What was the country of registry for MS Mega Smeralda in early 2010s?
MS Mega Smeralda MS Mega Smeralda is a cruiseferry owned by Medinvest and operated by Corsica Ferries - Sardinia Ferries . She was built in 1985 by Wärtsilä at the Helsinki New Shipyard in Helsinki , Finland for Johnson Line as MS Svea for use in Silja Line traffic . Between 1992 and 1994 she sailed for Silja Line as MS Silja Karneval , and between 1994 and 2008 for Color Line as MS Color Festival . History . Silja Line service . MS Svea and her sister MS Wellamo were modeled after Silja Lines highly successful Helsinki–Stockholm service ferries MS Finlandia and MS Silvia Regina . The main difference to the older pair of ships was outer appearance of the new sisters : where Finlandia and her sister had had a very box-like exterior , the new sisters for the Turku–Stockholm route had more attractive rounded looks . In 1989 there were plans to rebuild Svea with rails on the cardeck so that she could also carry railroad carriages on board , but these were shelved . Until 1990 her funnel displayed the colours of Johnson Line , but at that time Silja Lines owners Johnson Line and Effoa merged into one company , EffJohn , and Silja Lines seal logo was moved from the ships hulls into their funnels . In 1992 Svea and her sister underwent a large-scale reconstruction at Lloyd Werft in Bremerhaven , Germany where most of the ships interiors were rebuilt , a new skybar added on deck 9 , a new more blue-dominated colour scheme replaced the traditional Silja stripes and the ship was renamed Silja Karneval in accordance with Siljas new name policy . In fact the funds used to rebuild Svea and Wellamo were originally meant for rebuilding of the GTS Finnjet , but her planned rebuilding would have been too expensive and EffJohn opted to spend what money they had on Svea and Wellamo instead . Color Line service . Silja Karnevals service on Silja proved to be short . In early 1994 EffJohn decided to sell her sister Silja Festival to Norway-based Color Line . However , when time came to deliver the ship to Color Line , EffJohn for some reason decided to sell them Silja Karneval instead ( the two ships being structurally identical ) . Problematically for Color Line , they had already printed material advertising their new ship as the Color Festival . As result Silja Karneval became M/S Color Festival , not Color Karneval as would have been logical . After reconstruction at Cityvarvet , Gothenburg , Color Festival was initially placed on the Oslo–Hirtshals route . In 2002 she damaged one of her rudders in Hirsthals and had to be docked in Hamburg because of it . In April 2006 she started operating on the Oslo–Fredrikshavn route in direct competition with her old Silja Line fleetmate MS Stena Saga . On 21 November 2007 Color Line sold Color Festival to Corsica Ferries for €49 million ( 400 million Norwegian krone ) , in preparation for the delivery of the new Color Superspeed vessels in mid-2008 . Corsica Sardinia Ferries service . The Color Festival was delivered to Corsica Sardinia Ferries in early January 2008 , subsequently renamed Mega Smeralda and re-flagged in Italy with Genoa as her homeport . Reportedly she will be placed on Civitavecchia – Golfo Aranci or Livorno – Golfo Aranci service . In 2011 , the ferry operates between Tolone , Ajaccio , Bastia , Nice , etc.. . 2013 Tour de France . In June 2013 , the Tour de France visited Corsica for the first time . To accommodate the Tour entourage , the organisers chartered the Mega Smeralda to house members of the organisation , media and others who worked on the Tour and to host press conferences , although the riders stayed in hotels in Porto-Vecchio . External links . - Corsica Ferries ( Company website ) - M/S Svea ( 1985 ) at Fakta om Fartyg