Everybody talks about St Thomas but the port that we are calling at is called Charlotte Amalie. A name which is a left over from the days that the Danish owned St Thomas. The place is named after Queen Charlotte Amalie who lived in the 17th century and was the wife of King Christian V of Denmark. Her last name was Hesse-Cassel and that is why the island that separates the port in two halves is called Hessel Island.

The part of the port that most guests are familiar with is Haven sight which has all these streets with the shops in converted and newly built warehouses with the brown doors. The other part is Crown Bay, which used to be a Navy dock until the early 80’s. Everybody called that place Sub Base as US navy submarines used to dock there. When the Navy pulled out, the dock came in use for cruise ships on days when Haven sight could not cope with the volume. Lately the pier has been extended, the depth alongside dredged to allow for deeper drafts and a small shopping mall has been constructed at the entrance to the dock. It is now in regular use.

As there are now two “shopping and docking” areas it is a bit confusing for the guests, not knowing where they will end up when arriving in St Thomas. The docking space at Havensight can take a maximum of three mega liners as the dock is just over 3000 feet long. There are plans for an extension in order to be able to accommodate the Royal Caribbean Genesis Project currently under construction. The policy is to put the ships with the most guests “per inch of dock length” alongside first. Also the ships that call most frequently have preference. If the dock is full, then the inner harbor can take one big cruise ship at anchor, or two small ones. When the inner harbor is full then there is still room for three ships at the outer anchorage. That is the area where the Norway always anchored in the past. From the outer anchorage it is a long tender ride in to the down town sea front, so no captain is very happy with being sent there. Then there are two docks available at Crown Bay. Both sides of the pier can accommodate a 1000 foot ship.

With more and more mega liners coming into service and quite a few of them on a weekly run which includes St Thomas it became more and more problematic for company’s such as Holland America and Princess, who run longer cruises on (slightly) smaller ships to get a decent docking space. On a Saturday, Sunday or Thursday, which are normally the quiet days with no ships in that are on the 7 day run, you could dock at Havensight, on other days you could end up at the outer anchorage. To alleviate that inconsistency, Carnival Corporation signed a contract with Crown Bay developers so that HAL and Princess ships would use Crown Bay provided they would get preference there.

Thus today the Veendam docked at Crown bay, together with the Caribbean Princess. An anomaly, but the result of this contract, occurred today was well, as there were no ships at all at Havensight. A lot of people complain about Crown Bay. The disadvantage is that the shopping mall is not yet completely finished and there are also less shops, yet, than at Havensight. The advantage is that it is a shorter taxi ride to down town. Also if you are at the outer anchorage it is 25 minute tender ride into town, which can be very bumpy on a windy day. So there are pro’s and con’s. For those who just want to cross the street and go boutique hopping, it is less good. For those who want to go to downtown and on tours, it is better as the traffic congestion between Crown Bay and downtown is normally less than from the other side.

We docked at Crown Bay, early in the morning and we had a sunny day, until 30 minutes before departure when we had one downpour, just when the last tour came back. Crown Bay dock is located behind Water Island and ships normally come in via the South West arm, called West Gregorie channel and then depart through the NE arm called East Gregorie channel. So did we and with docking bow out, it was a very speedy departure. Let go all lines, speed up to six knots and 10 minutes later the pilot was off and we were on our way to our next port of call Roseau Dominica.