Mykonos is one of the major tourist attractions among the Greek islands. The little white village was sought after by celebrities in the mid of the last century and later the regular crowds followed. That meant that more and more restaurants opened and also that the night life started to buzz. Since the 70’s it has been an important day destination for cruise ships as well. Now with the cruise industry booming there is a regular traffic jam of cruise ships, especially on mid week days. Mykonos has 5200 inhabitants and today eight cruise ships (not counting the 30 ferry calls) brought another 10000 guests to the little town. Luckily not all ships came in at the same time. The Veendam was first assigned to the anchorage but was able to shift to the dock after the Emerald Princess (3200 guests who only had a morning stop) pulled out at 14.00 hrs. The Veendam stayed until midnight as the ladies wanted to sample the Mykonos night life.

You might wonder what or who decides where a ship goes. This depends on a number of factors. First of all the cruise company makes a booking, normally two years in advance. The earlier you are, the better chance you have to get in. Then it comes to docking or anchoring (when both options are available) If a ship uses the port as a turn over port (e.g. disembarking and embarking guests) that ship will dock at the passenger terminal. For a normal day call it might be assigned to another dock. If the ship is on a normal day call, then the assigned location depends on the following factors:
1. Length of available dock
2. Number of guests on board
3. Arrival and departure time
4. Frequency of calling. (a 7 day ship takes precedence over a 10 day ship)
5. Draft of the ship and the ships length.
6. Harbor fees (some ports go on tonnage, some on ships length, some on number of guests on board)
7. What does not fit in will have to anchor.

Based on the above criteria the harbor master, especially in a busy port, will decide 24 hours before the arrival where the ship will go. If there is only one cruise ship calling during the day, then it will get the prime spot in the harbor. Take as an example Rhodos. During our last two calls, we were the only ones, so we had the best spot in port. Last call there were 5 early arriving cruise ships who occupied every inch of available dock. One dock was 300 meters and took two smaller ships. One dock was 240 meters and that took the Veendam of 220 meters. One dock was 200 meters and that took the Grand Voyager of 180 meters. Etc. etc.

In a town as Dubrovnik where there is only one dock, the ship with the most guests will dock. For all our calls the Veendam was docking as we were the biggest, except last call when we were bumped by the Carnival Freedom. 3500 guests against the Veendam’s 1000. Not pleasant for us, but it make sense to have only 1000 an guests using tenders instead of 3500.

For Mykonos, it worked as follows. The Emerald Princess, being the biggest ship, got the dock. When it left, the space was given to the Veendam as this was the ship spending the longest time in port. After we had docked, there was a little bit of pier left and thus they had the Perla coming alongside was well, as their gangway fitted just on the pier, while the bow stuck out by 60 meters into open waters. Tomorrow in Piraeus, we will see something similar happening as there are 5 cruise ships expected. One will have the terminal as it is the change over port and the Veendam will get a dock, where it just fits in. The other side of the pasenger terminal will go to a ship with the most guests on board, that still fits alongside. the other (longer ships) will docked further out.