Cadiz is one of the most important cruise ports for Spain, after Barcelona. It offers sightseeing options to Seville and the surrounding area and also towards its own city centre. Hence that many cruise ships make a call here, some on a regular basis and some such as the Prinsendam during Atlantic crossings and when repositioning from the Baltic to the Med and back. For us it was the last call on the European mainland before we start our Trans Atlantic crossing. The port is located in the shelter of a peninsula which is laid out as a crescent moon with the entrance to the port in its sheltered curve. The only issue with the port is that the bay is very shallow and has a heavy high ocean swell if coming from the South West that tends to build up over the shallows. That can make the approach very rocky to say the least and getting the pilot onboard a real challenge. Nothing of that today though. The North Atlantic weather has been predominantly bad further to the North with the British Isles and the Bay of Biscay taking the brunt of it. That generates North Westerly swell and Cadiz is reasonably protected from that by the coast of Portugal.

We also had the luck that during the night the wind died off to a great degree and the waves were nearly flat when we approached the pilot station. We followed the Vision of the Seas in, which made a half day stop there and were docked by 07.30. Outside it was still dark, as Cadiz should really be on another time zone, but it keeps central European time, so the sun only rose at 08.08 in the morning. Still the sun did rise and stayed in full view all day long, making it a very nice and warm day, especially for the time of the year. As the port is very sheltered, it is an ideal port for boat drills and maintenance on boats and related equipment. So the chief officer had a field day with overhaul work on davits and maintenance work on winches and other vital life saving gear. For this work we have to lower the boats in the water and tie them up somewhere, and Cadiz is ideal for it.

My focus was on the coming crossing of the North Atlantic. Everybody always gets a bit apprehensive when the crossing starts as you never know where the weather systems will go. This crossing has a very good route for remaining in the most favourable weather. We are first sailing further to the South, to Funchal Madeira and are then going across to the Bahamas’. From there we follow North West Providence Channel, going North of Nassau and straight over to Fort Lauderdale. That route takes us far below the normal routes of the bad weather systems. Basically my only concern is if the wave fields created by bad weather systems, either the result of hurricane remnants or new creations near Cape Hatteras, will “ripple” far enough down to bother us.

Nothing I can do about, we HAVE to go that way but I can prepare for it and advise the guests timely. There are several good websites on the internet that give swell predictions and there is one that I use as it gives a simulation of the progress of wave fields over the Atlantic. My experience is that it is quite reliable for the first 36 hours and gives a fair preview for 24 hrs. after that.

We sailed from Cadiz at 20.00 hrs. after the sun had been set for a while. It was now completely wind still and flat calm with the moon and stars in view. A wonderful way to glide out of the harbour. Now the first part of the crossing starts, going down to Funchal, Madeira. The low South Westerly swell is forecast to be no more then 8 feet high; I need to maintain an average speed of 16 knots and going with that speed against the swell, will make the Prinsendam ride the waves very gently. The first part of the crossing should be very pleasant.