So by 1 am in the morning, I was on the bridge in order to arrive an hour later at 1 am. at the NE Spit Pilot station for the Thames. The 1 and 1 worked out this way as we also had to give a time change of one hour back to get in synch with English time. The nice thing was that it was a beautiful night with nearly wind still weather when we sailed towards the pilot station. That pilot boarding area is located just above Ramsgate (where the pilot base is) and just under the fairway leading up the Thames estuary. While heading that way we listened out on the VHF and enjoyed all the conversations in various languages between the ships in the Dover Strait. There is always somebody who muddles things up for somebody else and it is quite funny to listen to a Russian telling a Greek what he thinks about the others seafaring capabilities. Also Traffic Control has the occasional issues to get a message across of what a certain ship has to do and when. Not always is the result that they want to achieve and quite often the party on the receiving end does something totally un-expected. That is why I never sail through this area with the watertight doors open………you never know what might happen next.
However this time, peace reigned in our part of the Thames estuary and the pilot hopped onboard at the prescribed time. For some reason or the other we seem to get the same pilots every time, which makes life easy. They get used to our way of running things and we know how a certain pilot does his job and that makes it very easy to make the pilot an integrated part of the Bridge team. With the end of the ebb running against us we moved up river, with the plan to be off the Tilbury docks at 04.30, swing off the berth and have the first line ashore by 05.00 and to be all fast at 05.30. It all worked out that way and the gangway was firmly in place so that by 0600, immigration could step onboard to start the clearance procedure.
The only odd thing that we had this time was that it was low water at Tilbury at 04.08 but by 04.30 there was still no flood current to be seen. In contrary, instead of being set up river by the flood, the Prinsendam was gently drifting down river while I was swinging her around. Today for some odd reason the flood was 45 minutes late, or the calculation was 45 minutes off. However as we all know that computers do not make mistakes, it must have been the flood. This call we were going to use the shore gantry gangway for the first time. Last call the car carrier was in the way but this time it would not be a problem. To our utter amazement, what pops up on the schedule, that same car carrier again that kept us away from the gantry gangway last time. In order to be able to use the gantry gangway we have to be in an exact position so that the gantry fits but also all our other doors remains accessible. That is quite a puzzle for the docking master. The solution was to dock in our old spot and wait for the car carrier to sail. Arrival 0600 planned sailing time 1600 hrs. we would then move 75 feet back by 16.15 hrs. Cargo ships seldom stick to their schedules and this time it was not any different. They had Port State Control onboard and were not finished with their inspections by 1600 hrs. so they kept the ship until 1900 hrs. at the dock.
Tilbury last call, when we used our own gangway as well. Not easy when disembarking with luggage in hand. Hence our eargerness to get the shore gangway installed.
Then it left and we started shifting our mooring ropes, each one bollard aft. With that done, I lifted the ship off the dock with the bow and stern thruster and then let the flood current push the ship astern to the new position. Now we were where the ship should have been from the start. The guests and the crew on and of via the gantry gangway and the luggage on and off via deck 4. Last call all traffic had to go via deck 4 which meant the Luggage trolleys alternating with the boarding guests, which is not very satisfactory.
We will be in port for three full days. Today was the full port day for this closing cruise. Tomorrow is change over day and Saturday is the port call day for the commencing cruise. The weather outside looks totally out of synch with the weather forecast, so I am wondering what we will get tomorrow. Rain as predicted or just an overcast day.
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