Dag Has Resigned

There has been considerable speculation about Captain Dag's employment status at Regent. His letter notifying interested parties of his resignation has been posted on the internet. So the period of speculation is over. Pat

and wished fair seas wherever he sails.

Hope he is happy -- wherever he goes next.

Is this letter posted somewhere public, Pat?

(Ah, I found it, never mind.)

Wendy, sent a copy to your private email.

Thanks Wes, in the meantime I found it.

I can't find it, no matter what search criteria I use; what phrase pulls it up?

Sad! Though I know he's not the only good Cap'n, I wonder at his reasons....

I can't find it, no matter what search criteria I use; what phrase pulls it up?

 

Sad! Though I know he's not the only good Cap'n, I wonder at his reasons....

Try: ****************.com. Town Hall Meeting.

It's on the internet, so no state secret here:

Dear Friends,

As we cruise through life we frequently get to crossroads – in nautical terms we call it way points, where we have to decide the proper course to continue.

After 36 years of sailing the seven seas I have reached one of those way points and I have decided to select a different course.

On April 19th, I left Regent Seven Seas Cruises after 18 years with the company.

Reflecting on my life at sea generally, I must say I have had an interesting and diversified time and in spite of some stormy days in between, I have enjoyed almost every minute of it. Since I joined my first freighter M/S Taronga, in Singapore, a warm September day in 1974 I have seen many changes within the shipping industry and I feel fortunate to have been a part of it.

My first experience with the cruise ship industry was launching the Sea Goddess cruise line. After about 3 years with Sea Goddess Cruises, I was approached by another cruise line in the making, Wind Star Sail Cruises. Having the opportunity to be part of the launch of yet another new cruise line was too good to pass up and in April 1987 I sailed out of Le Havre as Captain with The Wind Song bound for Tahiti – a dream come true. After 5 years with this line, I was approached by Seven Seas Cruise Line to take command of the Song of Flower. This was the beginning of today’s Regent Seven Seas! Among many highlights of my time with RSSC, was the building and successful launching of the Seven Seas Voyager.

Now, signing off from RSSC, it is with a wealth of good memories – the thousands of fine people that I have had the pleasure of either sailing with as guests, or working with as part of the crew. The friendships that were established are too many to mention. Let me take this opportunity to thank all the fine people that I have come to know during my time with RSSC. To all the crew I have sailed with, thank you for your support, I am, and always will be, proud to have been part of such a fine group.

To all of my fellow RSSC team members, I thank you for all the memories and great team work over the past 18 years.

Warmest regards,

Captain Dag Dvergastein

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thanks for trying, Ste. Michelle! And thanks for posting, jhp.

Well ... until I read the letter itself, I was able to imagine that the "resignation" was a miscommunication or a hoax. However, that letter was clearly written by Dag himself.

That leaves Bjørn (chief engineer) the only Norwegian crewman now....

There has been considerable speculation about Captain Dag's employment status at Regent. His letter notifying interested parties of his resignation has been posted on the internet. So the period of speculation is over. Pat

At last the long time speculation appears to be over.

Some of us do hope that he will be joining Seabourn, our favourite line, as he would fit in excellently with the other Captains (some Norwegians) and the Seabourn ambience.

We await further news with bated breath!!

The photo that Larry posted on the other board made me cry...that must have been so difficult for Capt. Dag standing on the Voyager bridge for the last time. I too hope our paths will cross again....he will be sorely missed. Wishing him all the very best.

I never had the pleasure of sailing with Captain Dag - and I always hoped I would!

I wish him well in whatever endeauvour he undertakes. Life changes, so do people... he takes with him the warmest memories of all those who did have the luck to sail with him!!

He sounds fabulous and looks divine.

I have been reading Larry's and others very informative posts,

Why would Regent get rid of such a positive and seems almost perfect person?

I want to join his water polo team on his next voyage.

Why would you assume he's been fired by Regent?

go with the cruise line that offers him the best deal. He is one hell of a good Captain. I hope he got a wonderful assignment. Go Dag!

I assumed he had be fired after reading the many posts on the many blogs of cruisers on the world cruise.

It appeared that passengers, crew, and maybe even Dag himself did not know of the 3 month contract that he was on when the cruise first began.

Surely the ships captain and his senior staff would be aware that he was only on the ship till South Africa and not be such a huge surprise when it was announced that he would soon be leaving the ship

Apparently Mark Conroy made a special visit to the ship around this time, to probably help smooth things over as he knew there would be a huge backlash

Just my opinion, which is usually wrong anyway

Grapejuice, I do think you're mistaken here. As a past world cruiser (though not this year) Mark Conroy, makes several visits during the WC. I think the timing of this particular visit and subsequent Town Hall Meeting was partly to answer questions about Dag's departure in Cape Town and I understand he was drilled extensively. Dag has been the captain on every WC since Radisson/Regent began them. I know the passengers were surprised that the WC would see the changing of Captains based on previous WC's. Whether Capt. Dag was surprised, we can only speculate. I understand this is a 3 month on/3 month off policy that FDR explained and yes, to everyone's surprise, it even applies to the WC.

I think Capt. Dag thought long and hard before making his decision and most likely reached this decision before his departure in Cape Town.

I doubt he was fired. I was at the Conroy Meeting watching all the body language. Not to mean to ad to rumor mill but he didn't like to be ordered around by the new company. It wasn't his ship like it was when the previous company owned the line. He couldn't go off and do his special tours that he was noted for. Instructions always came from the owners. With this new company it's obvious that the profit margin is number 1. It's also been a big rumor that they will flip it when they have made their money. The rumor was that had happened a few weeks ago when Jamie announce the line had been sold to the Koreans. Which was a pretty good joke

He certainly had charisma and charm like no other Captain I had sailed with. My guess is that he is headed to one of the other big luxury lines. But who knows?

WC11, I think you have nailed the issue. There are six Regent captains at any given time. If one has "special" status how do you think that plays with the others? If one can set his own schedule and the others must conform to same, how do you think that plays? There has been tension over this issue and others since before the Apollo purchase. It doesn't surprise me at all that new management wants to call the shots. I'm sailing at this moment with a spectacular captain (McNeill). I've never sailed with a better one. He isn't second fiddle to anyone and shouldn't be viewed that way by headquarters or any of the other five Regent captains. Your post says it all, WC11. Pat

I disagree that Dag thought he was special. Although he did have seniority. many of the long time WC'ers remembered that things that Dag used to do. The special trips to special places, without phoning home for permission. I don't know the man or his history first hand, I am reporting what other's have said that have done multiple WC's . Most are unhappy with the new company because of cutbacks and policy changes by Apollo.

Convoy is on the Voyager now. His remarks at more Town Hall Meetings will be interesting. He will hold the new company line spinning all the improvements that Apollo is making too Regent management. It's going to be interesting what the future holds.

It wasn't so much that Capt. Dag thought he was "special", however, I heard quite a bit about his obvious favoritism to some passengers which was a bit offputting to other passengers. While I do not know him personally, I enjoyed being on cruises when he was "steering the ship".

I wonder who it is that is unhappy with perceived cutbacks on Regent as there apparently has not been any (with the exception of Gentlemen Hosts) since Apollo purchased Regent. It does seem that some long time Regent customers do feel that things have changed. No one can really argue that, but, the changes are not necessarily bad.

When Apollo purchased Regent, there was no question that there would be changes. The ships were deteriorating -- the past owners were not going to put any more money into the ships. Service and morale had slipped (as evidenced by posts on CruiseCritic prior to the sale of Regent) and, most importantly, Regent was not profitable.

Whenever a company is purchased, the people/employees who have been with the "old" company the longest are the most affected. Many lose their job or quit because they do not like how the "new" company is being managed and they are not willing to change. (Note: I do know this from experience from company buy-outs). Regent definitely lost and will continue to lose a few customers. More importantly, they have made many, many new customers who are looking at "what is" rather than "what was".

With the exception of "new ships", Regent's ships are in better condition than any of their competition. Most importantly, Regent is profitable so more money can be infused into the ships (perhaps a new one?)

As I mentioned before, I wish Dag well. From what I've seen, he is a lovely man and deserves to be with a cruiseline that will make him happy. For whatever reasons, Regent was no longer able to do that.

Favoritism? That's the first I've heard of it! I'm not disagreeing with you; perhaps I was lucky, or travelled with the right people, but in my experience Dag made _you_ feel special, and I don't know anybody for whom that isn't true. Of course, I've only been on two WC segments (as IST->FLL was cancelled!) but I had dinner with Dag twice, and many other encounters, and was made to feel very welcome.

Surely there are other excellent captains in Regent's employ, but I don't think the World Cruise will be quite the same without him, and his "word for the day" at 9 every morning.

I do love Regent, but I think there will be a good number of regular World Cruisers who will yield to the temptation to visit Dag if, for example, he should turn up captaining one of Seabourn's new ships....

I'll step forward as one of those people who found Captain Dag's "favouritism" on a segment of last year's WC somewhat irritating. Seeing the Captain socialising on deck with the same bunch of folks day after day wasn't really what we expected. For sure, he seemed a perfectly good Captain and as far as we can say, he did a great job steering the ship through tricky waters (pirates?) However, our more recent experience on Mariner with quietly efficient, though perfectly friendly, Captain Stan was more our style.