10 March 2016; Marghera, Italy.

Thus today the migration took place of all the officers and crew who were scattered throughout Mestre (the town next to the shipyard in Marghera) to the ship. We were blessed to today with sunny but chilly weather, in other words a perfect day to move suitcases up and down gangways and stairs. The lifts are working but they are constantly full of all sorts of shipyard people and thus it is much easier to go 4 decks up the stairs. We are all scattered over the ship; some are on A deck and some like me are on deck 4. We have been put everywhere where cabins are already completed and accepted. At least that is the objective as one of the crew came back with the magic words “cabin still under construction”.  But there are plenty of cabins so he got another number and there he went again.  This time the bed had been installed and he was in business.

Crew starts to help out with cleaning up. It releases shipyard people for other areas. This is the Ocean Bar area.

The whole boarding process is organized by the ships officers. We already have the purser in the yard and the crew officer and the GRM, the three most important people to set new boarding crew safely on their way.  The plan is to have between a 100 and 140 crew joining every day and if this works out then we should be up to speed by Sunday. That will then give us about three weeks to get everybody molded into a smooth operating team.  As mentioned before, the most experienced crew is being transferred from the various ships and thus the actual work will just be a matter of finding the right routine. More work will be needed in the safety training of the crew as the Koningsdam has a different mustering system and everybody will have to get used to that.

Vegetable Cold Room. For the time being one corner will suffice for serving the crew.

In the meantime a lot of finishing touches are being made on the lower decks. The cleaning ladies and the painters have moved in and miles and miles of temporary cabling is being removed. With 2500 guests and over a 1000 crew coming storing is in full swing but it will take a while before the store rooms are filled. One 40 foot container full of provisions does not make much of an impression. Some is done by the yard but more and more crew is being assigned to help speed things up. Ever thought about how much time it takes to get over 3000 matrasses on board? They are all the special Sealy matrasses that HAL uses and it takes sometimes more than 2 people to handle one of those things. They sleep heavenly but they are heavy to handle.

Store room Alleyway. It almost looks like a ship already as most shipyard material has been removed.

The ship is running on its own power and light, electricity, hot and cold water as everything is now produced on board.  I have been parked in an outside cabin (with balcony) and everything is working perfectly. Currently they have started with tuning in the televisions and as these are fully interactive they all have to be programmed / software uploaded one by one.  The A/V boys will not be lacking work in the coming days.  A nice touch is that we have usb ports on the sides of the bed so you can charge your cellphone while using it as your alarm clock during the night.  The vanity desk has 5 electric plugs, 2 European, 3 American and another usb port which should be able to take care of all connectivity needs. One task each crewmember has been given is to completely check each cabin and push each button to see if everything work. For this they have a form to be handed in as soon as all checks are complete. Everything in my cabin works; it just needs more dust removal / cleaning. That will be done by our own cabins stewards once they can get at all the cabins.

Painting the piping is always the final touch when work has finished. This area in the Engine Room we call the Pipe Tunnel (for good reason) and connects  the Fwd part of the ER with the Aft part by leading in between the Potable Water Tanks.

What is an annoying part of a new building is the constant alarm testing. Each cabin, each speaker, each smoke detector, etc.etc. has to be tested individually before a certificate of completion can be issued. As a result we are now listening to a constant cycle of 7 short and 1 long beep on the alarm system with in between (coffee and lunch time) Ramazotti (Italian pop singer) and Michael Jackson (who seems to be world famous here in the shipyard as I have not heard anything else in English yet) Luckily the Captain has decreed that by 7 pm. it should stop so people can go to bed on time as the yard is getting back in action every morning around 05.00 hrs.

A constant flow of Matrasses, until over 3000 will have been brought on board.

The weather is supposed to hold over the coming days which will be good for the boarding crew. By the weekend we should be in full swing. More and more crew coming on board, and less and less yard people on board when the various projects are completed one by one.