OLYMPIC CHAMPION (ΟΛΥΜΠΙΚ ΤΣΑΜΠΙΟΝ)

-ANEK Lines

Built in 2000 (age 24). Registered in Chania. Current line: None (under refit in Perama)

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The cruiseferry OLYMPIC CHAMPION was ordered by ANEK Lines in 1998, alongside another sister ship. They were originally named KRITI III and KRITI IV respectively, but their names were changed to OLYMPIC CHAMPION and OLYMPIC SPIRIT respectively prior to their launching. She was completed in 2000 in Norway, and became the new flagship of ANEK Lines, maintaining that role until the arrival of the ELYROS in 2008. She was deployed on the Piraeus-Chania line before transferring to the Adriatic Sea in 2001. She was deployed on the Patras-Igoumenitsa-Corfu-Ancona line, joining her sister ship, which by that time had been renamed HELLENIC SPIRIT. She spent the next 6 years there, before being sent back to the Piraeus-Chania line to compete with the ARIADNE of Hellenic Seaways following the 2007 summer season. She returned to the Patras-Igoumenitsa-Corfu-Ancona line from 2008 to 2011, and she was then deployed on the Piraeus-Heraklion line, under the newly-established ANEK-Attica Group joint venture. She operated on the Piraeus-Chania line in 2014, and returned to the Adriatic Sea in 2015, again on the Patras-Igoumenitsa-Corfu-Ancona line, where she remains today. In 2019, while departing Igoumenitsa, a fire that began from a lorry that was inside the garage started spreading over the ship, but it was safely extinguished by the crew and she was immediately repaired in Perama. Along with her sister ship, the HELLENIC SPIRIT, she is among the most modern and most reliable cruiseferries in Greece.

PHOTOS (2012, 2018, 2021):