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Bank Holiday English Channel Hopping |  | | | 23 August 2008 | | Source: Transmanche Ferries | The day began with breakfast at the Chatsworth Hotel in Hastings; this was about the only highlight of this rather dreary hotel. A buffet served in the Indian restaurant attached to the hotel was easily the best breakfast of the trip and we regretted not having dinner there the previous night. Though I was slightly disappointed it was purely an English breakfast without any Indian influences (whatever that would consist of?)
Checking-out of the hotel it wasn't surprising we weren't asked if we had a good stay, I doubt anybody does in this hotel. Over breakfast others could be heard mumbling their disquiet about their stay there.
We resumed our coastal drive towards Newhaven stopping in Eastbourne for a walk on the pier. What a lovely place Eastbourne is! The lowlife of Hastings was replaced by a sea of silver haired holidaymakers and everything seemed so perfect compared to Hastings, only a few miles down the road.
We arrived at Newhaven around 11:00, where Matt Sudders and I were joined by Ian Unwin. The motivation for this trip was to sample the Newhaven - Le Havre route, a new service opened by LD Lines last year to help provide the company with more capacity from Le Havre pending the addition of a second ship to their Portsmouth route.
For the daily roundtrip, from Newhaven at 12:00 and Le Havre at 20:00, the Seven Sisters was actually chartered by LD Lines from Transmanche Ferries, another LD Lines company which has the franchise to operate the Newhaven - Dieppe route. The seasonal route from the start of May to the end of September is finishing early on 3 September (instead of 27 September) and with the Norman Voyager becoming the second ship on Portsmouth - Le Havre in November the service is not required to return next year. (Indeed the changes required to the Le Havre berth for the new ship is why the service has had to end a few weeks early).
It is two years since I was last at Newhaven and before LD Lines took over management of Transmanche Ferries. Back then I was far from impressed.
Car passengers previously had to check-in at the foot passenger terminal beside the berth then drive around the corner to pass through security and the marshalling lanes to board the ship. The foot passenger building is now abandoned and the refurbished building at the car check-in lanes serves all passengers. The terminal is now as good as can be done without demolishing it, having been given a decent "tart up" over the past year - there is now a pleasant well priced Haven Café.
Cars are now checked in directly at the booths using booking reference numbers. There were two fairly long lines of cars when we joined but check-in moved at a reasonable pace, the only irritation being a people carrier in front carrying passengers who seemed to feel the need to get out and in the car every two minutes.
We were to go straight from check-in to board the ship. Boarding is via the bow at Newhaven and we were directed up the internal ramp to the upper vehicle deck where cars were parked in a U shape for driving off via the stern at Le Havre. The design of this vehicle decks of this ship and her sister the Cote D'Alabtre isn't ideal and is really a compromise to deal with the Newhaven berth - as a result loading and disembarkation can be quite time consuming at Newhaven where only a single vehicle at a time can be driven off the ship. On the French side wider linkspans allow both decks to discharge at the same time.
Parked quite far aft we entered the accommodation via one of the aft stairwells which brought us into the accommodation near the bar.
When I travelled on the Cote D'Alabtre in 2006 I was far from impressed with the ship - I reckoned she was cheaply finished and falling apart after just a few months in service. To be fair I think some of my views were flavoured by what was the worst breakfast I'd ever had afloat.
Whether it is LD Lines's management, crew experience of operating the new ships or just I didn't start the day hungry and bad-tempered, this experience was much better.
It is worth at this point giving a quick reminder of the layout of this class of ship. Forward on Deck 6 are cabins. To the starboard side is an information desk and a passage way leads aft along the starboard side of the ship into the self-service cafeteria. To starboard is The Lanes seating area for tourist traffic and to port the Brighton Pier area for freight drivers. There are stairs leading up to what was originally planned to be the waiter service restaurant (sadly designed in such a way that food couldn't easily be waiter served!) and is now named the Royal Pavilion Lounge (though roped off out of use on our crossing).
Moving aft, on the starboard side of the ship is a family airline seat type lounge called Devil's Dyke with the children's play area behind. Amidships is the vessel's shop and aft is the full width lower level of the two-tier bar, the lower level being known as the Agatha Christie Lounge. Central stairs lead up to the Beachy Head Bar. Forward but open plan of this is the Rudyard Kipling Lounge to port and the Hillaire Belloc lounge to starboard; both of these feature airline type seating. There are further quiet lounges containing airline type seating accessed through a forward passage, the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle lounge to Port and the Sir Angus Wilson lounge to starboard.
Transmanche have went to great trouble naming every lounge on the Seven Sisters with names associated with the Newhaven and surrounding area, whilst the same lounges are given similar names reflecting the Dieppe area aboard the Cote D'Alabtre.
Having met up with several other travel companions onboard (Bill and Richard Mayes and Matt Davies) we hurried to the upper level of the bar to grab seats together and had a pint of beer in hand in time for the ship departing Newhaven. We sailed on time with the usual remarkable departure from the port where the ship basically has to push herself into the quayside to turn.
Various departure announcements were made but were virtually inaudible in the upper bar area. Announcements seemed fine in other parts of the ship so I can only presume there is too much background noise in this area.
After finishing the first drink of the day it was time for lunch. Having had a look at the menu options earlier, the food looked promising and I was hopeful that I was going to be more successful than my last attempt to eat aboard a Transmanche ferry.
The servery area on this class of ship is poorly designed - a narrow passageway enclosed by a glass wall which only has room for one person to comfortably pass at once. Since my first trip the situation has been improved by moving the tea/coffee rooms to outside the servery and operating them with tokens. Previously those taking tea or coffee severely slowed down the queue. Served by the friendly French crew I took the Thai soup (with a bread roll) and Meat Balls in sauce with rice. With a quarter bottle of rather nice French red wine the cost was around £11 which I thought was quite reasonable.
Although the temperature of the food could have been hotter (and to be fair there are several microwaves available) the quality was good, making for an enjoyable meal. The seating in the cafeteria area appears to have been strengthened since my last trip (as it also has in the tub chairs in the bar) and no longer are arms pulled off just by moving the seat!
After a leisurely lunch I explored the ship some more including a visit to the shop where I bought some Haribo Smurf gums to take back the office. Unfortunately they never made my office as we consumed one bag travelling from Le Havre to Calais and the second was spotted whilst unpacking on my return home and requested as an additional gift from my travels! Anyhow, if you are onboard this ship do get yourself a bag of these - they are great and easily the best confectionary I've bought on a ferry!
It's worth mentioning at this point the staff on the Seven Sisters were great, the girl in the shop was friendly and chatty in particular. In terms of French crew they are more Brittany Ferries than Seafrance (and I know you can get good and bad with both those companies) - all polite, all helpful and all well turned out.
After another drink in the bar we continued with drinks on the top outside deck where deck chairs have been provided. The outside decks could do with a bit of a spruce up, the paint work looking a bit scruffy in places but with sunshine so rare this summer we had a most pleasant afternoon heading across the channel.
In what seemed to be a very short period of time we saw the Norman Spirit sailing out from Le Havre. Indeed, whilst I didn't note our arrival time and berthing was a little slow, we were driving off the ship in well under the advertised crossing time of 5 hours.
All in all I was delighted with my afternoon aboard the Seven Sisters - she will always have elements of a ship designed by a local authority as opposed to a normal ferry company and bits of her finish remain slightly cheap looking but what I found was a generally well-maintained vessel, with a good crew, good food and efficiently run. I would have no hesitation travelling on this ship to Dieppe in the future. |
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Transmanche Ferries - Special Offers |
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