of EASTERN CRUISE LINE´s prompted GOTASS-LARSEN to search for additional, larger, second-hand cruise tonnage and, in a deal with CHANDRIS, purchased that company’s ATLANTIS, renamed EMERALD SEAS, selling ARIADNE to the Greek in part-payment for the much larger ship.
On completion of the deal, however, CHANDRIS chartered ARIADNE back to EASTERN CRUISE LINE’s sister company BAHAMAS CRUISE LINE for eighteen months, but under her new name FREEPORT II, for cruises from Miami to the Bahamas and back.
ss Bon Vivant of Chandris
ss PATRICIA´s, ARIADNE´s new appearance as BON VIVANT after the major refit in 1973 - own collection
The FREEPORT II was delivered back to CHANDRIS at the end of her charter in December 1973, and was dispatched to Piraeus for a major refit. In April 1974, she emerged from the Greek shipyard virtually unrecognisable. Gone were both her forward and aft masts; in their place, a modern radar mast atop the bridge. Her classic funnel had been replaced with a modern tapered stack with a rounded top, and the gap between her Main Deck superstructure and aft deck housing was fully enclosed to shield the newly installed swimming pool. Renamed BON VIVANT, the ship was immediately re-chartered to BAHAMAS CRUISE LINE; GOTASS-LARSEN, at the time, experiencing operating problems with the big EMERALD SEAS.
Chandris Cruises Adriatic cruise vessel Bon Vivant
ss BON VIVANT in CHANDRIS colours during her Adriatic cruise days - copy from a CHANDRIS CRUISES broshure, own collection
Handed back to CHANDRIS in 1974, BON VIVANT replaced the older, smaller FIESTA on 11-day and 12-day cruises out of Venice along the Dalmatian coast to Corfu and Corinth, but spent the short winter months laid-up in Piraeus. She completed three successful years on this schedule but, in 1977, was chartered out to Dubai and, on 8 January, arrived at Abu Dhabi for use as a floatel, conference and social centre, but primarily as an accommodation ship for expatriate building workers. The charter lasted one year and, upon return to Piraeus, BON VIVANT was refurbished, renamed ARIANE and, in Spring 1978, she began short cruises from her home port to the Greek islands.
ss BON VIVANT in CHANDRIS colours aa a Floatel in Dubai - courtesy Alan Dumelow
By 1979, ARIANE was beginning to show her age and become commercially unviable. Chandris, in the meantime, were adding newer and larger ships to their fleets; the end result of which meant that the ARIANE was laid up cold at Piraeus until, in 1989, she was sold to the Cypriot-based NIOS MARCH CORPORATION and renamed EMPRESS KATERINA. 
ss BON VIVANT in lay up in Eleusis Bay - photo by Antonio Scimali, courtesy from Rich Turnwald collection
 In the "living grave" of Eleusis Bay, ss ARIANE amoung other laid up vessels, ss ELLINIS, ss REGINA PRIMA and ss NOGA, ex AUSTRALIS, ex AMERICA - courtesy Reuben Goossens, ssmaritime.com
ss EMPRESS KATERINA, es ARIANE, ex BON VIVANT, ex FREEPORT II, ex ARIADNE, ex PATRICIA, anchored in Singapore - courtesy Alan Dumelow
A year and a half after the sale, on 23 March 1991, she departed Piraeus and sailed via the Suez Canal and Singapore to Ho Chi Min City, where she suffered the penultimate indignity of becoming an army barracks ship for the Peoples Republic of Vietnam for six years before being acquired by FORTUNE REGAL MARITIME in 1995, and re-located to Subic Bay in the Philippines for further service as a barracks ship.
In 1997 the final bell tolled for this once beautiful little passenger ship. Bought by the St.Vincent-based THAFIL SHIPPING & TRADING COMPANY and renamed EMPRESS 65. On December 18th, 1997 she arrived at the Aalang beaches to be broken up; the final indignity for a proud old lady.
ss ARIADNE bow-to-bow with EUROPA of NORDDEUTSCHER LLOYD - courtsey by CardCow.com

3D type deck plans of ss PATRICIA and a more common deck plan, clearly visiable the three classes of ss PATRICIA
above and down courtesy Reuben Goossens, ssmaritime.com

Comments

  1. I sailed on The Ariadne '59 _ '60 from New York to Cherbourg with my mother to visit her family in France. We crossed the Atlantic via ocean liner many times but our voyage on the Ariadne became our most memorable.
    Played ping pong with the crew on her small deck. I recall there was even a swimming pool ( salt water). Otherwise a simple vessel remembered more fondly than others such as the giants of their time like the Bremen,Untied States and Liberty. Thanks for posting its history. Robert J. Lees, Westfield, Massachusetts U.S.A.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

ss NORMANDIE 1935 - 1942 IX

s s / te NORMANDIE starting from cold Owners: COMPAGNIE GÉNÉRALE TRANSATLANTIQUE BUILDERS: PENH Ö ET, St. Nazaire, France   by Stephen Carey © , editing by Earl of Cruise   This document is almost exclusively about the engineering aspects of NORMANDIE , mainly on how to start her up from cold. If you are looking for photos of the passenger spaces, there is a plethora of them on the web, in Facebook groups - Admirers of the ss Normandie , ss Normandie photographic file , The French Ocean Liners / Les Paquebots Fran ç ais , ss Normandie , GREAT LINERS OF THE PAST & PRESENT , and others, Pinterest and in articles about NORMANDIE here in the blog, please see at the end of the article. Using "ss" for NORMANDIE is quite incorrect, as NORMANDIE was a Turbo Electric vessel and not a steamship, therefore NORMANDIE should be adressed as "te".   by Earl of Cruise te / ss NORMANDIE berthed in Le Havre, Gare Maritime May 29th, 1935 - colouring courtesy

Thank You 500,000 readers

HISTORY - ts / ss BREMEN and ts / ss EUROPA

Germany’s two luxury liners, BREMEN and EUROPA , have not only played an important part in their country’s mercantile revival, but have added also an immortal chapter to the history of transatlantic travel. Copy from Shipping Wonders of the World   From part 6 , published 17 March 1936 editing by Earl of Cruise ss / ts BREMEN in her early years - Source: Shipping Wonders of the World/Bundespresse Archiv The PRIDE OF A NATION - the NORDDEUTSCHER LLOYD quadruple-screw turbine express liner BREMEN . The keel of this ship was laid in June 1927. Her launch took place in August, 1928. In less than a year later, the Bremen made her first voyage to America, when she crossed the Atlantic from Cherbourg to New York in four days seventeen hours forty-two minutes, thus setting up a new record and gaining the coveted “Blue Riband”. During the passage the Bremen attained an average speed of 27.83 knots. ss / ts BREMEN in her early years - Source: W ikipedia For the populac

HISTORY - PACIFIC MAIL STEAMSHIP COMPANY

The PACIFIC MAIL STEAMSHIP COMANY was existing for "just" one hundred years and was in her heydays a backbone for the development of the US West. The PACIFIC MAIL STEAMSHIP COMPANY was founded April 18, 1848, as a joint stock company under the laws of the State of New York by a group of New York City merchants, William H. Aspinwall , Edwin Bartlett, Henry Chauncey, Mr. Alsop, G.G. Howland and S.S. Howland. These merchants had acquired the right to transport mail under contract from the United States Government from the Isthmusof Panama to California awarded in 1847 to one Arnold Harris. The company was sold 1938 last to AMERICAN PRESIDENT LINES , existing only on the paper, was closed down in 1949.   by Earl of Cruise CALIFORNIA , PACIFIC MAIL's first ship - Source: Wikipedia   CALIFORNIAwas the first steamer built by the PACIFIC MAIL STEAMSHIP COMPANY and she was launched May 19, 1848. She sailed from New York for Panama, via Cape Horn, on October 6, 1848

HISTORY - Traveling with airliner LZ 129 HINDENBURG was the most luxurious airtravel

The real airliner LZ 129 HINDENBURG enabled the most luxurious airtravel for decades. Imagine, gliding through the air while the landscape or the sea below can be seen ... LZ 129 HINDENBURG marks the climax of airship construction. On May 6, 1937, the story of civilian airship ended in a tragedy. In Lakehurst, New Jersey, the largest flying object and has been with the similar sized LZ 130 GRAF ZEPPELIN II the most luxurious of all time. How this came about can be reconstructed logically, a series of fatal physics concatenations . The airship LZ 129 HINDENBURG marks the climax of airship construction. It was in its time the fastest and most exclusive traveling object between Europe and America. The challenges of the construction of the giant of the heaven were immense. by Earl of Cruise LZ 129 HINDENBURG, 1936, in Lakehurst - digital copy of a coloured cover photo, originally by Bill Schneider, published in Dan Grossman´s book ` ZEPPELIN HINDENBURG: AN ILLUSTRATED HI

HISTORY - The CUNARD - WHITE STAR Liner rms QUEEN ELIZABETH (1938-1972)

Over years, in my early youth, the QUEEN ELIZABETH was shaping my mind for the perfect ocean liner, despite having made my first experiences with a liner onboard the HANSEATIC (1), ex EMPRESS OF SCOTLAND, ex EMPRESS OF JAPAN. When leaning at the rail of HANSEATIC entering the port, my eyes where every where and I wished to by a camera, I took all in. And when seeing the QUEEN ELIZABETH with my own eyes, the nice behaving young boy turned into a tomboy, that my grandmére was no longer able to tame ... I did draw quite a lot of looks, back then. I found, while on research, this article and thought it interesting publishing in my blog: written and published by John Sheperd at liverpoolships.org editing and comments by Earl of Cruise I ( John Shepard ) joined the CUNARD LINE in March 1962 as an Assistant Purser and sailed the QUEEN ELIZABETH throughout that year, before transferring to the Liverpool-based CARINTHIA in November, where I remained as Crew Purser for the next five

Germany and HAPAG - A Journey through History

HAMBURG-AMERIKANISCHEPACKETFAHRT ACTIEN GESELLSCHAFT - HAPAG or HAMBURG AMERICA LINE is reflecting, as Germany, the LLOYD of Bremen, two times of rsing and two times of devasting downfall and a third rise. BORUSSIA , 1856, First Day Cover 1956 of Deutsche Bundespost - own collection Once Germany´s biggest shipping line HAPAG / HAMBURG-AMERIKANISCHE PACKETFAHRT ACTIEN GESELLSCHAFT-LLOYD, merged with it former old Hanseatic rival NORDDEUTSCHER LLOYD in 1970, to now HAPAG-LLOYD, had its peaks and downs, but rose each time on its own to new hights, without any state subsidies. As German mail subsidiaries did never cover the costs for purchasing or mainting the vessels ordered for the specific German mail lines.   by Earl of Cruise In this article I used most German Wikipedia links, as they proved to be mostly of better research quality, and surprisinf to me, some English lines and liners have only German written articles, for the others, English Wiki links are to find

Ocean Liners in Movies or Films at Sea (updated Nov 2017)

For liners and the shipping companies movies and films had been a top marketing tool Movies or Films and liners at sea, had been intriguing me since I have read about in my youth in LUXUSLINER - BILDER EINER GROSSEN ZEIT by Lee Server ( THE GOLDEN AGE OF OCEAN LINERS ). But earlier, mot only since my first crossing, I was keen watching movies with liners in it, and disapointed, which was an understatement, when I realized the films have been made in a set ashore in some movie "factory". That was after my first crossing.   by Earl of Cruise an essay in progress `Sabrina´, Humphrey Bogart in the office, while LIBERTÉ is sailing out of New York harbor - screenshot Ocean liners, especially those of the luxury category, had been the location of dramas, love stories, thrillers, suspense and catastrophies sinde film was born, or nearly. In this list, the most descriptions are taken from Wikipedia, as I guess no one can expect having seen all these films ... otherwise I w

HISTORY - the ROYAL MAIL STEAM PACKET COMPANY sailing the South Atlantic

While on research for an article published in print in Jan/Feb 2017 eventually, about the CAP Express steamers of HAMBURG-SÜD (Wikipedia) HAMBURG SÜDAMERIKANISCHEDAMPFSCHIFFFAHRTSGESELLSCHAFT I had to look into the competitors and took advantage of creating seperate articles about. by Earl of Cruises ROYAL MAIL LINE cruise broshure of 1959 - own collection The first of these South America or Rio de la Plata route related articles is about the ROYAL MAIL STEAM PACKET COMPANY which was a British shipping company founded in London in 1839 by the Scottisch business entrepreneur James MacQueen. The line's motto was ` Per Mare Ubique´ (everywhere by sea) - nobody ever should argue about the motto of Albert Ballin `Mein Feld ist die Welt´, both mottos are not ostentatious they express the same: I don´t want to be hindered by frontiers and my limit is the other shore or the sky. After good and bad times ROYAL MAIL STEAM PACKET COMPANY became the largest shipping group in

HISTORY - RHEINGOLD the German luxury day express train

Between May 1928 and August 1939 the luxury day express train RHEINGOLD operated between Hoek van Holland and Basel as a FFD Pullman train of DEUTSCHE REICHSBAHN GESELLSCHAFT (DRG) and MITROPA. The name was mystic and elitarian. by Earl of Cruise   RHEINGOLD, the name of the most luxurious train ever of Germany - detail, own photo On May 15th, 1928 the luxury express train RHEINGOLD started for the first time, connecting Hoek von Holland, Netherlands, and Amsterdamn with Basel, Suisse. Name giving was the legendary treasure of the Nibelungen. This special service for most international travelers was an immidiate success. Advertisment for the RHEINGOLD created by Frank Newbould - collection Earl of Cruise For the most travelers in the RHEINGOLD meant the voyage in the luxury train more than being transported in high comfort. From their soft armchairs they could watch the pitoresque Rhine landscape, with wine villages, vine-growing slopes, forteresses and castles, and the Lo