Spirit of Tasmania

spirit of tasmania is one of australia’s most iconic travel experiences, operating sailings across bass strait between melbourne and devonport on tasmania’s north coast. our history on 1 july 1985, tt-line began operating passenger and vehicle transport across bass strait on the german-built abel tasman. this ship maintained regular and reliable service until 1993, when she was replaced by the much larger “original” spirit of tasmania. in 1997, things kicked up a notch with the introduction of the devil cat, a tasmanian-built catamaran that took just six hours to travel from george town in tasmania’s north to station pier in port melbourne. the vessel operated during the peak season in conjunction with the original spirit of tasmania until 2002. in march 2002, tt-line purchased two vessels from superfast ferries, a greece-based operator servicing the adriatic sea. the ships, built in turku, finland, sailed between italy and greece as superfast iii & iv. in may, they travelled to the ne