Greek Shipping

Maritime, ferries and Greek shipping companies

A small reference to the Greek shipping and development of Greek Maritime companies.

Coming my self from a Greek seaman family and work at Greek ships for some time I had the opportunity to learn about the Greek shipping from Captains Engineers and many of my seaman relatives .Greece has always been a seafarer's nation from the depths of its History. The development and growth of the modern shipping companies in Greece starts with the end of the second world . After the World War II and during the early  50's many Greek ship owners bought many ships from the US navy the so called Liberties ,those where the ships that have been used as convoy ships during the war. At this time comes the time of the Great Greek ship owners like Onassis , Niarchos , Livanos,  ,Lyras ,Lemos most of them from the island of Chios, the Goulandris and Epeirikos families from the island of Andros, all of them with hundreds of Tankers and Cargo ships .In the mean while others like Potamianos start with cruise ships. At the end of the 50's the Greek Passengers ships where a few mostly from the companies of Kavounidis, Nomikos and Typaldos . At the 60's Typaldos creates the first attempt for big Ferries to connect Piraeus and Crete .At the same time another name comes in to the ferry business the KE lines.Efthimiades brings tankers from Sweden and transform them to Ferries .After the tragic sunk of Typaldos ferry" Heraklion" in Falkonera ,Efthymiades takes over the Ferries in Greece with main lines to Crete and Patras Italy. During the 70's after the collapsing of Typaldos and Efthimiades, the Cretan Minoan lines buys few of the Ferries of Efthimiades while another company from Crete the ANEK make is debute.That was the beginning of the Great Passenger ships and Greek Ferries. Today ANEK ,MINOAN ,SUPERFAST FERRIES ,BLUESTAR FERRIES , NEL lines, HELLENIC SEAWAYS and many others are the biggest shipping companies on the Greek domestic lines of passenger ships and ferries .The Greek passenger ships and Ferries have nothing to do with those of the 50's 60' or 90's.Huge super luxury and super fast Ferries with amazing services. Maybe the romantic time of the Greek Tycoons like Onassis are over but the modern Greek ship owners like Alafouzos ,Pateras ,Tsakos ,Vardinogiannis , Stelios HajiIoannou and others have hundreds of more ships then the old Tycoons and expanding their businesses in banking,  refineries, shipyards, airlines (Stelios-Easy) ech  .Today the Greek owned fleet is the number one in the World with 4545 ships and  even with the current recession there are multibillion orders for new ships in many shipyards in Greece and abroad mainly in China.

Top 10 countries in % of the world fleet
Greece 18,5
Japan 14
Germany 6,9
China 6,8
USA 5,5
Norway 5,2
Hong Kong (China) 4,9
Korea 3,3
United Kingdom 3,1

BOOK YOUR FERRY TICKETS ONLINE

Ferries from Piraeus

During the summer and especially July and August be sure you pre book your tickets go and return if you travel including cabin and car .There are many travel bureaus around the port of Piraeus where you can obtain your tickets. If you intend to book your tickets from abroad check availability and make your travel reservations earlier there are some good websites like http://www.greekislands.gr  and www.ferries.gr where you can book online. Ferries to Crete Dodecanese Samos Chios Mytilene and Cyclades are departing from Piraeus.Ferries to Skiathos Skopelos Alonissos and Skyros from the port of Agios Konstantinos .Ferries to Andros Tinos syros and Mykonos you can get as well from the Port of Rafina.Ferries to the Ionian islands Corfu Kefalonia Paxi Ithaca and to Italy Bari Brindisi Ancona and Venice from the port of Patras .

Piraeus Port information  Map