M/V Vacancier

[JimN]

I was wondering if by chance anyone might be familiar with this vessel operated by the CTMA Group. It operates 7 day round-trip cruise/ferry trips from Montreal to Quebec, Chandler/Gaspe, and Iles de la Madaleine. Its a small (12,000 gt) and I assume fairly spartan ship, but the itinerary is somewhat intriguing.

[dougnewmanatsea]

To put it simply, she's a ferry... A rather elderly, small ferry. She was built in the early '70s for Baltic service and after a few decades of hard service with a long string of European operators, wound up in Canada. To call her a cruise ferry is really rather generous - she is more like a ferry pressed into cruise service than a true cruise ferry.

 

On the other hand, if you view her purely as transport, you may well be quite satisfied.

 

You can see a very good report on her here from some British ferry enthusiast friends of mine who sailed in her on part of an odyssey they undertook to sample the ferries of Canada and Alaska. (The report is very long and covers all these ships, but I linked directly to the start of the section on VACANCIER as I suspect the rest is probably not of a great deal of interest to you.)

[JimN]

Thanks very much, Doug. The pictures and comments equaled or exceeded my modest expectations--except of course for those worrisome sandwiches. We're contemplating a rail trip from Montreal to Gaspe. After a day or so, we'd catch the Vacancier in Chandler for a two or three day trip back to Montreal. While luxury is not required, an open dining room would be. Thanks again.