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Compañía Naviera
Marasia, S.A.






    The preliminary history started on 1956 when a group of owners, including Sala (Naviera Mallorquina), Ferrer (Naviera Ferrer), Yllera from Santander, Bages from Barcelona and others, established Naviera Euromar which was mainly working with chartered vessels on tramp trade.

    On 1963 Mr. Jaime Yllera and Mr. Eduardo Bages, with some others partners, established Naviera Marasia which priority was the transport of jute to Spain from Bengala Gulf (India and East Pakistan).

Collection A. Mantilla

    The new shipping company started its operations with vessels chartered to Empresa Nacional Elcano; Pedro de Alvarado and Alonso de Ojeda with 7,571 DWT, and La Rioja and La Mancha with 3,809 DWT.

    On 1964 Naviera Marasia bought two ships: La Rioja and Rio Umia, which became its first two owned vessels. These ships were later renamed as Antartico and Indico respectively.

    The third owned vessel was Pedro de Alvarado, bought on 1972 and later renamed Pacífico.

    In addition to these three owned vessels Marasia chartered for six years, later renovated, the vessels Vega and Auriga, with Yugoslav owner and crew.

Collection A. Mantilla

    Marasia had normally many other short time chartered ships, among them some Spanish as Juan Claudio y el Ramiro Perez owned by Naviera Asón, from Santander.

    During those years Marasia expanded its activities opening regular lines between Europa and West Coast South America, West and East Africa, Asia and Australia.

Collection J.J. Alcaraz    Collection J.J. Alcaraz

    On 1975 bought two relatively modern ships, the German Tabora and Luise Bornhoffen renamed as Artico and Atlantico.

    On 1978 y 1979 were built Maresme and Emporda, the only new vessels ordered by the company. These two ships remained in the company till the end of its activities.

Collection A. Mantilla    Collection A. Mantilla

    On the '70s the most of the shares were bought by Banca Catalana. When this bank had financial problems, which lead to the intervention of Banco de España and later to its purchasing by Banco Vizcaya, the Naviera Marasia was taken over by Fondo de Garantía de Depósitos. On the first quarter of 1987 Marasia was sold to Naviera García Miñaur, but after that its life was very short.

    On 1987 summer both ships were seized by the Banco de Crédito Industrial what handed over them to the Sociedad de Gestión de Buques for their management.

    With the Marasia disappearance almost 500 years of Spanish merchant vessels trading regularly to the Pacific Ocean came to an end. Ocean that for two centuries was known as "Spanish Lake" because was surrounded by Spanish territories.
    On 29 September 2013 was the 500 anniversary of its discovery by Vasco Nuñez de Balboa del Pacífico, who named it Mar del Sur (South Sea).
    The first regular line across the Pacific Ocean started as early as 1565, linking Acapulco and Manila, with some intermediate calls. The fleet carrying out the voyages was called the Galeón de Manila or the Galeón de Acapulco, and was trading for 250 years, because the last one sailed on 1815, when Mexico became independent.

Collection A. Mantilla

    From the beginning of 1988 they were sailing under SGB for some months till they were undersold, together with around fifty more, to Lexmar International in one of the monkey bussiness which characterized those years. That time marked the end of Spain as a shipping country and the disappearance of most of the Spanish shipping companies.


BIMCO article
Article about Mr. Eduardo Bages in 2004 BIMCO book

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Maresme-Emporda

Part of the data was got thanks to Mr. Juan Bautista Buades and Mr. Carlos Bayó, respectively Technical Manager and Technical Superintendent of Marasia. Any collaboration, in history or photos, is welcome to be added to this section.
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